Peter Merholz of Adaptive Path does a great job distilling all the talk around mobile design down to one concept that, despite its simplicity, often gets overlooked (and overcomplicated).
People’s inclination is almost always to try and do too much with a mobile experience than their users will ultimately be willing to learn and endure for the long haul. This is because people are coming at the problem from a very web-centric point of view and overlooking that the context of use and experience is not a difference of degree but a difference in kind .
So next time you’re thinking about your own mobile application or building one for a client, always keep this in the back of your mind when you’re thinking about what to build (bold added by me for emphasis):
What we’re realizing is that the key item of concern when designing for mobile is the context in which the device is used. What this means is that discussions of “PC” versus “mobile” are misguided, because we shouldn’t be focusing on the device. We are not designing for mobile — we’re designing for mobility.
It’s helpful to contrast designing for mobility with designing for sedentariness. What we hadn’t realized until we were designing explicitly for mobility is that, in the past, we had been designing not just for the “PC,” but for a sedentary experience. We shared unstated assumptions that people would remain in one place for long periods of time, with little change in their environment. We could take advantage of this with software experiences that rewarded deeper engagement, encouraged exploration and play, allowed for more complicated interactions to achieve a goal.
A key characteristic of mobility is that the environment around the user is dynamic — they’re walking, driving, on transit, in restaurants, theaters, offices, moving from place to place, context to context. Things around them are constantly changing.
Read more: adaptive path » blog » Peter Merholz » Don’t design for “mobile” - design for mobility
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