Designing for the Mobile Web

Designing for the Mobile Web is a good thing to be able to do because of the increasing number of people using the service. Steve Jobs even said there will soon be ads and interactive ads for iPod Touch and iPhone. He said you will be able to fully interact with the ads on top of any other open application(s) you may have and then easily return to doing what you were after you're done with the ad. I think this brings a whole new world to users as well as designers and programmers. That many more people will be seeing business ads too, which will help the companies who embrace this newest feature. Of the people who have smart phones, who doesn't use apps? I'm betting no one, because they are so addictive! There are seemingly apps for everything and yet more apps are being created every day. If you can make an app and get it out there either as freeware or as an application for sale in the Apple Store, you will be rewarded with exposure and possibly even money. Limitations of designing for the Mobile Web would be things like size of the page, readability, usability and different programming. I would think it would be very advantageous to be able to design for the web because the pros far outweigh the cons. Over the few years smart phones have been out, they've drastically become bigger and better and I think they're an important technology to understand because one day, people might only use smart phones. Because it's a constantly growing technology and it's always good to keep up with / be ahead of the curve, starting to learn about designing for the Mobile Web now is a great idea!


Here are some good links to get you started:
http://www.cameronmoll.com/archives/000398.html
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/01/13/mobile-web-design-trends-2009
http://articles.sitepoint.com/article/designing-for-mobile-web


Some good templates for iPhone design:
http://pineappleiphone.com/themes/free-iphone-templates
http://developer.apple.com/programs/iphone
http://www.teehanlax.com/blog/2010/06/14/iphone-gui-psd-v4
http://plugins.movabletype.org/iphone-template-set


Don't forget to visit the iTunes app store for inspiration as well!