We Are Living In The Future…

[ursulav]

…and it’s not always a good thing for sales.

I was at the book store t’other day-the real brick-and-mortar one, to sign a couple of my books, and I was browsing through the SF/Fantasy section, and I tripped over a trilogy.*

It was a big set of books. It would be a substantial cash investment for yours truly. And reading the back, the premise was…

Comments

[derakon]

Step 1 for optimizing websites for phones: remove all images and complicated styles.

Step 2 for optimizing websites for phones: remove any content that isn't immediately pertinent to the page's purpose.

That's basically it (though I grant I'm painting with very broad strokes here). Make pages short, simple, and to the point. However, given that you said it's an art site, things could be trickier. In that case I'd recommend making heavy use of thumbnails that link to the full-size version. Remember that your target user has a display resolution of maybe 640x400, probably less (the iPhone has a bigger resolution, but it's also much denser with smaller pixels).

Incidentally, my own cell phone is a five-year-old clamshell dealybopper, has a few cracks in the case, and still works just fine for its intended purpose: making phonecalls. I'm waiting to get a smartphone until there's a remotely reasonable data plan option.

[derakon]

It's not just the up-front cost; it's the cost of the extra service plans each month. An iPhone doesn't cost $99, even though that's what they charge you at the store. They make up the extra with the two-year contract.

Most big websites have a separate mobile site that they direct you to if they detect you're using a mobile device. If you're a sufficiently crotchety geek, you might actually prefer using the mobile site even when you're using a normal computer (since, being crotchety, you would argue that everything not shown in the mobile version is wasted bandwidth anyway). Most of us don't want to bother maintaining two websites though.

[anonymous]

*thumbs up for cell phone comment* Our cell is seven years old, has scratches on it but still works for making phone calls and still charges up nicely (although we had to replace the battery pack on the charger).

It's functional. (Also I'm lazy and don't need texting or web browsing. It would be fun but it's not an expense I want to deal with at this point). Tho I do wish my phone had a better built in camera. (As there are just random moments in the week where you go: OMG that's awesome! I want a picture of that!)

[ryokomusouka]

Basically you design two style sheets (you are using CSS, yes? Please?): one for normal surfers, and the second for mobile phones. There really isn't an automatic way to do it.

That way, you can make much smaller thumbnails and only use them for mobile surfers and keep the larger ones for those playing at home.

[trishalynn]

To Ursula: You could have also, you know, read the first page or two of the book in the store.