Simple web service
The task is to transfer small amount of data between desktop and mobile applications when mobile app will request it. As far as I understand the simplest way is to write a small web service, to which mobile app will perform request. 
Scheme will look like: desktop app provide data for web-service, mobile app will send request to service and service will send data to mobile device.

I haven't developed any web service before, only simple MVC applications, so I dont know where to start. I couldnt even choose appropriate framework/technology.WCF looks good, but It will IIS on server, which isn't exact thing that I want, so I am seeking for some other solution, may be Python or Ruby. Can you please provide me some information from which I can start my search?
Simple web service
===

The task is to transfer small amount of data between desktop and mobile applications when mobile app will request it. As far as I understand the simplest way is to write a small web service, to which mobile app will perform request. 
Scheme will look like: desktop app provide data for web-service, mobile app will send request to service and service will send data to mobile device.

I haven't developed any web service before, only simple MVC applications, so I dont know where to start. I couldnt even choose appropriate framework/technology.WCF looks good, but It will IIS on server, which isn't exact thing that I want, so I am seeking for some other solution, may be Python or Ruby. Can you please provide me some information from which I can start my search?