WebProNews

Shades of Jon Stewart! An award recipient at the Mobile Marketing Association's rave admonished the big names in mobile services for limiting creativity.

Nick Desai's Juice Wireless received an award in the category of best use of mobile marketing for its Epi To Go application. Visitors to Epicurious.com can search for recipes and send them along with a shopping list to a mobile phone.

Sprint Nextel, Cingular, and Verizon limit the potential of mobile phones, AdAge noted from Desai's comments in its report:

"Let's open up the barriers and not stifle creativity," he urged while accepting an award for best use of mobile marketing.

"We all compete with each other, begging the carrier to get on deck," said Mr. Desai. "How do you build great applications? I have no idea," he said. "The people who do are the consumer." But the industry is too focused on what the device can do or what rivals are doing. Wireless carriers also are trying to duplicate the TV or Internet experience on the phone, he added, instead of trying to find what makes sense for the third screen.
Not surprisingly, wireless executives disagreed. "There's plenty of opportunity for creativity," John Styers, director-wireless messaging & imaging consumer solutions for Sprint Nextel said in the story. Carriers need to control their portal to serve "the best interest of the target market and subscriber base."

David Utter is a staff writer for WebProNews covering technology and business. Email him here.