Nearly three-quarters of people are avoiding the mobile internet because of high costs and poor experiences of the technology, according to research published today. The findings highlight the need for firms to develop mobile-compatible content, said experts.

In a survey of 1,500 UK consumers by web hosting firm Hostway, over a third of respondents said they were frustrated by slow-loading mobile web pages.

A quarter said they did not use mobile devices to access the internet because often the web sites they wanted were not available, while others complained that it was too difficult to scroll and navigate their way through pages via mobiles and PDAs.

"We're in the dark ages compared to desktop browsing," said Hostway product manager Phil Turnbull. "Firms should take [the design of their mobile web sites] every bit as seriously, and because they have to be more ruthless about how the site is designed, it's potentially a greater challenge."

Mobile domain operator Dotmobi has published guidelines to help firms develop mobile-friendly sites based on W3C standards, and also provides open-source tools for site creation and testing.

"An industry-wide effort [will] enable mobile-friendly sites, encourage training for and innovation from developers and content providers, educate users, and persuade operators to offer mass-market pricing on data services," said Dotmobi's Alexa Raad.
Raad added that domain registrars such as GoDaddy are planning site creation tools for firms purchasing a .mobi domain name.