On my terms

Do you really need that on a mobile application?

It’s high time the application developers start to see mobile & computers as two fundamentally different devices.

Computers in their early days were often a shared property among a group of academicians, students etc. Things have changed over time. You have a computer available for yourself wherever you go - there is an office machine, lab machine, home machine and so on. Through out this time, users have never had a one to one relationship with a computer. Hence, a user authentication system based on a login/pwd on each use makes a lot of sense.

On the other hand, mobile phones right from their introduction have been a personal asset. Mobile phones are full of personal information - all kept open. People don’t share their mobiles with each other. Keeping all this in mind, and looking at the mobile device in isolation, does it look sensible to ask me a login whenever I use an application on my mobile.

I am not proposing any solution here(as there are many), I am just trying to identify the problem.

- If there are things that you hate to see on your mobile phone, do leave a comment about them