WAP disappoints users – but does it target the right market?

Users generally indicated a wholly unsatisfactory experience with WAP, finding that the effort required to obtain information exceeded its value. META found that WAP services such as financial transactions and travel services are difficult to access and not always reliable, leading to a high rate of abandonment.

According to META, limited content, slow networks, high latency times, and generally poor user ergonomics have not met the high user expectations and hype that accompanied WAP-enabled devices when they were first introduced. META does not expect a significant uptake in web-connected smart phone utilisation until these ergonomic issues are fixed.

META Group expects the future market to move beyond current WAP-enabled phones to encompass various wireless devices that meet enterprise user needs. It expects the “communication-centric” users to favour next-generation smart phones that offer personal digital assistant (PDA)-like functionality built into the phone. It expects users that are “data-centric” will choose larger and more costly devices for their data processing capabilities, with add-on wireless communications as a secondary benefit.

According to META Group, a one-size-fits-all model (also called device convergence) based on a telephone is not expected to meet the needs of all users. Rather, with the emergence of Bluetooth personal-area network technologies, users will choose components (e.g. a Palm and a small form-factor mobile phone) that intercommunicate, using the phone as a wireless modem for the data device, and using the PDA to process and interact with complex data sets.

"With new technologies on the horizon, we should see data access from mobile phones pick up again during the next two to three years — but only if the ergonomics are substantially improved," said META’s Vice President Jack Gold. "We have a catch-22, because most cell phone users want their devices to stay small — and are demanding the highest levels of portability. Yet the small size prohibits them from being ergonomically correct and data-intensive. That's why a cell phone will never replace a PDA, and a PDA will never replace a phone."

J.D. Power and Associates also reports this week that 68% of UK households now have a mobile phone. Nearly one in 10 households with a mobile phone has a WAP phone but just one in three of these phones is actually used for internet access. It found that the main use of the WAP services was sending and receiving e-mails and browsing the web.

"There has been a significant decrease this year among non-WAP phone owners expressing an interest in accessing the internet with their mobiles," said Gunda Lapski, director of telecommunications and utilities in Europe for J.D. Power. "The figure is down to one in four, compared with one in three in 2000. The difference may well be a reflection on the negative publicity that has surrounded WAP features and content."

However, David MacQueen, Creative Director of Scottish developer The Games Kitchen, said:

“What these reports don't talk about is the personal uses of WAP. It's hardly surprising that professionals don't use it as they likely have access to better mobile technologies, such as laptops or PDAs, which also have software appropriate for business.

“The content on WAP is largely for the leisure user, with the most popular content including games, email and sports results. We've found a very large market exists for games; for example, our game Wireless Pets gets 40,000 plays a week.”