(keitai-l) Re: BREW vs J2ME: money vs standards

From: Benedict Evans <inherent_at_hotmail.com>
Date: 04/19/01
Message-ID: <LAW2-F14QgvXV3uDggv0000e900@hotmail.com>
>mJava delivered over the Web went over like a lead balloon.

How about, "How well would Flash have done if Macromedia had to approve 
every Flash file?"

>Code-as-content - with the arguable exception of cute Javascript hacks
>and games - seems like it just doesn't fly if the code can't get its >hands 
>on all kinds of user-privileged resources.  Which is a security >risk.  Bad 
>enough when it's your personal data, but what if the mission->critical app 
>is running on thousands of corporate-use phones.

I'm not sure that I follow your reasoning there. Sure, you need security 
(MExE is full of it). But why is 'Qualcomm says it's OK' any better than a 
sandbox?

I don't think security on the handset against malicious programs (the point 
behind both the sandbox and Qualcomm's certification) is about protecting 
your personal data. That isn't on the handset anyway (except for your 
phone-book). What you need to do is stop people replacing the interface, or 
sniffing the browser for credit cards, or making voice calls to premium-rate 
numbers in Moldavia when the phone's in your pocket: you need to restrict 
access to the handset functions.

The applets you load that need personal info - be they personal banking or 
B2E (business to employee - the new buzzword - watch for it in Red Herring 
in 6 months) will use SSL to get it from a remote server.

As I understand it, the advantage of BREW is not the security, but the 
execution speed, because the code runs natively. (I think) the use of 
certification instead of a sandbox is part of this.

>So anyway, if you DO get a big slug of VC money to do mobile-phone
>games, why not develop iApplis in preparation for the i-mode >introduction 
>in the U.S.?

Better yet, why not develope them in Europe, and get the added benefit of a 
functional mobile phone system?

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Received on Thu Apr 19 12:57:46 2001