Well who needs to speed up towards the common goal of more and better social networking in the mobile was too long a title. Anyway, just read the results of a poll taken at 3GSM in Barcelona. The last question caught my interest:

Who provides the biggest obstacle to bringing social networking to the mobile?

Mobile Network Operators: 43%

Service Providers: 27%

Content Developers: 12%

Mobile device manufacturers: 12%

Publishers: 3%

Other: 3%

Two observations:

1. MNO’s need pull their weight here. Age and ID verification and flat fee data traffic should be the key ones in order for the masses to come. Walled garden approach and exlusive deals with web-based social networking sites are counter productive and the ones going down this road will soon realise and open up.

2. Service providers and content developers rank surprisingly high. So are there not good enough services out there today? Is this a sign of the limitations and challenges inherent in just porting a web service to mobile? I am intrigued by this and I will keep investigating this more.

Stay tuned for the continuation. If you have any leads let me know here!