Mobile Portals as Innovations

The purpose of this chapter is to analyze mobile portals (mportals) as an innovation. M-portals are wireless Web pages that help portable device users interact with mobile content and services (based on the definition by Clarke & Flaherty, 2003). Previous works in the area of mobile portals mostly concentrated on their technical aspects, implementation issues, classifications, and user acceptance (e.g., Gohring, 1999; GSA, 2002; Koivumäki, 2002). At the same time, these studies did not view mobile portals as innovations themselves, nor discussed the innovative potential of this novel technology. Analyzing technological artifacts as innovations is important for two reasons. First, such analysis can help m-portal developers and providers pinpoint the salient m-portal characteristics that drive service diffusion. Second, it can assist potential m-portal developers and providers understand the risks associated with entering this segment of wireless services.