Australians embrace mobile phone multi-media

Australians are quickly becoming comfortable with creating and sharing content through their mobile phones, but are still adjusting to the idea of mobile social networking.

Australians are quickly becoming comfortable with creating and sharing content through their mobile phones, but are still adjusting to the idea of mobile social networking.

The finding, from a survey of more than 2000 mobile phone users conducted by the Australian Interactive Media Industry Association, suggests the increased sophistication of handsets and availability of 3G services are having an impact on the way people use their phones.

Over half of respondents to the survey said they had used content on their mobile phone created by others, with games (43%) true tone ring tones (42%) and wallpapers (33%) being the most commonly downloaded content.

A third said they regularly share the content they create, mainly photos (96%), videos (41%) and music (32%).

The next mobile phone content horizon appears to be information. Demand for maps, lifestyle information such as restaurant or movie reviews, and TV program listings have all increased by around 100% or more over the past year.

But social networking, long thought to be the “killer app” that would take mobile phone rich media mainstream, still hasn’t taken a strong hold on mobile phone users.

According to the survey, 16% of respondents had visited an online network service on their mobile, with MSN Messenger, Facebook and MySpace being the most popular.

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