Wireless and Wirelessless

University of Sussex LibraryAnd we're off … the first sessions at AoIR 2004 (about 8 running simultaneously) have started now. I'm in one on mobile phones and wireless access. Kakuko Miyata starts this session, speaking of Internet use through mobile phones in Japan. She has three research questions: who uses mobiles to access the Net, how do people use these media, and does the use of the Net increase their social capital?

Emails, for example, supply social networks. While Webphone-based Internet use is generally to communicate with close friends and family, PC-based email generally is to communicate with more remote participants. Also, he suggests that online community participation builds social capital. Discussion online works as a kind of 'school of democracy' as people interact with others from different backgrounds, and there is a 'generalised reciprocity' of mutual assistance which emerges.

Kakuko has conducted a survey (in 2002 and 2003) of some 1000 users to identify their Internet use. Some 50% were not using the Net at all; while in 2002 some 26% used the Net mainly by PC. By 2003 this had changed: some 24% were PC and Webphone Internet users; an additional 18% were Webphone-only Net users and only 8% remained PC-only Net users. This is a significant shift, and occurred especially in younger users (20-29 years).

There are some very detailed statistics here, more than it is possible to take in in a short amount of time. Generally, there is a trend towards combined usage of Webphone- and PC-based Net usage, with some significant differences in the usage and effects of these systems. Perhaps, Kakuko suggests, there is a new digital divide emerging here?

Next up is Lisa Lee, presenting research on public wireless Internet access, a part of the EC-FLOWS project. She points out some basic trends: Internet use is becoming wider and longer, but divides (e.g. income-based) remain. The number of households with Internet access is steadily rising, but this does not equate to ubiquity of access; in fact, the divides of access to and knowledge about services are evolving as the services themselves do.

Interaction itself is increasingly seen as mobilised; fixed-line phones are being replaced by mobiles, for example. Key developments are the increase in mobile voice and data (also SMS) communication; the Internet itself is continuing to grow (in users, access, level of use, and content); and individual mobility and networks are growing. Some of these trends might be converging (certainly from a technological point of view), and also take place in 'third spaces' between home and office, e.g. wireless public access zones.

While this can lead to increased ubiquity, it needs to be recognised that this is not just a question of technology. In the UK, there are currently three models for public wireless hotspots: operator-based ones (subscriber-based); independent WISPs (linked to other services, e.g. free access with your cup of coffee), and local community ones (usually free, e.g. on Brighton beach).

Independent WISPs such as the coffee shop Benugo, whom Lisa studied, largely respond to the rise of wireless, and use the access as a product differentiator and an additional service, often little advertised as this is not the main business, and still a little-widespread service. Daily usage here remains relatively low, and there remains little awareness of WLAN technology and services (even amongst staff).

Third spaces are needed, but not necessarily as digital spaces; the role of place and space and time use within it is significant. There is a difference in the nature of various hotspots here: in airports and similar spaces, they have a captive audience, quite literally; in a coffee shop, that is not the case as people have access to various other connection points in their daily lives. There is also an interest comparison with cybercafes: hotspots are really temporary socio-technical reconfigurations of space which are also far less immediately visible.

Ubiquity is increased by them in terms of potential access, not necessarily in terms of actual use; key barriers remain: device ownership; awareness of wireless systems and hotspots; and a mismatch between the technological space and the customer's reason for visiting that space (e.g. people come to a café to get away from their work rather than to go online). As more WiFi-ready portable devices become available (other than relatively unwieldy laptops), there may well be some further changes (e.g. towards some more spontaneous uses), though.

On to David Robison, who looks at Internet access through mobiles in Europe and the U.S. Mobiles are becoming personal media and Internet devices, and perhaps the term 'mobile phone' itself isn't quite right anymore. There is a meshing of technologies and cultural practices alongside the concurrent increase in mobility. Pricing structures have affected the speed in which Internet access and mobile phone markets have grown (mobiles faster in Europe, Internet access faster in the U.S.), and geography may also have played a role; mobility may exist better in narrow urbanised spaces rather than across vast vistas.

Generally, though, they are growing in younger people, but even here some of the more traditional, basic services (e.g. SMS) are more widespread than the more advanced systems. As mobilisation continues, the Internet will continue to change both literally (technologically) and as a metaphor for networked communication; there are also surveillance and privacy issues here, of course, as users of the future may never be offline any more. David argues that distinctions between stand-alone, landline, mobile, etc. systems will gradually decrease as a result of ubiquity. Phones as much as other systems will simply be media devices of one form or another, combining a variety of services in flexible forms.

Fundamentally, at that point, other than the physical context of interaction (one or two hands, hand-held or desk-based), what will be the difference between mobile phones and personal computers? An analogy to end with: radios may be mobile or not, and interaction might be different depending on the context, but we still regard it universally as 'radio'.

Finally, then, on to Gitte Stald. Her paper title: "You've Got the Whole Wide World in Your Hand - or Do You?" The 'mobile multimedium', which is what the mobile phone has become, has been invested with narratives of empowerment, but is this sustainable? It is a tool for information, communication, and entertainment, and for the establishment and development of social relations, cultural practices, and individual and collective identity. It has constant presence without vacant moments, provides immediate and perpetual access and update (both informational and sociocultural), security, and control (e.g. of young people by their parents, of customers by advertisers).

It must be recognised that while mobile technology is very advanced, but that the latest gadgets aren't necessarily ubiquitous yet. At the same time, other mobile devices are already widespread (Walk- and Discmans, Gameboys, etc.). Technology is being updated very quickly, however, and prices are constantly dropping. We move between many geographic localities (both on a local and a global scale), but just as much also between local and global symbolic localities.

Digital media provide us with the locality and space for interaction, space, and proximity. Some points about the mobile Internet: it continues to have limited data capacity, with extensive transmission time, selected services only (which may need to be subscribed to specifically), and significant costs - so the mobile Internet perforce remains customised to the individual user. As a mobile multimedium, however, it does have high potential: immediate access to information and sociocultural updates; democratisation; and the emergence of new power structures.

In this it outdoes wireless, simply through the more widespread nature of mobile phone-style devices. Further future potential builds on the addition of mobile harddrives, the rise of smart phones, and further cost reduction; these are also linked to the ongoing move towards a digital society.

In questions, some interesting observations about the democratic potential of these media forms: the point is made that democracy is importantly also about encountering and dealing with opinions that you don't agree with; mobile phones perhaps are particularly good at organising groups of likeminded people (this links to Rheingold's 'smart mobs' idea). Perhaps this might change as mobile phones become more fully Internet-enabled?