Informa’s Mobile Web USA conference held last week in San Francisco brought together an interesting group of people and companies deeply invested in mobilizing the web (pun intended). There were a number of great presentations about innovation in the mobile ecosystem, getting consumers to adopt mobile content, whether flat data pricing is what will ignite the market for mobile services, and so on. Among the more interesting discussions (and not just because it was my panel) were those anchored around the notion of “open.” What struck me most at the conclusion of our panel is the relative ambiguity associated with the words “open” among an audience of people who live and breathe this stuff. No wonder the ecosystem is so confused.

There was lots of talk about how “open” is such a selling point to the consumer (does the average Joe even know what this means?) and why therefore “open” is essential for getting the mobile web to ignite. There was the usual hand wringing about whether carriers were really committed to an open strategy and a lot of generalization about “open equals good, closed (carriers) equals bad.” But what was obviously missing was any discussion about what incentives might be necessary to support such an “open” strategy. One might argue – as many did - that the best and most logical role for the carrier is to be entirely open (aka the dumb pipe) but at least for now, the carriers are not convinced that it is in their best interest to be the mobile ecosystem’s version of the public good.

But, I actually think the “open” discussion goes hand in hand with the “ownership” discussion. The mobile web is an example of an ecosystem in need of a catalyst to ignite it. It is the role of the catalyst to, in essence, own the ecosystem by aligning the interests of all of the stakeholders so that everyone profits. The problem today is that none of the players who are vying for that role, except possibly Google, really understand how to make that happen. Most, including the operators, don’t seem to get that everyone has to profit or else the ecosystem stalls. That is sort of where we are today, since operators who are positioned as could-be catalysts, don’t really get that their business model has to start looking more catalyst-like if they want to avoid the fate of their landline ancestors.

So my takeaway from my panel and the program is that the elephant in the room today isn’t whether open is good or whether closed is bad; it is the lack of clarity around who really has responsibility for igniting the catalytic reaction that will make the mobile web not just possible, but profitable. So, that brings me to the title of this post and why I wrote it in the first place.

At the end of the conference, I listened to a fantastic presentation by an executive from Nokia who described their transformation from handset manufacturer to an internet services company. It’s impressive. They are clearly innovating in this space, everything from their Ovi portal (which he made a point of saying he could not talk about) to their N95 handsets to their deal with Tru that allows customers to make calls over the internet (bypassing the carrier entirely). Then he got to the part about how the mobile web is “everyone’s responsibility,” that everyone needs to work really hard to make the mobile web something that consumers want, value and use. He went on to describe his vision of how that would work – from the consumers’ and developers’ point of view, ignoring completely the elephant in the room. Sure, saying everyone should work together is like saying we should all work together to end world hunger. It’s a worthy goal and an even better soundbite, but someone has to step up and lead the way. It is the lack of clarity now about how “everyone’s work” will be monetized that’s creating the impasse today throughout the mobile ecosystem.

Maybe Nokia is being naïve in making these statements or maybe it is what the corporate song sheets tell speakers they need to say. But, maybe it’s something else entirely. Maybe it’s that Nokia is getting into position to become the mobile catalyst and just wants to make nice to everyone before they do.