Friday, May 18, 2007

Amy Gahran The dotted blue line shows which content elements I'm selecting for my Joey page.

More from the "it's not your context anymore" department: Mozilla Labs (the folks who brought you Firefox) are offering a public preview of Joey, a new browser add-on that allows Firefox users to send Web content that you select (text clippings, pictures, videos, feeds, and Firefox Live Bookmarks) to your smart phone.

Here's how it works: After you register for Joey and install the Joey add-on, a Joey icon appears in the bar at the bottom of the Firefox browser window. Then, when you find a Web page with content that you'll want to access from your mobile phone (such as driving directions, a sports scores feed, a photo, a YouTube video, etc.) clicking on that icon brings up a menu that allows you select specific content items from that page and save them on your personal "Joey page." The Joey server converts your uploaded content to a version optimized for your phone model and service carrier.

You also need to download the Joey application for your smart phone. Once that's installed, you can access your Joey page and all the content you saved there via your phone's Web browser. That's supposed to be easy; although I haven't tried it yet.

So what? Well, anyone who's tried browsing the Web on a mobile phone's browser knows how painful and frustrating that experience often can be. Most Web content (including that from news sites) is not optimized for mobile delivery and navigation. Joey aims to put users in control of which content becomes mobile-friendly. Less slogging, more direct access.

I tried Joey -- and I'll warn you, so far it seems pretty buggy. Honestly, I couldn't get it to work right. But this service is in the early development phase. I'm betting they'll get it working reasonably well, especially with a broad geek community pounding on it.

Joey is yet another example of the slice-and-dice Web. Increasingly, Web users will be selecting, juxtaposing, and sharing specific chunks of content that matter to them -- ignoring page elements (including ads) which aren't attractive or relevant to them. Web page design, navigation, and site structure will count for less and less.

Yes, I know a service like this will raise copyright and branding concerns. But in addition to such threats, I think Joey and other slice-and-dice services (such as widget-maker YourMinis) also represent a potential opportunity to content producers, including news organizations -- and perhaps even to savvy advertisers as well.

For instance, what if a news org offered a simplified, branded, ad-supported version of Joey specifically for its content? Perhaps instead of generating an entire mobile edition of its site? Food for thought.

One thing's certain: It's looking more and more like journalists, editors, and Web producers should start considering the stand-alone and syndication potential of every single piece of Web content. Maybe studies like EyeTrack, which currently focus on site and page layout, should be updated to account for an increasingly mobile, fragmented, and personalized Web experience.

(Learn more about Joey from Linuxworld, the Mozilla Labs blog, and the Joey developer wiki. Thanks to Fierce Mobile Content for the tip.)

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