...Mobile devices in the developing world are shared resources, not personal computers used by a single person, as the smart-phone model assumes. One phone may be used by a whole family—or a whole community where an entrepreneur offers phone services. Pursuing the path to increasingly beautiful (and expensive) personal gadgets simply does not serve these people's interests. Instead, they need their mobile identities to be freed from hardware.

This is a radical shift for companies seeking new audiences in the developing world, but it can be done. At Frog, we have been working with a startup called Movirtu on a technology that allows people to use any handset to access their personal information. Now, why can't my iPhone or Droid do that?

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