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christopher walsh
10,763 PointsChina only uses the web on their phones, is that the future?
I read this fascinating article yesterday about the internet in China! they mostly use their phones, and instead of full on web pages, they use expiring links to reshare ads, single page overly simple web sites and bite sized apps.
I feel that with their high population and their internet on the cusp of one day becoming less regulated (apple made 17 billion dollars because a recent deregulation by the chines government allowed more carriers in China to have the iPhone), we should be watching China for the future of where things are going.
so even though Im still just beginning and learning, I thought all last night about web designs that are only mobile based. And how it would work to make websites that can still appear on desktop sized screens but really embrace the mobile phone experiance. and how to keep that separate from apps.
I feel I got inspired, heres a link
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2015/02/13/china-web-design-trends-2015/
what do you think?
1 Answer
huckleberry
14,636 PointsWell, the obvious future is in more mobile interactivity and design but it's never going to be "only mobile". There's just too much work that gets done and needs to get done on desktop devices and wide displays.
No one is ever going to build an app or design and build a site or code software or do their clients books or design an album cover or record an album or edit a movie or design an engine/airplane/car/bridge/building/home/etc..etc..etc.. or trade the markets or manage their portfolio or manage their customer or employee base or do payroll or edit and compile photo albums or research their thesis, or do their homework, or manage and restock their inventory or ship client orders or any number of a myriad of things strictly from their phone or an ipad.
It's just not feasible for things other than the non-essential. Most of it is fluff. Time-passing browsing, sharing photos and links, quickly looking things up that you forgot because we've become an idiot google-based humanity and can't actually retain anything other than bullet point factoids, staying connected, making yourself feel important by BEING connected and broadcasting your life to an incalculable amount of people that don't actually care but feign interest in hopes that the socially contracted karma will result in their own incredibly banal day to day musings and hum-drum updates that they also share will be fawned over by people they haven't actually interacted with in years and possibly ever.
Basically, useless crap of the 'unwarranted self-importance' variety. That's a huge market, but nevertheless, non-essential.
For everything else, there's mast... I mean desktop.
christopher walsh
10,763 Pointschristopher walsh
10,763 Pointsthe things you listed can be done on different programs on a tablet/ipad!
I see your point but Im gonna keep my eye on China!
technology is always changing. if people can't use tablets for heavy professional work, that seems to be a UX problem to overcome. I wouldn't be surprised if the keyboard gets dated and every screen is a touch screen on our laps or table.
huckleberry
14,636 Pointshuckleberry
14,636 PointsTo an extent, yeah, but it's simply not as efficient.
They also lock up political dissidents and journalists as well as censor their internet with an iron firewall. That doesn't mean I'm gonna be watching them to pave the way for internet freedom :p.
Just because there are a lot of them and they do something a certain way doesn't mean it's the wisest or will be 'the future'.
I'll be watching technology in general no matter where it comes from but I just don't think it's gonna wind up that 'mobile centric' way for much more than fluff and things of convenience.
Which, you know, still a big deal, but not a desktop killer.
This is where we diverge hugely.
If you're talking about actual detailed work then I'm gonna have to disagree and say that tablets and especially phones, are the inefficient ones. Touchscreens are just horrible for typing in general and for a lot of the things I mentioned you need an easier more detail oriented approach as well as clearer vision. I don't care how good you get the design, you cannot redesign the human eye nor the human hand and at a certain point there's a bottleneck in terms of what we can deal with in both speed and clarity in regard to typing and vision.
As an example of what I mean, the mouse was a 'genius invention' that was the new wave that was here to replace the 'clunky and inferior' keyboard but there's not a person worth their weight in salt that works on a computer that can't do things ridiculously faster with a keyboard.
There's a reason it's an enduring classic lol.
Until I see those sci-fi type holographicalUI's that shoot out of your phone and create a 30" display right in the middle of the air at eye level that you can zip around and poke and drag and type just by waving your fingers in the midst of the projection, then I'm sticking with my current position on all this lol.