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Smartphone users choose mobile games over enterprise software

BlackBerry 8300

A recent NPD Group research paper says that not only are people using their smartphones more, but they’re playing games more often than using enterprise and productivity software. The findings come from a portion of the report aimed at discovering what features and functions consumers are most aware.

Smartphones are still being used primarily as a communication device, with phone calls, email and text messages occupying the majority of a smartphone user’s time. This is changing due to a trend that has been primarily pioneered by the iPhone. Mobile gaming on the iPhone has steadily increased over the last three months and the trend is perpetually growing.

If mobile gaming, applications and web browsing are becoming an increasingly larger percentage of device usage, I’m anticipating a time when our phones are using 100% data. Phone calls will be made over VoIP and the majority of social interaction will be done via social networking and messaging programs. At this point, I feel we will truly have left behind the archaic and soon to be obsolete telephone.

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Tether your iPhone to your laptop with AT&T - or not.

AT&T

AT&T Mobility Chief Executive Ralph De La Vega has dropped the bomb that iPhone users will soon get an official AT&T iPhone tethering solution. After reading about the service, I would personally stick to jailbreaking and hacks because the AT&T solution is a complete ripoff. Let me explain why.

AT&T currently charges $30 a month for an unlimited iPhone data plan. If you purchase the official tethering system, you have to pay an additional $30 for tethering data. At this point, you can be expected to pay $60 on top of your phone bill which, for the average person, amounts to about $60. In total, this means your guaranteed bill at the end of every month, will be at least $120. If you were to jailbreak your phone and tether, you would not exceed your iPhone’s unlimited data plan and save yourself $30 per month. Oh yeah, and the tethering data is also capped. Yet another reason to not sign up.

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The Korean mobile web - where is it lacking?

Korean mobile web

I have been talking to some old Korean friends about the mobile web. I showed them my iPhone and gave them a quick demo of the mobile web experience on the iPhone. I told them it was the best mobile web experience the West has to offer and they reacted appropriately: “Where is the Flash?” they asked. They got me. There was no Flash.

My Western friends here have told me that the mobile web in Korea is virtually (no pun intended) useless. Although Koreans are very Internet savvy, and broadband penetration in this country is incredible, the mobile web I have seen has been fairly lackluster. Apparently, the web is highly state controlled, but this is something I will have to do more research about. Another reason I have heard, is that Korean websites are very Flash intensive, and Flash has not been ported to many Korean phones either.
Continue reading about the mobile web in South Korea

Canadian iPhone users not taking advantage Rogers data plan

iPhone from Rogers

Back when the iPhone launched in Canada, I did some interviews with CBC Radio where they asked me what I thought of the new iPhone data plan. They were expecting the usual “Good! Rogers is a big corporate corporation with money so they’re evil! They caved because they knew we were coming!” But I really didn’t feel that way. There was so much consumer anger going around at the time but it wasn’t totally merited. I told CBC Radio that the new plan was a ton of data at a great price, and that I didn’t really see many users using up the full package. Consumer education in this country is such that you can’t expect many customers to use their phone enough to burn through that much data.
Click through to read about the actual iPhone data usages in Canada