Throw out that WAP browser on your cell phone. We are quickly approaching a point where a full browser experience is available on our mobile devices. And it is not just the iPhone. A startup called Skyfire is in some respect even further along than Apple in bringing the entire Web to your phone. Its mobile browser lets you slide Web pages around and zoom in like with the mobile version of Safari. But it also supports Flash and Ajax sites. (It does this by offloading most of the heavy lifting to its servers rather than the mobile client). That means you can watch Youtube videos and go to Google Maps right in the mobile browser instead of having to download separate apps. In contrast, the iPhone’s Safari browser still does not support Flash and so to watch a a video you have to launch the separate Youtube app.
As it becomes possible to do more and more inside the mobile browser itself, it raises the question of whether that indeed is the killer app for mobile Web phones. For the most part, you still get a richer experience by downloading a separate single-purpose app to your phone. But efforts like Skyfire’s point to a future where that may no longer be necessary for all but the most sophisticated apps and games.
Skyfire launched on Windows Mobile, but as of today it is also available in a private beta for Nokia phones running Symbian’s S60 operating system. The first 200 TechCrunch readers to sign up for the beta here will get invites (enter invite code: Tcrunch).
I just tried it on a Nokia N95, and watching video in the browser looks great as long as you are connected via WiFi. As 3G networks become a reality, that should change (although I am supposedly on AT&T’s 3G network in New York City, and videos take so long to load that they are basically unwatchable at this point). And I still prefer the speed of the Safari browser overall in terms of responsiveness. But for other mobile platforms, Skyfire is going to give mobile browsers like Opera’s a run for their money. And if Apple ever actually allows another browser on the iPhone, it could add some much needed competition there as well.
The company recently raised $13 million in a series B round from Lightspeed, Matrix, and Trinity. Below is a video demo of Skyfire on Windows Mobile:
Only for US users right now it seems. You can put yourself in wait list though if you live abroad.
if you are from canada, just input your number as if you’re american and the beta invite will come through.
I’m installing it now.
me too! thanks for the heads up!
dude, never heard of Opera Mini browser? FYI, there’s already 45 million mobile users in the world and it brings full-browser to (almost) any cell phone and is, in my opinion, much better and faster than Safari.
134867644358
We already have the iPhone
Everybody else is just trying to catch up way way behind
The iPhone needs to catch up — it’s doesn’t do Flash.
Bingo!
Pull your head out of Jobs’ colon, moron
stupid brainwashed idiot. read this: http://gizmodo....n-safari-mobile
Opera is much better than iPhone’s browser.
The iPhone can play video outside of the youtube app. The videos have to be in the proper format …
That’s a ridiculous comment. The point of this is that we can now run Flash and don’t have to worry about video being in the correct format.
I just started using it a few minutes ago and it looks really nice.
You misinterpreted my comment. What do you think the 3 dots are for ?
irony.
Of course, it is outrageous !
I have a decent mobile phone and an N800 and I have no desire for an iPhone. The safari browser is very poor compared to the Firefox-esque Maemo browser which can do flash, java and any other current tech you’d care to throw at it.
The fanboi response (we already have the iPhone, why would anyone want anything else) is getting old really quickly.
I’m waiting for the N96, so this looks like it might be a useful addition.
“If your phone is currently not supported or live outside the U.S., you will be notified as soon as Skyfire is available for your phone type or in your area.”
If it is a S60 Browser/App why the necessity to have an SMS confirmation or does the phone and/or server need to ’stay-in-touch’ via SMS messaging?
Cannot this be tested using any 3G/3.5G/WiFi access points from anywhere in the world?
If you ‘must’ send a confirmation SMS why not ask for our mobile number anyway and throw an international SMS our way, can’t cost that much more via VoIP/Skype SMS Gateways etc?
I’m sorry, maybe I’m an @$$hat but I think there are a couple of things I like about this company and a couple of things I’m worried about.
I like the concept outsourcing the hardcore processing of flash and java onto an 3rd party server. This allows for the mobile phone to reach processing levels analogous to the fastest super computers in the world, pending a bandwidth that can support usable FPS rates. Further, this circumvents whatever challenges there are to port these tools to the mobile phone.
The things that worry me are:
1. This is pending on phones being too slow to process web technology. Maybe I’m missing something but shouldn’t this problem be obsolete maybe even 1 year from now, if not already with phones like the iPhone. It seems to me that things like Java and Flash coming to the phone is now only a matter of time. I’d be interested in Skyfire’s plan to combat this once it happens.
2. I am also wondering what Skyfire’s business model is? Since they’re doing hardcore processing for every user their server bill must be off the charts. I’m curious as to how the browser will be monetized and scaled.
Opera’s been doing this same sort of thing, only not as well, for years with Opera Mini. Somehow, they’ve managed to continue to offer it for free, despite bandwidth and processing costs. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if Skyfire launches with a yearly subscription fee, or something.
This sort of proxy-browsing will probably be with mobile phones for a while. Web-browsing on the iPhone kills the battery pretty quickly, because it has to work really hard, and that’s without Flash support. With Flash, it would be even worse.
Also, lots of web pages weigh in at several megabytes. Even on a 3G phone, just downloading a full page often takes 20 seconds or more. Then it has to be crunched down to fit on screen. A smart proxy, sending you a pre-formatted page with only the information that you need loads much faster.
I’ve been using Skyfire on WinMo for a month, and I also have an iPhone. On Wi-Fi, the it takes the iPhone about 25 seconds to display Digg.com. With Skyfire, Digg opens in about 5 seconds, and the processor in my HTC Mogul is 200 MHz slower than the iPhone.
Ya me anote, esperemos que dejen participar si te encuentras fuera de los EEUU.
Skyfire uses Firefox at the server side to render the webpages and a “handset thin client” to show the results, so, how is Skyfire supposed to scale at the server side? A gmail session with my Firefox browser grows to 63M RAM, so with 1TB of RAM, they should handle nearly 16000 concurrent sessions. Opera Mini transcoded 3.2 billion pages in June (1234/sec), but typical browsing sessions range from 10 to 29 minutes (http://www.mmet...1-smartbrowsing), so if Skyfire ever gets as popular as Opera Mini, we’re talking of about 46-135 TB RAM at the server side.
And what about bandwith? Opera Mini is around 1/4 of Norway total Internet data traffic (46MM MB in June), and that without fancy video/AJAX/Flash!
While Skyfire is a wonderful piece of software, I have my doubts regarding its viability…
Disclaimer: I posted a modified version of this comment at allaboutsymbian.com
S60 has had a native browser based on Safari code for a while, that renders quite the same. So what is the value added of Skyfire? Also why do people persistently believe that iPhone was a world pioneer in genuine web browsing on a mobile phone?
What about Opera Mobile 9.5?
I think video sites–at least the better equipped ones–are going to start encoding specifically for mobile devices. I just saw a release this week that http://www.monkeysee.com has made their entire library (8,000+ videos) of how-to videos viewable on iPhones. Now that’s a pretty cool competitive advantage.
http://www.webv...cle.php/3762111
I want to see it on a non touch device
there whole UI is then not working..
uhh, all S60 devices are non-touchscreen. just put this on my N95 and it works great
That is very great. The idea of caching the data into their server is very good, it allows users to get heavy content faster. Java, Javascript, Ajax are all pluses, but FLASH, that is double pluss (++). But how the system will perform under those heavy resource app? Still to see.
I got one problem with so far, (maybe it’s there they haven’t shown it), the site doesn’t fit the page automatically like Safari on iPhone. You have to scroll left and right. I would like it to fit so I can see the full page, then I zoom in for closer view. Firefox executes that job greatly (not on mobile, can’t wait to see it on mobile) and love Safari.
Skyfire seems promising and will teach Safari on iPhone some lessons (just some). Before I finish we can’t forget about the Opera 9.5.
http://www.givemebeats.com/
Symbian S60 phones already have WebKit based browser with full browser experience, this is just another one, like Opera Mini.
I wanted to try for the youtube streaming, very choppy on my n95 over wifi. It gave me 3 different frames from a 7 second youtube clip. Sound was good.
With innovation comes competition.
http://blabtech.blogspot.com
So what’s wrong with us outside the US? It’s a browser, FFS!
What about security? The more java, flash, scripts and so on they will render, the more flaws can be exploited.
I really, really, won’t enjoy a mobile browser popup blocker
This browser sucks. If you don’t enter the ‘.com’ at the end of a url, it won’t automatically try that. The scrolling and zooming is slower than the default nokia browser. And finally, I know its a beta, but why do I need to key in my email address everytime I load the browser? I can’t even context switch to go to another app and then come back without needing to enter in my email address.
Deleting.
I’ve been running it on a Motorola Q9M on Win Mobile for several months. I was initially “wow’d” by the look however, there are some fundemental issues with the product and I see a release of a new platform when not a single thing has been done for the current .6 beta. Most people will quickly be frustrated. If the browser loses conn. with their server (frequently and randomly), the whole thing shuts down and you have to start from scratch. You can’t set the zoon level and persist it. So, every page view is at a minimum, two refreshes. Once to get to the entire page in microscopic and one to get to a zoom level to allow you to select something. This really slows things down.
I love the look, I love the ability to hit pretty much any website that I want and not need a mobile version, but the scalability question is still the biggest concern, especially since they can’t keep it running in beta.
Love the product, hoping it will succeed but having my doubts.
First, I have to set the record straight regarding the S60 browser experience. This article implies that the S60 browser offers a limited WAP-like experience and this company suddenly makes the surfing experience like the iPhone. The S60 browser has been based on the same Webkit source as Safari for some time. Other than a difference in input methodology (button vs. touchscreen) the Nokia S60 browser has been offering the same browsing experience as the iPhone browser for longer–before the iPhone was even available. Just like the iPhone browser, the S60 browser hasn’t supported every function, i.e. Flash, AJAX, etc.. Skyfire offloads this to servers and then delivers it to the browser in a renderable format.
Second, it seems like Skyfire’s functionality will be quickly be incorporated into the browser of high-end phones. Maybe within this year. Its long term relevance will be greatest in low end phones deployed in secondary/developing markets. Even at that, doesn’t Moore’s Law dictate the processing power necessary for a good Flash/Ajax/etc. experience on a cellphone will become cheap enough to be deployed even in low end phones? What is this company’s strategy to stay competitive for 3-5 years?
The writer said he tried Skyfire out on the N95. If he doesn’t like WAP-rendered sites he can get them to render as standard HTML with the S60 browser. The same for Opera-Mini.
I get a sense from this submission that the writer doesn’t know much about mobile phone technology but is more of a trend-watcher.
Sadly enough their management has no clue how to make money (according to what I’ve heard from them). So far they only figured how to waste funds. I bet CEO paid nice bonuses to himself too. They mumble something about “huge ad-based revenue” but modestly stay quiet about their operational cost on all traffic which gets pumped through the proxy servers (to reencode requested web-sites into proprietary format). But anyhow eventually (and very soon in my opinion) Internet bandwidth won’t be an issue on mobile devices and there won’t be a need for handicapped solutions such as Skyfire.
I haven’t looked into it that much, but ex-employee’s story sounds all too familiar. Companies set up almost as shells to raise money, pay some execs more than they are worth, then shut down when salary costs burn through all the money. Like what happened with Amp’d and a whole load of other ones… for shame!
It is interesting that they have the symbian beta available, and, personally a happy thing. I am no fan of windows mobile.
What will be interesting to see is how they scale the service out to the general audience. While Windows Mobile has a good smartphone presence in the states, it’s nothing compared to the Symbian install base.
For the company to succeed, execution, monetization, and scaling will be important.
Can anyone help me out please with an invite would be great
Techzdfxp@gmail.com
Techz
I love my iPhone but competition is great for consumers.
tell me more bout it guys
I don’t try Skyfire yet because I only have PocketPC 2003. I use Opera Mini 4.2 on J9 MIDP emulator. It’s fast and support my work for Yahoo/Google mail with attachment, read news or forums. but Opera Mini have obml propietary format as output that I don’t like. sorry for my bad English.
skyfire allows me to watch hulu on my Nokia E71 . It is a killer app for that service alone