NASA Mobile Site | Jet Propulsion Lab

File under “This is so cool you have to bookmark it.”

When I was a kid, I got to meet an astronaut. A real, live astronaut. I thought that was really, really cool. He showed us his space suit and answered all kinds of questions from the audience. Today, I got a taste of that same excitement when someone from the Jet Propulsion Lab at NASA contacted me to see if I would put a NASA mobile site on mobiEnthusiast. Hmmm, let me think about that one…. Are you kidding? YES!

Ok, so maybe that wasn’t the calm, cool, professional, jaded response you would expect from a blogger. Let’s see how calm and collected you are when astronauts and rocket scientists (or their marketing department) come knocking on your door.

The site itself has the compelling content you would expect from the Space Agency. Interplanetary photography, artists’ renditions, news, discoveries and links to other NASA sites are plentiful. The NASA mobile site is a great way to keep up to date on the latest in space, or to keep your little scientists busy in a traffic jam or while waiting for a bus or train. Teachers can incorporate it into their lesson plans, and space enthusiasts can get their space fix wherever their mobile internet or wifi network allows.

The NASA mobile site for the Jet Propulsion Lab can be found at jpl.nasa.gov. Those of you who read this blog regularly are calling “Foul!” right now because it is not a .mobi site. That’s correct, it is a .gov, owned by the United States government. It autodetects phones, and is more likely to show on a smartphone than a feature phone. That’s all the more reason to upgrade to a smartphone if you haven’t already.

So, mTLD, here’s your opportunity to meet the nice people at NASA to see if they’d like their .mobi. After all, the sky really is the limit.

Japan Mobile Blogger | Jim Atwood mobi

Jim Atwood made a WordPress blog and used a mobile plugin. That’s impressive, but not unique. After all, I do that here on mobiEnthusiast.mobi every day. The unique part is that Jim is an American living in Japan. As a mobile internet junkie, I want to learn all I can about what makes mobile tick in a country that is mostly mobile-only – especially since I don’t understand the language.

According to Jim, it is common in Japan to make two completely separate versions of a website. One is for desktop computers, like his standard blog, Ricochehost.com (computer link), and a completely separate, stand-alone mobile website, such as his mobile blog, JimAtwood.mobi.

In Jim’s words:

The Japanese like to make things simple and have two sites. This avoids the browser detection problems that everyone has all the time. With just one dedicated mobile site, things are much easier. In some cases, Japanese website only one version and that is mobile. In my opinion, mobile usage for the Internet is much more prevalent in Japan.

As a mobi enthusiast, this is music to my ears. It makes perfect sense to avoid trying to guess what new phone is going to come out next and garble my site. Granted, mTLD/dotMobi does a great job with Device Atlas, but if you make a site that complies with ready.mobi in the first place, it is much simpler and saves a lot of time and headaches. Dot com for computers, dot mobi for mobile web.

I met Jim through LinkedIn (mobile link). If you are interested in networking with me on LinkedIn as well, please let me know.

Here’s to the mobile web!

This post is featured in Carnival of the Mobilists Issue #185. Check it out for a great weekly roundup of mobile bloggers.