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Flat pricing schemes for mobile internet are enticing customers to dramatically increase use of bandwidth. Interestingly enough, that is the axiom on which most operators have buidlt their mobile internet business models. Will this be sustainable in the long run?

The burgeoning legal challenges to Apple over its rapid advances in mobile computing mounted on Friday when Finland's Nokia launched a patent infringement suit over the iPad. Nokia accused Apple in a US federal court in Wisconsin of infringing five patents in the iPad, which has sold 1m units since its US debut in March. Nokia's suit cites technology used to enhance speech and data transmission and antenna innovations that allow for more compact devices. "These patented innovations are important to Nokia's success as they allow improved product performance and design," the Finnish company said in a statement. Apple had no immediate response. The Finnish company, the world's biggest mobile phone maker, is already in dispute with Apple over alleged patent infringement in the iPhone. IDC said on Friday that Nokia's smartphone market share in the first quarter was flat at 39 per cent, while Apple saw its share of the shipments jump to 16 per cent from 11 per cent a year ago, closing in on Canada's Research in Motion, the maker of the BlackBerry, which occupies second spot. Overall, smartphone sales rose 57 per cent in the quarter. The iPad is Apple's bid to leverage its smartphone success into a new category of mobile computing, with fingertip control instead of a mouse and an interface designed for consuming digital content. Apple announced on Friday that the device would go on sale outside the US at the end of the month in nine other countries. The US technology group is planning to charge more for the iPad in other countries than it does in the US, with UK prices starting at £429 ($632) for tablet devices, which currently only offers a WiFi connection to the internet. Prices in continental Europe will begin at €499 ($630). This compares with $499 in the US. The latest patent dispute, as well as the earlier cases, will aim to establish whether the intellectual property that powers Apple's mobile devices owes more to the world of mobile

A strange battle is coming up. Apple's portable devices cannot access Flash content on websites. The declared reason is that Apple thinks HTML5 content would work better on mobile devices and wants to force website developers to adopt this standard instead of Flash. This looks like a dangerous position: why should a company engaged in a standards batlle look for the "technically best" solution and forego the advantage of compatibility with the main complementary asset (the Internet)? Apple made a big mistake a few decades ago with a similar stance. Or, could it be that Apple thinks that the diffusion of the Flash proprietary standard is a threat?

Analysts are starting to recognize that - maybe - operating systems for smartphones will follow a different story than in the past. Instead of a winner-take-all market based on standardization, diversity is likely to prevail. This because handset makers and telcos will try to push in that direction  - as long as this will not reduce customer utility - and because the real source of value (and potential locus of standardization) now sits in the web and in social networks. In this case, which device and which OS is going to be used is going to be irrelevant.