So my Sony Ericsson final died on me, my attempt to fix it failed, the phone repair person said it was a problem with the operating system and too difficult to repair. After procrastination, research and decision, I finally opted for a HTC Wildfire S on contract - still not being sure what side of the Apple fence to stand on and wanting to gently wade into the Smartphone water - also, historically I have been a little bit clumsy with phones and didn't want something too big and expensive.
I have spent the weekend familiarising myself with the phone and have already found out I cannot access BBC iplayer - which I moaned about for 1 hr, but would I want to watch programmes on such a small screen? I then started to do my Android app shop - I was a bit disappointed I could not find one for Google Scholar, but stocked up on my usual diet of Google docs and reader, Tweetdeck and Grooveshark. I have yet to try out viewing office docs and pdfs but that's next. It's odd once you start entering the App market it is cognitive chain reaction with respect to what you should get next, and then you start thinking about how do you create an app and how useful an app for feedback, assessments would be.
I presume once you enter the smart phone world there is no going back as you start to think how creative you can be with mobile learning in general. The challenge is developing mobile learning that is not exclusive, using flash that is not supported by cheaper models, providing apps that are only Apple compatible. It is a challenge eLearning Developers have had for some time - how many media formats to do you provide and which ones, when do you stop supporting a format, ensuring that learning is inclusive.
