Redesigning the Web for Touch Screens

iPhones and other touch-screen based mobile devices provide a slew of challenges for user experience designers, and it’s not just the size of the screen:

Web designers will have to wrestle with several issues when considering touch computers. For one thing, touch interfaces don’t give users the fine-grained control that they have with a mouse.

and

roll-over interactions are common on many websites, but these don’t work on touch devices. Other common tricks, such as hovering over a link to see the connected URL in the status bar, have to be adjusted before a user can perform the same function

Given that within the year  there will easily be over 100 million touch screen devices in the wild, this is a potentially serious issue for businesses looking to connect with their users’ evolving needs. Some sites will need complete make-overs, others will need some subtle tweaks and other sites will need new mobile/touch screen versions.

There will also be a whole new range of opportunities to take advantage of mobile and touch-screen-specific capabilities to reach markets in new ways.

via Technology Review: Redesigning the Web for Touch Screens.