If you design websites, build websites, or own a website, you might want to take note: iPhone users are surfing the web with a 480×320 screen resolution. The popular Blackberry 8830 has 320×240. And netbook users are surfing the web with resolutions as small as 800×480.

“What’s a netbook,” you ask? Netbooks are ultra-small, very-light laptops that have just enough processing power to surf the ‘net, send emails, and do basic office processing tasks. And…they’re super cheap. Most netbooks are currently selling for a few hundred bucks. Experts are predicting sub-$200 netbooks soon. Netbooks are selling like crazy in this tight economy. In Q3 of 2008, netbook sales rose 160%.

With more mobile devices and netbooks on the way, all of which have sub-standard screen resolutions, how do you make sure your site looks good and works well on all of them, regardless of resolution?

The way I see it, you have three choices:

1. Let ‘em deal with it.

You don’t have to do anything, technically. You can let website visitors deal with the way your site looks or performs on their mobile device, even if it’s less than ideal. Most sites aren’t getting significant mobile traffic just yet, so maybe you can just chill and deal with this later on. Don’t ignore the netbook trend, however…it’s not about early-adopter technophiles that browse the web from their phones. These are people who are looking for a laptop alternative. Netbook traffic to your site is probably going to increase faster than mobile traffic.

2. Target specific devices.

If you really want to make sure that every user sees a version of your site that is 100% optimized for their device, you can design and build versions of your site that are tailored to the target resolution. This may mean you’ll need to build 3 or 4 versions, however, so check your bank account before starting down this path.

3. Rely on web standards.

Although building a website with web standards doesn’t guarantee it’ll look identical on every device, it does drastically increase the odds that the site will look and work great on most devices. How do you know if your site was built according to web standards? Enter your website address in the W3C’s validator tool.

At Agency Fusion, we’re betting that as the number of web-enabled devices continues to skyrocket, each with different capabilities and resolutions, the need for web standards will only increase.

For website developers, it’s time to learn more about coding to web standards. For designers, especially those with print backgrounds, it’s time to let go of the pixel just a bit. And for website owners, ask those who work on your website to start adhering to web standards if they aren’t already.