Today, the Mobile Internet for Dummies book landed on my desk wih a thump. A book like this is a great sign for us, a confirmation that the mobile internet is heading squarely for the mainstream, which hopefully means an increasingly easier user experience and lower data charges from the networks.

It’s got a mention of Taptu, which is very flattering, and, of course, being a “… for dummies” book, it’s got the unavoidable The 5th Wave cartoons - with my favourite being before Part V of the book. You’ll have to get a copy to find out which one it is.

Here’s the link to the book on Amazon US

Here’s the link to the book on Amazon UK

And yes, I realise my top matches the book… I’m that dedicated to my job.

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Last week, we released some fresh updates to the Taptu service. Since some of them are sneaky changes under the hood, I wanted to highlight a few of the more interesting ones.

More Filters

We’ve added some more filter information to help you find what you want easily before you even get to the summary page.

Better SMS Sharing

We’ve brought SMS sharing to a wider range of mobile phones than before, and since you don’t need to register (on most networks) it’s a breeze to send an image, a video or a song snippet to your friends.

Six Taps of Separation

Related searches adds a whole new dimension to your searches; Make your first search, then scroll down for some suggestions to narrow down your search, or look at similar topics.

One of our developers apparently lost an hour going through related searches, starting with some current charts band and ending his quest on “Women wrestling” (hmm interesting!) so this feature comes with a warning label the size of Jupiter: “The mobile web is full of fascinating quirky stuff, so don’t blame us if hours disappear when you next look away from your screen!”

I’m Bored

On a similar note, we’ve created a page dedicated to all of us public transport commuters, back-of-the-classroom dreamers and recreational surfers. It’s called “I’m Bored” and on that page, you’ll find top searches, most shared content and some topical pages picked out by our editors. You can bookmark the page for new, fun stuff to look at every day.

You’ll discover all sorts of interesting stuff, from videos and music you’ve never heard before, to blogs, news items and sites full of great content to read on your mobile phone. It goes to show that there’s so much more to mobile search than finding your local pizza place; There’s endless entertaining content in that tiny gadget we carry in our pocket.

As for the other new features, you’ll discover them as you browse, won’t you? We can’t tell you everything, we’d be spoiling the fun.

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I watched the launch of the second generation of the iPhone with great interest on Friday, not because I planned on replacing my first generation one, but because I wanted to see how the world would welcome it. While not everyone here is an Apple fiend as I am, we couldn’t help but be curious about it since we’ve just launched a new iPhone version of Taptu*.

The product

In December, after a month of iPhone ownership, I reviewed it. I loved it then and I still do now. It’s clearly not everyone’s cup of tea, as certain Symbian-owning friends regularly remind me, but definitely still the best device for my needs.

The new version of the firmware gives all iPhones, new and old, a fresh lease of life with a wide range of downloadable applications available to make better use of the phone. Applications range from really useful to downright silly (see the iPint one for possibly the wackiest one around), but I can’t get over the fact that they can’t run in the background. I appreciate that the battery would run down faster than our office manager Celia can neck a glass of wine, but it still renders applications like streaming radio and instant messaging pretty much pointless.

The 3G hardware theoretically brings GPS functionality and faster browsing speeds, but I’ve yet to witness these first hand. I’m sure it’ll make a marginal difference, but still isn’t enough to convince me to upgrade.

The 3G iPhone is Apple’s tough second album, and not bad going, but not an awe-inspiring result.

The launch

Oooh, now here’s my bone to pick with Apple and the operators. How could launch day go so horribly wrong?

With expected sales of over 1 million handsets on day 1, plus millions of first generation iPhone and iPod Touch owners across the world, why did O2, the UK’s operator to win the iPhone contract, grind to a halt within moments of opening its doors at 8:02am? The iTunes Activation Center then followed suit shortly.

Sure, that’s a bunch of frustrated new users. But it’s also a whole lot of stranded existing users: My phone began its update and restore around lunchtime, yet I only managed to reactivate via the iTunes store around 8pm, leaving me unreachable for most of the day.

So Apple and the operators owe their users an apology for a poor first experience, I think!

The future

While execution wasn’t perfect over the launch, it’s still undeniable that the iPhone’s impact on the mobile world is increasing with every phone sold. A large and bright glossy screen, a user-friendly interface with single-click app download and no learning curve, this is inspirational for mobile developers.

The gloss is marred by the strong DRM and lock-down the iPhone suffers, one of the main criticism heard from those who opt for the Symbian-based alternatives. I’ll be curious to see how many users of the 2.0 firmware still choose to jailbreak their device, defying Apple and the operators. In fact, how long before jailbreaking becomes pointless?

[* Best viewed on an iPhone, but can be accessed in your browser]

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Did you hear it this morning? The sound of 200,000 UK iPhone hopefuls getting an SMS simultaneously. It caused tremors around the Internet, and has certainly has thrown the operator’s website to the ground.

Everyone and their grandma’s dog have reported the issue O2, one of the UK’s main mobile operators, has suffered by now, but I’m amazed (yet oddly unsurprised) that an operator can be so unprepared for a traffic rush.

Based on this activity, it’s already obvious that the second coming of the iPhone will be more popular than the first. If the majority of these are new users adding themselves to the O2 network this Friday, we can only hope that O2’s mobile infrastructure is more resilient than its website!

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Over the next few days, the Taptu team will be spreading across Europe to attend a few conferences.

You’ll find Stef and Lynsey in Barcelona for Mobile 2.0, an event organised by dotOpen, ESADE and Mobile Monday. Meanwhile, Chris, Conor and myself will be going to Amsterdam for the Mobile Social Networks & UGC Conference, organised by IIR Events.

If you’re attending either of these events, we’d love to meet you and have a chat.

In our competition for who would get the best weather tomorrow, it looks like Barcelona wins over Amsterdam. Aww shucks!

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Has anyone else spotted the new (or fairly new) notice on the BBC News website?

With phone cameras getting better, broadcasting over mobile getting easier and more outlets than ever for us to publish our day to day lives, citizen journalism is challenging the old school thinking that big media gets the news first.

Scoble used Twitter to report on the earthquakes in China, receiving instant updates from those affected locally, and the BBC seem to post any ol’ rubbish they get sent, like this pile up of cars in a Belfast Co-Op car park. (Slow news day, guys?)

You can publish from Glastonbury to show your mates on Qik.com quite how muddy you’re getting this weekend (not to curse the weather forecast or anything!), Twitter that Yahoo!’s just fired you or grab shots of a public protest and upload them instantly to Flickr - it’s become so incredibly easy.

But it’s easy to get carried away in the heat of the moment and put yourself at risk, which is why sites like the BBC cover their ass by reminding us not to do anything (too) stupid for the sake of That Great Shot.

What’s the worst situation you’ve put yourself in for the sake of a video or photo of something newsworthy or really funny?

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Within Taptu, we have a type of page that we call a ‘Content Summary’; they’re the useful little pages containing snippets of information for every search result. These pages make us different - they make it easier for users to get mobile search results in a digestible, clear format.

How does it work? Once the user has selected a result, we take them to the content summary page. We do this rather than linking directly to the source site - which is what happens with most desktop search engines.

The content summary offers key information and content for the chosen result. Sure, it goes against common wisdom that “less pages is better”, but this means that users can stay within Taptu if they wish - they can defer (or avoid) navigating off to a poorly composed mobile internet page or a transcoded page. This creates a better user experience by avoiding additional navigation and scrolling of pages.

What issues have we considered in our ‘Content Summary’ design? Some of them are discussed below with a ‘Song’ result.

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Last night, Sir Alan Sugar picked his Apprentice (no spoilers for those who haven’t seen it yet!) and here at Taptu, we think we may have found ours. Or at least we’ve found a new wacky person to join the team!

Seriously, how could we not invite her for an interview?

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So it’s happened. Saint Jobs announced the Second Coming of his child, the Holy iPhone.

Like Ben, I sat in front of my MacBook watching MacRumors, TUAW and Cali Lewis liveblog and report on the Keynote. Unlike Brian, I wasn’t mad (or privileged) enough to attend the Keynote at the Moscone Center, in SF.

Keynotes are a bit like circus acts. The event is rehearsed to the second, we all watch and wait with bated breath for the grandiose final scene, wondering whether anyone’s going to fall flat on their face along the way. While the keynote was light on substance, the short of it is the new iPhone hardware includes 3G, GPS, and there are a number of software changes - MobileMe particularly appeals to me.

However, the biggest change isn’t in the physical device. It’s all in the perception. Last time around, Apple was looking for early adopters, geeks and IWOOTs* to test-run their product in a giant, live usability testing session. Now that they’ve been able to watch us use the device, it’s time to reach out to the normobs with lower upfront costs. While the tariffs are still in the upper end of the scale, unlimited data makes it completely worthwhile.

As an existing user, I’m grateful that under O2’s reign I’m not given the “brand new customers only” treatment. I can upgrade without getting stung for breaking my contract. All first generation owners shedding their skin in prep for the Second Coming means there’ll be a number of orphaned first-generation iPhones floating around. Mine, for example, will most likely find a new home with my father-in-law, Roy. I’m curious to see what the trickle-down impact of giving second hand iPhones to unlikely buyers like Roy will have on the profile of future buyers.

I think Apple will continue to own marginal marketshare, because the iPhone remains too expensive, too complex and too closed for most, but it’s about to take a significant leap ahead. Are you jumping with me? Or kicking back and shaking your head at the fangirl* that I am?

[* Def. IWOOT: “I want one of those”, otherwise known as saddos like me who can’t resist the latest gadget, even at exorbitant prices.]
[* A fangirl who began supporting Apple back in 1986 when it definitely wasn’t cool to own a Mac, I must add!]

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Just like when you’re writing software, a trend is nearly always “90% there” - We always expect next year to be bigger, for the grass to be greener, and we wouldn’t recognise it if it stared us in the face. In the same way, everyone is waiting with bated breath for “the year of the mobile” to arrive, as obvious as the pizza delivery ringing the doorbell.

However, on Monday night, Marek Pawlowski, who was on the Mobile Monday panel on Mobile Media and Marketing, made a refreshing observation in saying it IS the year of mobile and that it’s been the year of mobile for some time now. While it isn’t at the center of most people’s world, the mobile phone is an essential tool for most. We would have been a couple of panelists short if it hadn’t been for Google Maps on their phones, and Helen wouldn’t have been able to share her every thought on Twitter that day had it not been for the mobile web.

Later on, Simon Maddox mentioned a recent survey in which Brits were asked to say which of television, computer or mobile phone they’d be able to live without: Mobile phones consistently came out as the one electronic no one wanted to go without.

If we’d rather get our left arm chopped off than lose that lifeline to friends, business and the rest of the world, I suppose Marek’s statement is right!

For more soundbites from the latest Mobile Monday, check out what James Cooper and Ben Matthews have had to say. They’ve clearly taken better notes than I have! And many thanks to Dan, Alex and Jo for organising yet another great event.

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