I read Ander's viewpoint in response to an article on Yahoo! titled Media: Making money on wireless will take years, where it talks about media and mobile being far from becoming mainstream, as far as 10 years.

Then I read Mike's post Open Ecosystem for Service Providers piece in response to a write-up by Paddy.

All three pieces bring up a set of emotions about what we all wish and know needs to happen to truly realize the mobile vision, and then there is reality.

And reality is that we are still far from reaching the sweet spot in mobile/wireless in general… and while the article says 10 years (for media/mobility), I'm optimistic it will be around 5 years from now, which will put us around 10+ years since mobile data got its start. Around 5 years ago I made a bet that 2005 was going to be the year where mobility would be making a (re)splash and that was accurate to some extend, yet we are not “there” yet.

And these delays have to do with the state of the carrier-controlled ecosystem and how challenging is to brink to market a mobile solution and sound business model, with the right distribution channels and thus user-reach… While a lot of cool stuff and Mashups can be created right now, very few have a sound business model and visibility.

And while Mike R and Paddy, and many others, including myself, evangelize open services and networks and ecosystem, the reality is that to be successful today, to come to market and maximize reach sooner rather than later, we have to deal with the current state of affairs, and with the network carrier.

It is what it is – the carrier owns the network, and owns the decisions of what handsets run on their network, and owns what's in the handset (by default).

And if done right, this love/hate relationship can actually be productive for both sides, with the carrier helping you push your product through their channels. And while this is not an easy endeavor at all, the secret to this is to include the carrier into your overall business model; but not all areas and business models are appealing to the carriers.

Maybe some day, network carriers will separate their pipe business from their services business, and provide flat-rates, and bring down the walls… Competing with carriers vs. using their pipe is two different things, and should be independent for the sake of fairness of innovation and user-reach.

But today, it is a carrier-controlled environment, and it will for a very long time, and while we need to continue evangelizing the mobile vision, at the end of the day business is business, and it is important to be open-minded, accept this fact, adapt, and move forward.

ceo

[Image source: The ECOSYSTEM]