Smartphone Thoughts: Primary Internet Device to be Mobile Phones by 2020

"The mobile phone – now with significant computing power – [will be] the primary Internet connection and the only one for a majority of the people across the world," the Pew Internet & American Life Project writes in a new "Future of the Internet" report. "Telephony [will be] offered under a set of universal standards and protocols accepted by most operators internationally, making for reasonably effortless movement from one part of the world to another."

This survey isn't too far from reality. From what I hear from all of my friends that have visited Japan in the last few years, this is something that is already taking place there. My friend Brad who recently just returned from a visit to Tokyo was describing to me in great detail how this older gentleman on the train was showing him a World of Warcraft-like MMO that is only playable from your phone and not a desktop computer. Even now with the release of devices like the HTC Touch HD, Apple iPhone and T-Mobile G1, users are ditching the laptops in favor of doing their casual browsing on these mobile devices. Heck, even I can't remember the last time I pulled my laptop out when I was watching TV and wanted to do some quick browsing during a commercial break. I would go as far as saying that these experts are more than a few years off and as mobile phone technology advances we might see a drastic turn to mobile web browsing as early as 2012 - if not earlier!