Nokia seeks lost Marble widgets

Nokia has announced that its next-generation cell phones are going to have full support for Web 2.0. Web 2.0 opens the door to sophisticated web applications that have widget-like capability. Sounds great right?

Andrew Orlowski at The Register is skeptical about the move. In his view, turning cell phones into "multimedia computers" is the worst of both worlds -- the lack of security seen on the desktop combined with the impracticality of using a cell phone as a serious computing device.

JavaScript worms are a popular delivery mechanism for Malware on the PC, but as the J in AJAX, they've recently been adopted to take advantage of Web 2.0: causing havoc on MySpace, Yahoo! and, er... MySpace again.

Nokia says it will initially restrict the functionality of the JavaScript worms, before opening the floodgates. Ovum analyst Tony Cripps has glimpsed the horror that awaits us, but can't quite bring himself to step out of line, and say what's begging to be said:

"Scripting-based security exploits are commonplace on the desktop," he writes in a research note, "and we believe countermeasures need to be employed early to avoid such issues arising on mobile phones."

Needless to say, The Register has doubts whether the kind of security cell phone users expect from their mobile phones can be maintained.

Andrew Orlowski argues that Nokia should focus on their core strengths. Nokia was, after all, once THE cell phone maker of choice (remember "The Matrix"?).  But from making game machines to other digital gadgets, Nokia has expanded far beyond that and Andrew Orlowski believes the results have been less than ideal.

When one looks at the prime assets of the Nokia of five years ago, it's alarming to see how many have been discarded. At the turn of the decade, the Finnish giant boasted a formidable reputation for reliability, security and ease of use. Now it's thrown all three out of the window, with security being the last to go.

Do users want to run Google gadgets (and other Web 2.0 gadgets) on their mobile phones? Or would users prefer to see content that was designed explicitly for their cell phones? Can using an open platform such as "Web 2.0" (which is more of a marketing term than any specific technical concept) benefit cell phone users without diminishing security?

Read the whole article below at www.TheRegister.co.uk.