Big numbers and small screens: Challenges and opportunities of the mobile web for national statistical offices

The telecommunications industry has been hyping the arrival of 3rd Generation (3G) data services for many years and more recently the imminent arrival of the “mobile internet”, which promises always-on, anywhere, anytime high speed access to a smorgasbord of websites. As anyone who has used a mobile phone to browse the internet will attest, the reality is usually a far cry from this promise. Even though there have been significant improvements in recent years, browsing the internet via a mobile phone has been generally a slow, cumbersome and frustrating process for the user who must put up with unreliable networks, browser software limited in its functionality (e.g. no JavaScript support), high costs, and websites that were never designed nor intended to work with mobile phones. There are, however signs that mobile carriers are finally positioning themselves to deliver on this promise. For example, in April 2008, an interesting milestone was reached in Australia – there were more mobile phones in service (21.26 m) than there were people (21.21 m). According to the Australian Media and Communications Authority [1], this milestone was reached mainly due to significant increases in subscribers to 3G mobile services in the preceding year, which were not surprisingly accompanied by an equally significant increase in 3G network coverage. Recent statistics published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) [2] also confirmed that there was a significant increase in the number of mobile wireless access connections in 2008 (up by 20%) and industry research such as a recent global study by m.Net [3] supports the claim that there is strong growth in many other markets, particularly the United States. This growth is being repeated around the world, albeit for different reasons. In economies with well established telecommunications infrastructure, mobile carriers are rushing to upgrade their networks to high speed wireless technologies (e.g. 3G, 3.5G, HSDPA, WIFI), as their traditional voice services have been commoditized and data services represent the new frontier both in terms of differentiating their services and maintaining their profit margins. In emerging economies the latest generation of wireless technologies represent a significant opportunity for countries to adopt a “leapfrog strategy” and bypass the need to rollout expensive copper and optic fibre networks, particularly in rural and remote communities that have little or no telecommunications infrastructure. Together with significant improvements in the capacity of mobile handsets and changes in consumer behaviour, the net effect of these changes is that the majority of people in countries that have the required infrastructure should now have (in theory) access to a high speed mobile network designed to accommodate data services, including access to the Internet. It would seem therefore, that the conditions for the mobile internet to deliver on its promise are not that far away, a conclusion that seems to be gathering momentum amongst mobile and IT industry commentators.