Wall Street Journal tech columnist, Walt Mossberg, believes that the iPhone, Google G1 and the Blackberry Storm are currently the only mobile Internet devices around.
In a question and answer session here at the Dow Jones Technology Showcase, Wall Street Journal gadget guru, Walt Mossberg, shared his thoughts on Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs), Netbooks, E-book readers/Amazon Kindle and Net neutrality.
Here are a summary of Mossberg comments on these various topics.
The iPhone, Google G1 and Blackberry Storms are the real Mobile Internet Device
Mobile Internet Device (MID) is a made up term that Intel made up to support the sale of some of its chipsets. The only one that matters are these things [Mossberg holds the iPhone and RIM's Blackberry Storm] which I just call handheld computers or super smartphones. These are mobile Internet devices. The people that are buying these devices are not spending most of their time making voice phone call. If they were they’ll buy something smaller and cheaper. They are mostly doing Internet things.
But if you’re referring to something with a different form factor than this, that’s a little bigger like the Nokia 810 kind of small tablet device, I don’t think they have emerged. I think they are a few of them that have shipped and that didn’t sold very well. And the one that I reviewed haven’t been very good.
Netbooks is a serious category
There are some netbooks which of course are clamshell devices. The original idea of a netbook was to connect to the Internet. It didn’t have very much performance or storage in it. And that’s been a better more serious category
The Ebook readers category is a home run since the Amazon Kindle
The perspective for the Ebook category is definitely brighter since the Kindle shipped. I don’t think the Kindle is yet a true mass market product… It’s my impression that they will not be like iPods, iPhones or RAZRs or some huge millions and millions. But compare to before the Kindle, one every single one of the Ebook readers have failed miserably and have lot of trouble allowing you to download books and the catalogs were tiny… It’s a home run compare to those.
Supports Net neutrality, like the upcoming Obama administration
I think the Obama administration has screwed it up miserably. Look at their record, it’s horrible [audience laughs]. I favour Federal rules and regulations that will ensure Net neutrality. This is my personal position. I haven’t checked but I suspect this is not the position of the editorial writers of the Wall Street Journal but we have a separation between News and Editorial.
I would observe however for someone that lived in Washington for decades that when new Presidents come in, even if they believe in all their promises… They have to prioritise the list of things to do. And in this particular case, the guy is inheriting a colossal mess in the economy. And I don’t think Net neutrality will be in the top 5 things he has to worry about.
Carriers stifle competition, entrepreneurship… but that’s starting to break down
The carriers, both here and overseas, have too much power in the whole value chain when it comes to wireless computing and wireless devices.
I’m 100% capitalist, that’s why I won’t have a bailout booth out there! And I believe that if you invest and build a network, wether it’s wireless or wired, you have an absolute right to get a return on your investment, etc..
But I don’t think that because you own the pipe you should have anything to do with how the network computer work, you should not have control over that. So I think it’s a big mistake in the U.S. that we developed a system where carriers say what hardware or phone or handset you can use, what device you can use on their networks. And what software those devices can run and what services can be run. I think that’s a problem. It stifles entrepreneurship and I think it hurts consumers.
The good news is I think it’s beginning to break down.
All the cool phones are in Europe or Asia? Not true anymore. North America is back!
As for the premise which I think would have been true 4 or 5 years ago that all better devices are in Europe or Asia, is just not true anymore. The best handheld computer, the most influential in the world is probably the iPhone. And if you don’t like the iPhone, the other good ones that I mentioned are the Storm and the G1; all are designed in North America.
