The Mobile Internet and Mix Tapes
by Rachel Hinman
I have been thinking a lot recently about the first point of the MEX Manifesto, “Content itself will be the interface of the future” as it relates to Internet content on mobile devices. The point reminded me of a portion of Edward Tufte’s video review of the iPhone interface where he describes the experience of accessing the New York Times on the (then new) device:
“Here, visiting the New York Times on the Internet, notice how the URL and the title bar go away as the user moves into the newspaper. The idea is that the content is the interface, the information is the interface – not computer administrative debris.”
Tufte’s statement fuels my continued amazement at the degree to which our expectations around the Internet have been shaped by the PC legacy. Certainly the iPhone has greatly improved the mobile Internet experience, but it nearly mirrors the interactions and metaphors from the PC. Despite being able to touch links with one’s finger, content is not the interface – browsers, web sites, web pages, URLs and links are.
When I think about how we might start creating experiences where the content is truly the interface, two things come to mind: Information Architecture and mix tapes.
The blue print of the Internet we experience today has been created and shaped strongly by the discipline of information architecture. Don’t get me wrong – I love me my information architects – but I do believe the legacy of that discipline is part of what makes it difficult to deliver Internet content on mobile devices.
Information architecture is a discipline born out of information and library science. In light of this history, it’s not surprising that much of how we interact with content on the web today is based on a search and retrieve interaction model. Like the pages of library books, Internet content is trapped in the organizing principle of the web page.
Who can forget the angst and labor of creating mix tapes. They’re a brilliant, Rube Goldberg-style example of a workaround for an organizing principle. The music industry used the concept of albums as the organizing principle for music – but the model began to break down as new technologies were introduced and the the ways that people wanted to use music changed. We wanted to do more than buy and consume music. We wanted to create our own soundtracks so we cobbled the technology together to create our own albums. Most importantly, we broke the organizing principle from album to song. While the legacy of the album organizing principle still exists, I suspect digital music will make it obsolete within the next ten years.
Similarly, I think that delivering great Internet experiences on mobile devices will be less about “mobilizing” web sites and web pages and more about dismantling the page-based organizing principle into a more flexible one. It will be about breaking apart boulder-like web-pages into pebbles of content that can be configured and combined in ways that make sense in mobile contexts. It will be about privileging XML over HTML and focusing on lightweight applications and presentation layers like widgets. Most importantly, it will have to be based on a deep understanding of how people want to use Internet content in mobile contexts.
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on Thursday, June 5th, 2008 at 1:25 pm and is filed under Content Strategy, Experience Design, Information Architecture, Interaction Design, Interface Design, Mobile, Search.
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June 5th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Hi, Rachel. I agree completely with you. Most likely the internet on mobile devices will be more about tasks than about navigation. Yesterday i wrote (in spanish) an article talking about this topic inspired by this post on small surfaces(http://www.smallsurfaces.com/2008/06/browsing-is-not-for-mobile/)
I think we are in the right direction. Ah, i know my english is poor, sorry…
June 5th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
[...] Adaptive Path placed an interesting blog post on The Mobile Internet and Mix TapesHere’s a brief overviewCertainly the iPhone has greatly improved the mobile Internet experience, but it nearly mirrors the interactions and metaphors from the PC….The point reminded me of a portion of Edward Tufte’s video review of the iPhone interface where he describes the experience of accessing the New York Times o… [...]
June 6th, 2008 at 8:32 am
Hi Rachel,
How I miss my mix tapes!!!!
Your post caused a major word rumble in my head, which I believe might be somehow related to this landmark change you foresee: 37signals & harvester iphone apps, yahoo mobile 3.0, mashups.
I wonder how many companies are approaching the mobile internet arena with a blank mind…and how much many others do such with a web one
I’ve participated in some projects in the mobile internet arena (from SMS messaging up to Mobile apps) and in most of them we had the same problem: product owners and stock holders find it too difficult to think outside the web model, and when pushed to do such they counter attack with the mythological “but why change it if it is an already proved way?”.
June 6th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
Give me exactly what I need now so I can make the right decision at that moment with no more and no less - thats a useful mobile experience.
June 6th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
[...] I read a post by Rachel Hinman at Adaptive Path, about “The Mobile Internet and Mix Tapes”, where she compared the emerging trends in mobile information architecture to the days when we [...]
June 6th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
[...] The Mobile Internet and Mix Tapes [...]
June 6th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
[...] adaptive path blog : The Mobile Internet and Mix Tapes - “delivering great Internet experiences on mobile devices will be less about âmobilizingâ web sites and web pages and more about dismantling the page-based organizing principle into a more flexible one.” [...]
June 7th, 2008 at 11:18 pm
Thanks for your thoughtful post on a very timely topic.
The organizing principles you describe also affect the way we consume content. We still tend to think in terms of albums, we also tend to think in terms of web sites. Despite having used my iPhone’s Maps application almost daily, I still find myself going to the browser to search Safari because it’s ingrained in me.
To use your metaphor, contrast that boulder example with the kind of pebble-like interaction that’s emerging with Twitter, where users are actually having 2 way, public conversations with Comcast tech support (follow comcastcares) all by interacting with a mobile UI that has zero navigation: SMS.
June 20th, 2008 at 11:46 am
This is great… wish I’d read it a couple of weeks ago, but I’m so behind on my blog-reading! I agree about the “IA Legacy” — it’s a problem. It’s something I tried addressing with my Summit talk in April (http://www.inkblurt.com/2008/04/15/linkosophy/) In a nutshell, I think IA is about structuring context & connection, and creating structures that allow others to influence/shape the same. When the Web was manageable and static, that meant arranging the stuff on the shelves, as it were. But technology and scale have changed — and the structures we need to focus on now are those that allow users to do that work themselves. As for the music thing: there’s an awesome description of this shift in Spook Country, about a third of the way into the book. I don’t have it on me, but here’s a blog where I found someone quoting it: http://virtualeconomics.typepad.com/virtualeconomics/2008/05/comprising-it.html This idea that “mass media” doesn’t exist “within” the world now, but rather it “comprises” it … delicious way of putting it, methinks.
June 21st, 2008 at 8:56 am
[...] the web : Small Surface (définitivement une ressource de grande qualité) cite un article d’Adaptive Path (définitivement un cabinet de design où on se pose des questions). Je me contente de citer la [...]
July 14th, 2008 at 10:50 am
I agree with you; the paradigm for mobile user interaction is one that is going to drastically in order for it to work.
I can imagine a “streaming” metaphor instead of “browsing”. You have “channels” instead of applications on the phone, where each channel is a two-way communication pipe for concepts/objects/people that you publish/subscribe to. Upload a photo to flickr and receive updates from friends. Each contact could also be an aggregated channel where all SMS, emails and IM conversations, photos, lifestream activities can be uploaded and downloaded. Of course, that’s just from my very limited imagination.