With that as background, here are the blogs that made this week’s lineup:

The favorite blog (and Pick of the Week) comes from Troy Brown, chief architect and president of one50one, whose guest column on MobileGroove expertly outlines how brands and marketers can address a multicultural audience. The column also details the impact of 4G, location & personalization on the mediascape of multicultural marketing, and brings our attention to what will surely be an explosion in mobile video.

• Advantix Solutions also looks at 4G in a post that explains what it really means for the average consumer.
• Audrey Watters, a newcomer to the COM, focuses on mobile learning in a post where she also challenges us to re-think education and imagine how learning in the digital age might blend hip hop, digital and mobile.
• Mark Bridge from Fonecast talks to Ovivo Mobile, an ad-funded mobile virtual network operator.
• Brian Katz highlights the real savings behind the idea of BYOD (Bring Your Own device).
• Another piece worthy of inclusion, although not officially submitted for the Carnival, comes from BBC Technology Correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones. Rory details his recent difficulties with mobile money payment applications. He aims to see how far he can get without cash over the coming days, so it’s a story worth following.

 [READ COM #272 HERE]

• Tomi Ahonen walks us through the OTT landscape and details why operators fear messaging apps and services such as BBM, iMessage, Skype & Co. Tomi dives into the numbers to quantify the damage and suggest the Empire [Operators] may Strike Back.
• Disruptive Dean Bubley counters with a pair of thought-provoking posts that bring us a new perspective. Yes, operators should fight back against the OTT threat — but they can win the battle if they launch their own own-brand VOIP and Internet-based messaging services.
• Voice on Telecom looks at the South Korean market and the impact of  OTT messaging (offered by provider KakaoTalk). Will this happen elsewhere in the world? Read on and find out!
• Scott Hanselman on Scott Hanselman’s Computer Zen takes a humorous look at the industry obsession with outdated icons. Floppy disk?! It means save for ‘us’ but youth can’t possibly make the connection. It’s a great post — and don’t forget to check out the comments section.
• Antoine RJ Wright chimes in with a post that lists all the phone functions he feels are outdated. Do we really need a Web browser? Antoine argues its a concept borrowed from the PC that we should leave where we found it.
• Mobile design guru Steven Hoober is not sold on the iPhone and points out how the ergonomics of this device could be vastly improved.
• Post that made a similar argument include The Samsung Galaxy S III: The First Smartphone Designed Entirely By Lawyers by Ron Amadeo on the Android Police blog (who argues the Samsung Galaxy SIII is ugly), and  Leigh Geary of the CoolSmartPhone blog, who asks if the Samsung Galaxy SIII is the ‘Next big thing’…
• Wilson Kerr on the Unbound Commerce blog observes a gap between the number of smartphone owners in the U.S. and the number of brands and retailers that have mobile-optimized websites.
• MobileGroove contributor and social media authority Ken Herron provides a detailed post packed with practical advice for marketers looking to harness Pinterest, which is also the third largest social network on the planet. How do you ‘pinterest-ize’ your content (when it isn’t visual to begin with)? Ken has the answers.
• Lynette Anthony Hundermark of mystechblog.com exposes a number of mobile apps out there that are — well — a FAIL. They can’t pass even the most basic criteria for a good user experience.
• Chris Reynolds on MobyAffiliates provides a list of 70 app stores, subdivided by cross-platform, operating system, manufacturer and operator.
• David Eads on the Mobile Manifesto blog looks at the ‘why’ and ‘how’ behind building a solid business case for mobile, using the example of mobile banking.

Pick of the Week — and a nod of respect — goes to the MobyAffiliates list of mobile app stores.

[READ COM #271 HERE]

Volker comes to us with “verve” and provides his pick after reading through (as he put it on his blog) a “plethora of good stuff from the trenches of mobile.”

Among the posts that made the lineup:

• All About Symbian brings us two contributions exploring aspects of device and OS design. And they both ask some tough questions. The first argues that — in a multi-screen world — we need to start asking (and questioning) if we actually have a ‘hone screen’ anymore. The second submission looks at the size of smartphones and raises the question: When is bog too big?
• Andy Favell over at Mobithinking — a topnotch destination for mobile stats and insights — connects the dots in analyst reports and provides us a comprehensive overview of the mobile market in China. One data point to whet your appetite for more: China has more than 430 million mobile Internet users, which is more than the population of either Europe or North America. It’s a worthwhile read, so be sure to read thoroughly!
• MobileGroove has a post from guest author Jeff Hasen looking at the steps the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC)  is taking to stem the use and distribution of social media and user generated content. Is this likely to be effective? Or is it all a huge step backward? Read on and decide for yourself.
• MobyAffiliates weighs in with a post on AppStore optimization, detailing what you need to do to be sure your app gets noticed.

Finally,

Mobile Payments Today helps us navigate the mobile payments jungle, and the complexities in connecting the systems that help us buy products using our mobile devices (these include different POS systems, card providers and loyalty programs).

 [READ COM #270 HERE]

A note to everyone reading and enjoying this weekly collection of the best mobile blogging:

We encourage everyone, everywhere on the planet to participate in the Carnival and join our COMmunity of 100+ influential bloggers and writers.

If you don’t have a post to share, then you can also take part by submitting the best blog(s) you have read this week (providing us your unique take on the post and a link back to the back to the site).

You can also sign up to host a Carnival at your own site. Just review the open slots on our Host Calendar and email me (peggy@mobilegroove.com) with your preferences. I’ll be in touch before you take the helm to ensure you understand the nuts & bolts, and get the most out of the opportunity to curate the best of mobile blogging.

In the lineup this week:

• Lynette Hundermark over at Gadgets and All Things Digital takes a hard (and hands-on) look at the new LinkedIn iPad App.
• Lisa Ciangiulli over at Optism explores how companies can reward and shape consumer behavior. What will commerce and marketing look like now that shoppers can earn value (loyalty points, free airtime etc) in exchange for participation (paying attention, ranking/rating, advocating and/or committing to a brand-sponsored charity event).
• MobyAffiliates — always a great source for lists, directories and practical mobile advice — brings us a roundup of the best mobile app promotion agencies, networks, and tools for marketing and distributing mobile applications.
• Joy Liuzzo makes her debut over at MobileGroove (where she is regular contributor on all things related to consumer behavior and research) looks at the emergence of Mobile Sentient Beings, and what brands and marketers have to do NOW to keep our trust and head off the public backlash destined to happen if privacy breaches continue.

Thanks again to out host Advantix Solutions, which is also hosting webinars focused data security and the impact of mobile apps on business. Check out their Webinar series, Mobile Data Security & Applications in the Enterprise.

[READ COM #269 HERE]

As she writes in her blog: “In our dynamic industry, we’ve found that keeping abreast of what ecosystem members are saying is critical to staying on top. That’s why we published our Permission Marketing in the News blogs for almost two years! Now, we’re happy and honored to be a Carnival of the Mobilists host — and we’ve got a great collection of articles to suggest to you this week.” We’re proud to have her ­— and look forward to having Optism host a COM again soon. You can keep up-to-date on her blog and the great job her team does curating the mobile news you need to know on Twitter @Optism.

Meantime, let’s get this party started with a line-up of the posts that made this week’s COM:

• Martin Wilson over at Mobileweb Company gives us his take on responsive web design and why it falls short when it comes to designing for mobile. It’s a great read (and makes a strong case against any approach short of developing a comprehensive mobile strategy), and was chosen by Optism as Post of the Week.
• Christopher Reynolds at mobyaffiliates provides us advice on how to best promote iOS and Android mobile apps. If you’re serious about making money from apps, then you’ll want to check this article out.
• UX Magazine’s Sachendra Yadav looked at how one app company uses onboarding as a strategy to turn customers into loyal customers.
• Over at Mobile Payments Today, Bruce Burke gives us new perspectives on the highlights of his recent Social, Mobile, Payments conference. Is it all a ‘numbers’ game in the MoSo space? Read on and find out.
• Steve Litchfield over at All About Windows Phone walks us through phone camera innovations and their impact.
• MobileGroove and partner UNTETHER.tv bring us a new episode of M-Pulse. This time the focus is design and the guest is Arturo Toldeo, Senior User Experience Design in the Windows Phone Design Studio. There’s also a nod to our fave Mobilist Tomi Ahonen for his new list of the largest mobile social networks to date by size. A worthy global resource indeed!
• Michelle Manafy, MobileGroove contributor, gives us her take on a new report about how (and why) Digital Natives switch media, devices, platforms 27 times an hour. What can content companies and marketers do to grab their attention? Michelle has some straightforward advice.
• Dean Bubley over at Disruptive Wireless takes a hard look at where rich communications suite (RCS) is in terms of adoption and implementation, and pays special attention to RCS-e and the Joyn services recently unveiled and branded as such by the GMSA.
• Kerry Skemp, Marketing Director at SnapHop, gives a break from the stats and heavier side of mobile to provide us a lighter look at mobile inspired by observations from a bicycle race. Simple and elegant common sense.

Honorable mention goes to Russell Buckley (the original COM founder) who wrote a thought-provoking piece about the real future for traditional middle class professions in a Digital Age. Optism submitted it on his behalf — and I’m glad they did. It’s a must-read, especially for parents and teachers as they council youth.

[READ COM #268 HERE]

Meantime, here is a lineup of some of the posts that made the COM this week.

James Coops over at mobyaffiliates shares a new, and evolving list he calls the ‘Best Mobile App Developer Directory. It includes iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Phone 7 and HTML5 developers, grouped by geographical region. If you don’t see your company or name on the list, then contact James.

MobileGroove columnist Jeff Hasen — one of the leading CMOs you need to follow to get the inside track on mobile marketing trends and developments — draws from his recent book (Mobilized Marketing: Driving Sales, Engagement, and Loyalty Through Mobile Devices) to provide some practical advice on how marketers can learn from regions to execute a successful strategy. A surprise: Asia may be a hotbed of ideas and innovation, but marketers shouldn’t assume marketing models and approaches that fly there will yield the same results everywhere…

We welcome COM newcomer Natasha Hutchinson over at Adfonic who tells us why marketers must shift their media budgets to mobile. It’s packed with insights and stats — which is why it is also WIP’s Pick of the Week.

Finally, WIP share an interview it conducted with Gary Yentin, CEO of AppPromo, on how to get known (and discovered) without a massive marketing budget.

Next week the COM touches down at Optism with a special focus on the hot topic in mobile: commerce.

[READ COM #267 HERE]

Posts that made the COM this week include:

• Steve Litchfield recommends a recent from post from Ewan Spence making a case for Microsoft Windows Phone. A timely post indeed if we consider recent data from ABI Research’s showing that Microsoft is gaining significant momentum. According to senior analyst Aapo Markkanen, “One message we hear from many developers is that, purely technically speaking, Windows Phone is actually a rather appealing platform. And if it turns out to be a platform for relatively high-end devices, avoiding the fragmentation pitfalls of Android, it won’t even need to achieve a remarkably large market share to attract a vibrant app scene. The arrival of the first Windows 8 tablets, as well as Windows Phone’s upgrade to the Apollo iteration, should also give it a boost, since developers can reuse their code to launch on various screen sizes.”
• James Coops at MobyAffiliates dissects the OMGPOP’s game, Draw Something. A great post chock-full of usage and download statistics, revenues and financials.
• Mark Bridge at The Fonecast gives us the inside track on RIM.
• MobileGroove and UNTETHER.tv submit the 10th episode of their weekly video show M-Pulse. This time the guest is Bango CEO Ray Anderson, who talks about recent deals (Amazon, RIM, Facebook) and what developers need to know to ask for (and get) money from their customers.
• MobileGroove guest columnist Hillel Fuld shares his three tips for developers serious about generating more clicks and — ultimately— more revenues from their mobile apps.
• Lynette Anthony-Hundermark ­— who is a true Mobile Passionate — puts experience before technology and makes a strong case for the importance of user experience (UX) first. Our newest (and certainly most lively!) Mobilist also shares the details of her UX Masterclass Conference. So read one and enjoy!
• Tomi Ahonen is back this week with another thought-provoking post. The title says it all: The ‘Cliff Theory’ ie How Handset Makers Die, why in Mobile Phones do Companies Collapse so Rapidly (Siemens, Motorola, Palm, Nokia, Blackberry and Windows Mobile). It’s not a light right — but it is easy to see why Tomi’s blog was named a must-read destination for all things mobile by Forbes(!)

And, finally, Tego Interactive’s Pick of the Week goes to COM veteran and enthusiast Antoine RJ Wright, who shares worthwhile insights about the need for a contextual UI, or smart interface.

 [READ COM #266 HERE]

And before we move on  — allow me to cover some important housekeeping items:

1. We are still looking for a host to take the helm April 16th — so step up to take the helm! Please email me at peggy@mobilegroove.com or mobilists@gmail.com if you want to take the slot.
2. Further to my emails and ‘nudges’ please send in your image (thumbnail), your Twitter handle and a 50-100 word description of what you do so we can add you to a new page that lists Mobilists and all the people who contribute their ideas and insights. THANK YOU.
3.  And don’t forget to follow the COM on Twitter (@TheMobilists) and spread the word!

Posts that made the COM lineup include:

Tomi Ahonen brings us another excellent and (predictably) controversial blog focusing on what he calls the “catastrophic situation with Nokia’s smartphones unit and the Lumia line.” Tomi’s blog is also the Pick of the Week.

Mobyaffiliates has a double-dose of mobile advertising insights. One looks at Facebook mobile advertising. The other outlines the pros and cons of rich media advertising.

Jonny Evans over at Orange Business blog brings our attention to a post and infographic expertly identifying the security implications of the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) trend and the impact on businesses everywhere.

Chetan Sharma brings us another installment of his U.S. Wireless Market Update, providing us insights about the market in 4Q2011 and forecasts for 2012. As with ALL of Chetan’s reports, its an essential read. The next global update will be released in April 2012.

MobileGroove brings us a pair of posts for the two-week period this COM covers. First off is a companion analysis of the latest episode of M-Pulse, the weekly video show with UNTETHER.tv. They welcome Caroline Lewko over at WIP (Wireless Industry Partnership), who walks us through her new must-read guide for developers (PDF). Another post from MobileGroove is a podcast interview with BJ Emerson, VP of Technology at Tasti D-Lite, a company that literally wrote the book on SoLoMo.

The Voice on Telecom suggests that all companies (retailers, banks, the works!) could drive money (and more importantly, stickiness) if they were able to support/enable voice, text messaging and video chat via their own sites.

Anne Thomas provides a post, playfully titled Unrequited love on mobile web, that makes a hard case for mobile-optimized sites.

Nigel Scott submits several posts, but the one that makes this week’s lineup is a hard look at the business value of gamification.

Nigel’s other posts are were:

http://excapite.blogspot.com/2012/03/apple-you-can-bank-on.html

http://excapite.blogspot.com/2012/03/is-network-thinking-for-birds.html

http://renaissancechambara.jp/2012/03/23/android-and-differentiation/

Ged Caroll draws from his personal observations (overhearing a loud business meeting and pitch) and draws our attention to deeper questions about the state of the Android ecosystem.

Steve Litchfield has a double-dose of mobile blogging for us. First, he takes us back 10 years to recount the top 10 Qwerty Symbian phones. The second blog comes from his colleague David Gilson and looks at the evils of Micro SIM cards.

Lynette Anthony Hundermark, new to the COM, sends us two submissions as well. First, she road tests a mobile-optimized site by Four Seasons and critiques its (many shortcomings). Her second post didn’t make this lineup but it does earn an honorable mention. A self-identified ‘Apps Girl,’ Lynette walks us through her first-hand experience with the new Ster-Kinekor mobi site http://www.sterkinekor.mobi/. Check out the post here: http://mystechblog.com/post/8820372116/is-there-still-an-urgency-to-have-apps-when-you-have-a

[READ COM #265 HERE]

And before we move on to the next COM at Tego Interactive next week — allow me to cover some important housekeeping items:

1. We are still looking for hosts for slots in May. Please email me at peggy@mobilegroove.com or mobilists@gmail.com if you want to take the helm.
2. Further to my emails and ‘nudges’ please send in your image (thumbnail), your Twitter handle and a 50-100 word description of what you do so we can add you to a new page that lists Mobilists and all the people who contribute their ideas and insights. THANK YOU.
3.  And don’t forget to follow the COM on Twitter (@TheMobilists) and spread the word!

Posts that made the COM this week include:

• Tomi Ahonen over at the must-must read Communities Dominate blog brings us a valuable collection of data and insights. Promising all the stats and facts we need for 2012, this post keeps its promise.
• Mobile Insider’s Steve Smith shows that encouraging customer engagement isn’t just a focus for brands. It’s also a must for politicians. The title of his blog says it all: From Obama to Brands: Leveraging Participatory Engagement .
• Matt Kapko at Eye on Mobile reveals the real story (and the real human cost) behind our mobile devices — in particular the plight of the workers at Foxconn in China who produce mobile devices for Apple, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung and many more.
• Peter-Paul Koch on the QuirksMode blog voices his frustration with how mobile manufacturers — and smartphone OS and browser vendors — fail to provide developers with the devices (and support) they need to deliver sites and apps for the myriad of different platforms.
• Sticky Smartphone brings us a fascinating history of cameraphones — well timed and prompted by Nokia’s announcement of the new Nokia 808 Pureview.
• James Coops at MobyAffiliates has started making a useful list of mobile marketing and advertising agencies. He’s counted 88 so far, so contact him if your company isn’t included.
• Simon Andrews on the Addictive Mobile blog argues the time is NOW for mobile operators to stop being dumb pipes and become smart innovators.
• Lars Cosh-Ishii of Wireless Watch Japan asks whether Felica – Japan’s m-wallet/contactless payments system has plans for overseas expansion.
• TheFonecast.com’s James Rosewell considers the impact of Microsoft’s Windows 8, the new operating system that will bring — among other things — touch to the PC world.
• David Rogers at the Mobilephonesecurity.org blog uses an interesting anecdote to drive home the point that security is only as good as its weakest link.

Andy can’t pick just one Post of the Week and so the honors go to Matt Kapko — for the post that moved us most —and Tomi Ahonen — for the post that educated us most.

[READ COM #264 HERE]

• Peggy Anne Salz provides an analysis of her regular video show with UntetherTV. This week they continue their in-depth examination of the opportunities for mobile voice services and innovation.
• MobileGroove guest columnist Michelle Manafy draws on her new book, Dancing with Digital Natives, to give businesses advice on how they can best motivate the Millennial generation.
• Yomi Adegboye over at the Mobility Blog offers us a personal post about his own plans to go “mobile-only.” It’s a fascinating read and gives us insights into the evolving mobile market in Nigeria.
• Dave Olsen via Mobile in Higher Education blog recounts his experience with responsive mobile design and links to a number of sources that are currently leading this debate.
• Dmitry Namiot from Russia gives us an inside view on mobile app that blends Facebook and Google search.
• Johnny Evans from Futurity Media shares a detailed infographic all about NFC, on behalf of the guys over at Orange Business.

[READ COM #263 HERE]