Naming conventions

In a little more than a month, the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association will convene the 2004 Wireless I.T. & Entertainment show in San Francisco. The show--the association's smaller, more data-focused version of its spring blowout--shows promise and should ride the wave of all the mobile data momentum generated by, among other things, recent deployments of true commercial 3G services (see this week's cover story of Telephony).

Unfortunately for the new management of the CTIA, the event is saddled with the previous administration's unfortunate decision to recast it from a more general wireless applications show (appropriately named "Wireless Apps") to one marked by an arbitrary breakdown between two niches of mobile data (enterprise and entertainment). The name and accompanying direction of the event didn't make any sense at the time the CTIA changed it, and it makes even less sense now.

It's not just about the name, either. (Take it from the editor of a magazine called Telephony that's been around for more than a century and covers territory that extends vastly beyond just "telephony": A lot can be done to change people's perception of what's in a name.) It's about a major industry association's pigeonholing of mobile data applications into two finite categories, effectively fencing in the evolution of the concept of mobile data services--not just for an annual event, but for an industry as a whole.

What's more, while one of the two categories the CTIA selected to represent the future of mobile data via its annual show already has proved to be one of the most promising, the other seems to be destined for a much longer development cycle. The concept of "wireless I.T." is a nascent one--and if anything, refers more at this point to wireless extension of broadband networks via technologies like Wi-Fi than it does to mobility and mobile data services in the enterprise network environment.

The mobile data applications environment is one of the most potentially rich and obviously embryonic sectors of the wireless industry, and it will never be distinct or limited enough to be labeled. If I were CTIA president and CEO Steve Largent, the first thing I would do when I take the stage on Oct. 25 in San Francisco is to acknowledge that reality and announce that the 2005 show will go back to the original name of CTIA Wireless Apps--or, better yet, take on the new, broad and future-proof name of CTIA Mobile Multimedia.

E-mail me at jmeyers@primediabusiness.com.