The user experience of the mobile internet is most of the time inferior to the desktop internet. This is often explained by the mobile internet´s cumbersome user interface. We argue that the real reason behind the mobile internet´s perceived inferiority is the business community´s incomplete of understanding of the mobile context, preventing the creation of killer applications. While mobile browser access to any web page is fundamental, we argue that it is even more important to offer mobile context specific web-based services. These services would generate user benefit by initially aiming for the mobile context before catering the desktop context. One study presented explores potential usability gaps when users switch from a familiar to an unfamiliar mobile phone interface. A within-subject experiment was performed in which nine users familiar with Sony-Ericsson T630 and nine familiar with Nokia 7250 performed tasks on both phones. On average, test subjects spent more time on finishing tasks with an unfamiliar phone than with a familiar one. For two of the four tasks, there was a significant difference in completion time between the first-time Nokia users and the first-time Sony-Ericsson users. The tasks of adding a contact to the address book and sending an SMS to a contact in the address book were performed more quickly by new Nokia users than by new Sony-Ericsson users. The subjective difficulty ranking also showed that first-time Nokia users found the new phone easier to use than first-time Sony-Ericsson users did.

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