Recently, there have been rapid developments in the fields of mobile and wireless technologies which have enabled the acquisition of information at anytime regardless of the location and mobility status of the users. However, despite the increasing popularity of mobile devices which are becoming an indispensable part of our everyday activities, the disappointing results regarding the adoption and use of mobile applications and data services lead scholars to question the understanding of the adoption and usage behaviour within these new wireless environments. The author believes that there could be attributes which are still unexplored and could provide an explanation why the mobile data services are still unsuccessful. The aim of this study is to explore, understand and highlight the role of place in the decision of the people to use mobile data services and thus to assist professionals and scholars to consider the importance of the attributes of place in the design of new applications and in the adoption and usage models of mobile technologies and services. In order to achieve this objective an exploratory in nature research was conducted combining conventional and innovative research methodologies. A model of place was generated which served as a sensitizing device in order to interpret, and analyse the collected data. The first phase of this research involved the understanding of the market in question and the selection of the appropriate case (mobile data services platform) to conduct the research. The second main phase of the research then sought to get a better understanding of how users experience place before deciding to use mobile data services. The research methods were applied within everyday settings with 30 users of the selected mobile data services platform, all of whom were selected according to specific criteria. The findings tend to suggest that participants did experience the different places in a similar way before deciding to use mobile data services.

行動上網之概念已提出多年，然受制於硬體規格限制與資訊實用面廣度、深度不足，因此市場未如預期般快速成長。如今受惠於系統業者廣佈GPRS系統，功能性手機普及化，以及內容提供者積極參與，行動數據服務始展露一絲曙光。和信電訊公司看好市場前景，藉與NTT DoCoMo合資關係引進行動上網服務典範─i-mode。本研究之主要目的旨在檢視目前台灣i-mode服務之品質，經結合理論探討與實務分析，具體提出發展行動數據服務之改善要素。 本研究彌補國內相關研究在深度上之不足，採質性研究法，以NTT DoCoMo發展i-mode服務為模式，就技術、內容、策略和使用之關鍵面向，深入訪談系統業者、內容提供者和使用者後，交叉分析以找出三者認知上之落差，進而推論改善行動數據服務品質之關鍵要素，並提出建議解決方案。 本研究結果發現：系統業者之改善要素包括價格、手機選擇、連線品質、行銷、後端管理及利潤分享；內容提供者之改善要素包括價格、實用性、介面、品牌及獲利模式。本研究最大貢獻亦在於提供相關業者諸多建言及產業發展方針，整體而論：第一，系統業者應致力於提升行動上網平台之可用性；第二，內容提供者宜鎖定目標客群主動創造需求；第三，系統業者和內容提供者應從商業合作關係提升為策略聯盟關係。在延伸討論部份，本研究認為：第一，應建立以內容聚集為中心之商務模式架構；第二，推動XHTML做為改善非人性化介面和網路封閉性之解決方案；第三，將行動數據服務從以個人為單位提升到社會關係的層次；第四，開發企業用途之應用，將服務拓展至企業市場。 / The concept of mobile internet has been introduced many years ago; however, due to the limits of hardware standards and the inadequacies of breadth and depth of information practicability, the market didn’t rise and flourish as expectations. Now because of the benefits of distributions of GPRS network system, popularization of feature cellular phones, and active participation of content providers, the mobile data services start to grow. With faith in good prospects of the market, the KGT company introduced i-mode, the paradigm of mobile internet services, from NTT DoCoMo through their partnership. The main purposes of this research are to view the quality of recent i-mode service in Taiwan, and to concretely propose key improving factors of developing mobile data services through integration of theory reviews and practice analyses. For retrieving the lacks of depth in former domestic researches, this research uses the i-mode service as an example and adopts qualitative research methods by deeply interviewing with the operator, the content providers, as well as the users on critical aspects of the technology, the content, the strategy, and the usage. Then, after cross-analyzing to find gaps of the cognition among the three roles, this research infers the key factors to improve the quality of mobile data services and proposes the corresponding solutions. The major findings of this research are as follows. The improving factors of operators includes the price, the phones selectivity, the connection quality, the marketing, and the profits share. Those of content providers includes the price, the practicability, the interface, the brand, and the profit-earning model. This thesis also contributes many suggestions and guidelines of industry development for relevant players. First, operators should strive for enhancing the usability of mobile internet platforms. Second, content providers ought to aim at target customers and actively create demands. Third, the relationship of operators and content providers must be promoted from business cooperation to strategic alliance. In the section of extended discussions, this research presents several recommendations. First, a framework of content aggregation-centered business models should be established. Second, XHTML should be drived as a solution to improve recent unfriendly interfaces and network closure. Third, mobile data services based on individuals should be raised to a high level based on social relationships. Fourth, services should be expanded to cooperate market by developing applications for enterprise purposes.