Presented in September 2014 as part of the "What Do You Know Sydney - The Smackdown Edition" event. IMPORTANT CONTEXT: each speaker was assigned a specific topic to debate. In my case, I was asked to defend "m-dot" (mobile specific) sites against responsive design. I do not necessarily agree with all of the points in this talk. (But I totally won anyway.)

1. M-DOT SITES
not as sucky as you think

2. #FML

3. Why M-dot sites are better:
• Better performance on crappy phones with crappy
Internet connections (ie all of them)
• Custom mobile content leads to better SEO
• Custom mobile interface makes it easy for users to
actually do stuff
• Simple mobile site is way, way easier to build

4. Performance Matters
• Data Plans
• Bandwidth
• Latency
• CPU & RAM
RWD = OVERKILL!
SLOWER PAGES =
LESS MONEY

5. Page load time +100ms
=
1% drop in revenue
Page load time 6s → 1.2s
=
+12% revenue & 25% PVs
Page load time -2.2s
=
+15.4% conversions

6. “Users don’t!
give a shit!
if your site is
responsive”
- Brad Frost

7. Content and SEO
• Content should be short and
to the point - CLICKBAIT
• Images should be cropped
and zoomed
• SEO tailored for mobile
audience with particular goals
• Put alternative and canonical
references in meta tags or
XML sitemaps

8. User Experience
• Highlight functionality users
actually want
• Make it work really nicely with
touch screens: big targets,
icons rather than text
• Use mobile-specific HTML5
form elements
• Support older phones if you
can: 38.5% of the world has a
smartphone, which means
61.5% don’t

9. Complexity
• More powerful mobile devices
don’t mean you should
reproduce the desktop site
• RWD = trying to support an
infinite number of viewing
experiences without
necessarily optimising for any
particular one
RWD = one size fits all!
M-dot = WAY SIMPLER

11. M-dot sites rule.
Sharkie drools.
Kris Howard
@web_goddess
I work at Mi9.
Ask me about jobs.