College sports gets mobile ‘Lift’

By Andrew Lippe

Lift Mobile, a mobile solution developed by UsableNet, has been selected by multiple universities to deliver sports content to mobile devices without the need of downloads, or registering on a separate mobile site. Its technology accommodates all Web-enabled cell phones including BlackBerry s, Palm Treo, and PDAs.

Lift Mobile, will provide game scores, game statistics, and team news for students, alumni and fans for many universities including the University of Illinois, Youngstown State University, Grand Valley State University, Northeastern University, Ohio Wesleyan University and University of Houston; Clear Lake.

We created a dynamic mobile solution, says Jason Taylor, Director of Mobile Products, UsableNet. “And it isn’t limited to colleges.” Lift Mobile is also used by Delta Airlines and Amtrak to offer flight and train information to mobile devices. Lift Mobile, also allows content owners to extend their web business through advertising and sponsorships.

Lift Mobile s top aspect is that it detects browser types and adapts to different formats. Also, regardless of the mobile device capability, Lift Mobile, functions even on a non JavaScript device and provides users with a customized interface. Anyone, anywhere can view this content, adds Taylor.

To install Lift Mobile users need a supported operating system with the proper Tomcat and Java packages already installed. Any Linux box with a 1Ghz processor, 512 MB of RAM and 6 GB of disk space is enough to support the Lift Mobile system.

The Lift Mobile system has succeeded with universities where the Mobile ESPN device struggled. The University of Illinois is successful using our approach because, unlike the ESPN Mobile model, the University does not need to control the device or the wireless carrier, says Taylor. If you have a phone or PDA with web access you can access http://www.fightingilllini2go.com, so the service is available to all.