Ajit has said that I have made up my own definition and falsely attributed it to him in order to say that it’s hype. I perhaps didn’t make my point well enough and that is regrettable and I openly apologise to Ajit. Is Mobile Web 2.0 hype or not? That’s the question.

As I posted on his blog, some concrete examples of Mobile Web 2.0 services would help frame the discussion better. I understand this may take time because Ajit is very busy with seminars, so we can suspend that part of the discussion.

Let me briefly re-state my case, but using Ajit’s characterisation and clearing up the validity of summarising in my own words what Web 2.0 is about, per O Reilly’s definition, not mine.

O Reilly doesn’t define Web 2.0, he attempts to use the term to label a meta-narrative of various ideas that characterise a major change in the evolution of Web that has occured. I simply essentialised what he said, not redefined it, emphasising the shift in capability of the Web and in the overall experience. The shift is surely the bit that matters, otherwise why call it “2.0″?

By attaching his Mobile Web 2.0 definition to O Reilly’s, which Ajit is keen to do, he is clearly implying that a similar paradigm shift has occured in mobile, possibly in parallel. Ajit is also now keen to emphasis a single over-arching idea - “harnessing collective intelligence”. Keeping in mind that one of Ajit’s principles is that the Web is the backbone for Mobile Web 2.0, then he is saying the following:

1. We are in a new phase of mobile, one that it is characterised by “harnessing collective intelligence”
2. This new phase is tied to the Web

The mobile industry and the user experience is dominated by voice and text, no one can deny this. Therefore, any claims that we are in a new phase, especially one that is web-centric (one of the principles) and that is based largely on “collective intelligence” is an exaggeration. This is the definition of hype. If anything, the “collective” behaviour already seen in mobile users is texting-centric, not Web. It can be emphasised more by focussing attention on the address book and the existing social connection data buried in the operator’s records, although operators are slow to realise this.

On the third characteristic of Mobile Web 2.0, which is PC as cache/control point, this is not much in evidence either and, in fact, I don’t think is significant. It is much more useful and likely that mobile services will not be tethered to any desktop PC. In fact, there are advantages for operators to ensure that this doesn’t happen, but, again, they may be too slow to realise it.

Could we get to a new stage that is outside the current voice/text-centric paradigm? Yes, I think so, although not so quickly. Will it be web-centric? Perhaps, but I don’t think that the essential characteristics will be as closely tied to “Web 2.0″ as Ajit currently wants to assert. That’s my view and this is conjecture, which is something different from hype.