Mobile TV tops handset wishlist
February 13, 2008
From Colin Mann in Barcelona
Mobile TV use is set to surge due to strong consumer demand, with the service ranked as the number one application users want on their phone, according to a consumer behaviour study conducted by Ericsson and news broadcaster, CNN. The results suggest that mobile TV is poised to become a mass market reality with more than a third (34 per cent) of respondents ranking it as the most in-demand application and almost half (44 per cent) of respondents set to adopt mobile TV in the next two years.
Other findings revealed that photo and video messaging look to be set for wide-scale adoption as consumer pricing and functionality improves. Fifty-seven per cent of respondents use photo technology to send and receive images on a monthly basis, making it the most popular activity. This trend is mirrored by popularity of CNN International's user-generated content service – i-Report – which launched in 2006. The service garnered 50,000 submissions, including mobile phone footage and images, from 189 countries worldwide in its first twelve months, driving the worldwide trend for 'citizen journalism' and giving audiences a deeper connection to network news.
According to the report, nearly one in four (24 per cent) current mobile TV users watch daily with around half (52 per cent) tuning in on a weekly basis. At 77 per cent, news leads genre viewing patterns, followed by scheduled television at 48 per cent.
Jan Wäreby, Senior Vice President and Head of Business Unit Multimedia Ericsson, said that although still in its infancy, mobile TV was clearly set to emerge as a mass-market service within the next few years. “Driven by consumer appetite for the service, together with new usage patterns, mobile TV represents one of the biggest networked multimedia opportunities for cable and telecoms operators,” he claimed.