I’ve been doing a bit of reading into audio streaming lately and someone mentioned a term that I had to look up just to make sure – Sideloading, or transferring files from server to server or from server or PC to mobile device or memory card (as opposed to uploading or downloading – device-server actions). Two other definitions here and here.
The funny thing is that this has been one of the main ways that I listen to podcasts on my phone. So I’m a sideloader. 🙂
Some folks think downloads, some think direct connection from mobile device network. I think they are all interlinked and all the options should be there. We should make it easy for users to choose which method suits their style and budget. Such a versatile and integrated way of transferring large files is really only part of that fusion of PC-mobile-Web I keep harping about.
So, if you are building services that use large files, such as video or audio, think of all the ways someone wants to get that stuff on their device and make them all available. Of course, your biz model needs to be amenable to such things, too.
And practical surveys are showing that people do not always want to download stuff over the air (sometimes slow and expensive!). See blurb below.
Link: Research Weighs Mobile Music Downloading, Side-Loading // Zeropaid.com.
Just recently, San Francisco-based Telephia released a report comparing OTA track downloading and side-loading among British consumers. The company found that 27 percent of 3G users downloaded content to their phones, and the average user grabbed 4.1 files per month. In terms of the preferred method of music delivery, though, some other findings emerged. In the survey, 44 percent of 3G subscribers preferred side-loading ripped content from their computers, while 49 percent of non-3G subscribers preferred the same. Comparatively, 14 percent of 3G users surveyed preferred downloading tracks directly from a carrier or non-carrier service, while 16 percent of non-3G subscribers preferred the same.
*And something tells me that most folks download phone apps to their PC and then ‘sideload’ them into their phones. I think that’s mostly because it’s easier to find apps via a PC browser. Ja?
LG Telecom to offer “side-loading”: A carrier shooting its own foot?
Electronic Times reports (note: in Korean) that LG Telecom, the #3 mobile carrier of Korea with around 7 million subscribers, is aiming to provide a full-scale web-to-phone (“side loading”) mobile multimedia content download service, starting from April..