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to create a framework that could help in classi-
fication of user motivation in relation to mobile
browsing. Taylor et al. tried to understand users
by classifying their motivations, behavior, and
physical settings. Motivations are divided into two
subcategories— utilitarian and hedonic ; although
the division was not originally invented by Kim
et al ., they base their use of this classification
on a paper by Kim et al . (2002) who studied the
use contexts of, and usability problems with, the
mobile Internet. Behavioral aspects were divided
into info seeking , action support , and info ex-
change . The Physical setting is a list of locations
or activities, such as 'home', 'work', or 'walking'.
Based on this classification, Taylor et al. aim to
provide tools for more effectively building user
scenarios to help product/service creation. Their
work focuses on creating tools for future work;
as such, it does not provide extensive information
on the frequency of different motivations (though
so called utilitarian motivations seem to be more
common in their study) or behaviors.
Cui and Roto (2008) combined the results
from multiple studies published between 2004 and
2007. They analyzed the mobile Web use of 47
people in 6 cities (and countries). The users were
familiar with mobile Web use; they were mostly
male and could be considered early adopters of
technology. Based on contextual inquiries, Cui
and Roto found that the mobile Web is often used
in stationary, rather than truly mobile, settings.
People browse both when alone and in social situ-
ations, but browsing sessions are for fairly short
periods of time. The length of browsing sessions
depends on network access type; people browse
for longer when they have WLAN access than
when they have cellular network access. Accord-
ing to Cui and Roto, the cost associated with the
different network access types is the main reason
for this difference. Cui and Roto divide user ac-
tivities when browsing on mobile devices into to
3 categories: information seeking; communica-
tion; and content object handling. All these can
be done for utilitarian or entertainment purposes.
The most common activity when browsing was
related to communication, and being aware of
social networks (via email mostly). Based on their
study, Cui and Roto observed that mobile Web
use sometimes changes people's daily chores and
behavior; for example, people choose routes that
have better network connections.
Hinman et al. (2008) adopted a very different
approach in their study; they studied 8 Internet
users in the U.S.; all users were familiar with both
mobile and full Web access. For four days, users
were allowed to use the Internet only on their
mobiles; the usage data was then analyzed together
with their 'natural' usage data that had been re-
corded prior to the deprivation study. Hinman and
her colleagues found that users' PC-based Internet
browsing experience substantially influenced their
perceptions of the Internet. Even when using a
mobile browser, users' usage motivation was in
line with their desktop computer use—the feeling
of being connected was more important than the
actual tasks done online. During the deprivation
period, users tried to follow, on their mobile device,
the same Internet usage patterns they had devel-
oped using their desktop computer, but found it
difficult and were unhappy about the situation. A
feeling of disconnectedness from social networks
was one of the strong feelings reported by users.
It was clear that desktop computer usage pat-
terns did not work on mobile devices. Based on
their study, Hinman et al. draw the metaphorical
conclusion that PC-based Internet browsing is
like scuba diving, and the mobile-based Internet
experience is like snorkeling. Internet browsing on
a desktop computer is like scuba diving because it
is immersive; it invites exploration and discovery,
and it supports multitasking. The mobile Internet
experience is like snorkeling because attention is
divided, and it is difficult to get totally immersed.
Based on my experience, this metaphor de-
scribes well the experience of users that use both
desktop computers and mobile phones to access
the Internet. The same experience was described
by one user in an unpublished media sharing
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