Institute For The Future

Off-Deck in the Walled Gardens

As a longtime advocate of a geospatial web, I'm constantly alert for signs that mobile wireless mobile carriers are seeing benefits of opening up their networks as a platform for experimental and entrepreneurial mobile applications.

Lately, I've been seeing mentions of a new meme: 'off-deck' services which I've now found out are mobile wireless content services offered independent of carriers' content portals -off deck- yet billed to customers by and through carriers.

Although this sounds like a half step towards an open mobile web, still intrigued, I googled around, and found an nicely thorough update on 'off-deck services, written by Cambridge, Mass. VC David Beisel There are a few hints, in the articles that some mobile network operators are allowing a few wildflowers to grow in their walled gardens of 'enhanced' mobile services.

"In the last few months, many have begun to predict that the U.S. industry will eventually emulate Europe