Type=file Is The Most Important Tag To Support In A Mobile Browser

If you make a browser these days, you MUST support a simple, basic, easy-to-use, tag called type=file in your web browser. It enables those forms we see which allow you to browse your local ‘memory’ (which you paid extra for) then upload a file to a website. Just like YouTube lets you upload a (potentially) massive file to create (and freely host) a smaller flv file in the browser – with progress bars! (If you need a desktop app to convert to flv BEFORE posting to YouTube – let me know – I have it built right here)

If your mobile browser does not support this then you’re losing out – trust me. Those that DO support it – don’t just support one system. The Metaweblog API (and even the Blogger API) was created for a reason. Those blogging vendors who don’t support that are leading your device into a walled garden – and no one wants that in the long run/tail.

It’s simple. This form tag supports systems that are easy to build. It’s ‘open’. It’s been around for years. If your device’s native browser does not support this, then it’s clear to me that you’re not supporting the user : you are supporting the carrier alone (hello iPhone) . Did you know that an MMS post typically costs about ten times the amount that a file upload via your mobile connection costs? If your device does not support open ‘wifi’ even though you harp on about that kind of ‘802 dot’ connectivity – forget it.

This is why I created camoby.com – which is now noklog.com for now. (Links to come once I sort out some setttings on WP which I fiddled with) – if your device’s web browser does not support the type=file tag then I’m sorry, but you’re missing out. You’re not in the game. You’re playing catchup with those that do support it. And what’s more : your carriers are rippiing people off. Period.

If you are a device product manager, or have any kind of sway in what goes out to the consumer, then please..’do what is right’. Enable the ability for mobile web developers to create systems which enable the owner of a device/phone/etc. to CREATE as well as CONSUME content. Your device CAN do it. If your app supports the ability for the device owener to add and browse OPML and RSS, then you just about have it right there. Hi Noki!

If your device supports the ‘podcasting standard’ of recording mime types of (at least) mp3, and your browser can upload that content, without installing anything at all, then you have ‘it’. (If not, then sure, we can transcode it for you!)

There are billions of mobile devices out there around the world. Sure, the majority of those devices stay used for years, and only recently are beginning to get updated more frequently, due to network availability, so .. why not enable that user to harp on about who or where they are, using a mobile blogging system which they control?

I believe that those device manufacturers which embrace this opinion will ‘win’. People WANT to upgrade their ‘pocket computer’.

I rest my case – aka/now pocket 😉