I never post such raw notes on this blog, but I thought, better raw than never tonight. I haven’t been to Mobile Monday in years, but spurred on by @roneo I went along.

Meet up flavour

Cheery friendly crowd ready to network and chat. Markedly more guys than gals. Devs, designers, developers… was there an investor or two in the room?

Speakers pitched their business ventures, spruiked projects and shared thoughts on topics they were passionate about as follows.

1. Mobile payments … Company mopay, come from gaming and dating industries, multiple payment flows and skins. Mopay.com. Q&A Merchants get paid within 21 days.
2. Hyperlocal with the “neighbourhood networks” platform. From usyd. Services, location for communities. Users can block neighbours, Define areas based on radius e.g. Item borrowing, catering, dating. The radius likely narrower for borrowing. Www.neighbourhoodnetworks.com.au. Incorporate data sets from gov like post codes and municipality.
3. WeSync. App for couples to communicate and understand each other better. Sets rewards and brownie points. People can register moods, moments, rewards. Launched 2 weeks ago. QA we sync is about hacking personal relationships, future plans for parent and business versions. Peso ally I think this is gamifying rather than hacking relationships.
4. Re-Placement speaker! BYOD organically been occurring in the corporate space. New terms! MDM Mobile device management. Is the slice of pie in SaAAS or BYOD? And of course something available for any scenario…more interesting is who owns the model? Ok clearly my notes didn’t cover this very well but you get the terrain hopefully.
5. Dan from Razorfish…and some other iOS dev company. What is the best way of outsourcing mobile development? Experience levels vary. Dos and dont’s of outsourcing development. If you give em a spec they will build it pixel perfect. But the data model/code can come back crooked. Have a domain expert in the field (windows, android, iOS) to own the “scaffolding” decisions, the data model. Might be somewhat costly at first , but it tends to be more effective than separating interaction design to data models. Q&A is your time saved or spent in quality assurance after build? Indecision is the real killer (references chaos review?). Fit for purpose = scope.
6. App village. “Community innovator” bringing together investors with app developers. Everyone has had an app idea. App village is about facilitating the process of development, finding and marketing. Experts assess submitted ideas. Research idea and target market to uncover features. Unique royalty based model. Project manage the whole process. Source ideas, designers, developers, and even consumers of apps. New apps coming out…bear hugs and food frenzie. Www.theappvillage.com. They own the IP but the idea owner earns the royalties. Revenue model is they take 40% of the royalties. 10% to the investor, 10% to the idea owner…and sorry I didn’t grab the rest.
7. Flash IZ. Payment (another presentation) has evolved over time. Innovators are challenging cash. Customers: people e.g. from Emerging economies who have access to smart phones but not access to credit. First world customers who just want to leave their cards and cash at home.
8. A 16 yo entrepreneur. Ok I feel inadequate now. This guy has launched a voice based taxi app and spoke about the process of making his idea a reality, and the companies he partnered with. 8 months of development, 8 employees. taxi 24/7. Has 17,000 users. If you want to follow the career of this young gun keep an eye on Zeryab Cheema. Is the product the app or the Voice SDK?
9. Ian Lyons. A polemic re email on mobile. The mobile phone is a one thumb browsing device. Most emails and newsletters are optimised for desktop experiences. But you don’t have to pinch and zoom emails from real people. Easy to forget how simple you have to make the design. Subject lines? The simpler, more casual the better as proven by the Obama campaign. Send mobile optimised emails! Responsive to the rescue. Sydney festival examples. Plug for campaign monitor and mail chimp’s new features.
10. Roger @Rog42. Top 20 iphone Apps for motor cyclists. Apps for sharing experiences, knowledge and location amongst others.

The winner tonight? Stock images and PowerPoint smart graphics. Also super passionate Ian Lyons and super charming @rog42 talking biking and life…just lovely.