Barnabas Kendall

(The title of this post could also be: Opera Stole Our Version Number! But we don’t have the number 4 trademarked, so we’ll let it slide.)

Today Opera announced the beta of v4 of their mobile browser, which I am downloading and trying out. There are all sorts of cool things you can do when you have both client software and server optimizing, and Opera is pushing the state-of-the-art here. Our mobile web optimizing software, Skweezer, is a server-only solution, so we are limited to the things your built-in browser can do. Anyway, I was interested to see some bloggers/journalists (and even Opera themselves) pitting Opera Mini vs. the iPhone (thanks to TechMeme for this list):

• The Tech Report: Opera takes a jab at the iPhone
• The Mobile Gadgeteer: Opera Mini 4: who needs an iPhone for mobile web browsing?
• MobileCrunch: Turn Any Phone into an iPhone
• Andy Beal’s Marketing Pilgrim: Opera Mini 4 Steals iPhone Thunder

As has been pointed out elsewhere: where’s the sense in comparing software to hardware? I call sour grapes on Opera’s part. You won’t be able to install Opera Mini on the iPhone, at least not right away, even though you could even install Opera on your desktop, phone, Wii, toaster, and slow-moving household pets. Your goal to install Opera on everything you love will be thwarted by Apple. So I believe Opera’s message here is: you don’t need an iPhone when you can have the mobile web on your crummy old phone right now! To which I reply: you don’t need client software, you can have a server-side web optimizer that works with iPhone’s Safari browser and your crummy old phone’s built in browser right now, no download! It’s called Skweezer, and we just updated it to version 4, which seems to be the right number for mobile web browsing products released in the summer of 2007.