iMode sites

iMode sites are basically HTML cHTML (compact HTML – a subset of HTML) websites designed specifically for cellphone web browsers – I didn’t realise how widespread they were, but is dominant in Japan because it is used by NTT Docomo.

In fact on closer inspection it seems to have been started by DoCoMo as a service, which goes way beyond just cHTML to incorporate Java and Flash based multimedia.

The first one I found was this one Googe Imode. Very useful, I was chuffed to find that it works (very slowly and expensively) on mobile internet explorer on my ancient sony cellphone.

The UK and US mobile internet market seems to be fairly oblivious to the potential of this, probably because of the WAP overhype, whereas Mobile internet use is more common than desktop internet access in Japan. Hmm deja vu

Update: mobile internet more popular than ever in UK

Also on this subject I was reading over at the register, about a move to Macromedia from Microsoft by Juha Christensen making flash lite an even more serious contender as a software product for mobile phones (has already been adopted by Docomo)