That Mobile Version
That mobile version we talked about a few weeks ago—it’s live.
We originally released it as a beta feature because we wanted to get some feedback on how people used it at the conference. People mostly used it as expected, to get quick information about the conference schedule or people they were trying to meet.
Because the calendar was such an integral part of the mobile experience we’re only releasing the mobile version for people with that feature (the conference plus, premium, and max packages).
The biggest change we made after getting feedback was to add an option to switch back to our normal web version. When reception or wifi is strong, there’s a group of users with great mobile phones (like the iphone) who would prefer the normal web experience. However, when reception goes south or when an attendee has an older mobile phone, the new mobile version is a life saver.
You don’t have to do anything special to access the mobile version. Just go to your regular CrowdVine URL and we’ll recognize whether you’re coming from a mobile device or not.
October 14th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
There’s a design decision that Tony and I made here with regards to automatically detecting mobile browsers.
A lot of sites prefer to put their mobile version at a different URL than the regular site. Some people like this. Me, I can never remember if the mobile version is at m.whatever.com, mobile.whatever.com, or mob.whatever.com.
So we’re hoping the links at the bottom of each version to toggle the mobile view on and off (which you only see from a phone, by the way) are a workable substitute. If you disagree, I’d really like to hear why.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:52 pm
Have you seen any Android visits yet? How have you prepared for that?
October 14th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
Allan, Android visits are right above visits from the Playstation Portable and just below visits from the Playstation 3. That is to say, not very high.
We haven’t had a chance to test with an actual Android device yet, but my expectation is that it will work just fine. Our design goal was to create the simplest possible site for both cross-device compatibility and high performance in low bandwidth/reception situations.