Every few months or so, I get the opportunity to host the Carnival of the Mobilists: a great tradition I am happy to be part of, that has been going on for several years now. Every week the carnival takes place in a different blog, and this week, when I get to play host, I am happy to say that there is not a single iPhone-related topic, which is refreshing…

So what DO we have for this week?

Data, data, data

We are finally moving from a voice centric offering in mobile handsets to a data centric one. A few of our writers bring different perspectives on this move:

• 3′s new service offering of free Skype calling was announced. Geoff Ballinger at Reflections on things mobile gives the run-down of the service, specifically listing the restrictions of it.
• Andrew Grill from London Calling decided to test drive Google’s Latitude APIs. Check out his post; you might even be able to meet with him accidentally…
• In Communities Dominate Brands Tomi Ahonen finds the time to discuss the huge opportunity of mobile data services. His post is long, but it contains a very large number of service examples – might give you an idea for your next pet project.
• Talking about service examples, Aaron Chua gives examples of a set of search based mobile services over at Wild Illusions.
• Rudy De Waele published his presentation on Mobile Social Contextual Applications and Services over at mTrends.
• Chetan Sharma published a detailed update on the US wireless data market for Q1 2009 on Always On Real-Time Access. It is a very detailed look at this market with some interesting insights on current trends.

Devices

There’s always the issue of the devices – they come in different shapes and sizes.

• Steven Hoober at Little Springs Design goes against pixel perfect designs in search for something more flexible that will work well for different types of devices.
• At About Mobility C. Enrique Ortiz provides a short overview of the new widgets system available on the Android platform, along with links to relevant resources. If you’re into Android – this one is mandatory.
• Tam Hanna from TamsPalm reviews the Sony PRS505 ebook reader from an Austrian point of view. The moment they’ll make smell like old books I’ll buy one.

Ads

Russel Buckley saves our ads section, and as usual, you can only expect the best from him. On MobHappy he provides details of an SMS/MMS supported ads service that actually works.

Wrap up

There’s no clear best favorite this week – the posts were all greate, so my choice is the data services section – we are sure going to see this one growing over the coming years.

And there is, of course, my own post for this week, about Mobile VoIP, or more specifically the fact that we shouldn’t be expecting it any time soon. Hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I enjoyed all the great posts on this week’s carnival.

Before I sign off, I’d like to remind you that Mobile 2.0 Europe is just around the corner. It’s a two-day event, June 18-19, in Barcelona. You are invited to read more about Mobile 2.0 on their website.

The next carnival will take place next week at Mobile Broadband. See you all there!