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47% of US teens say their social life would end or be worsened without their cell phone, and 57% credit their mobile device with improving their life. Four out of five teens (17 million) carry a wireless device (a 40% increase since 2004), according to a study by Harris Interactive.

Impact on Teen Life

* 57% of teens view their cell phone as the key to their social life.

* Second only to clothing, teens say, a person’s cell phone tells the most about their social status or popularity, outranking jewelry, watches and shoes.
Providing Entertainment and Security

* 52%) agree that the cell phone has become a new form of entertainment.

* One-third of teens play games on their phone.

* 80% say their cell phone provides a sense of security while on the go, confirming that the cell phone has become their mobile safety net when needing a ride (79%), getting important information (51%), or just helping out someone in trouble (35%).

* Teens carry cell phones to have access to friends, family and current events.

* Though only one in five (18%) teens care to pinpoint the location of their family and friends via their cell phone, 36% hate the idea of a cell phone feature that allows others to know their exact location.

Texting Replacing Talking

Texting is replacing talking among teens. Teens admitted spending nearly an equal amount of time talking as they do texting each month. The feature is so important to them that if texting were no longer an option 47% of teens say their social life would end or be worsened – that’s especially so among females (54% vs. 40%). Teens say texting has advantages over talking because it offers more options, including multitasking, speed, the option to avoid verbal communication, and because it is fun – in that order. With more than 1 billion text messages sent each day, it is no surprise that 42% of teens say they can text blindfolded. Teens have created a new form of communication. We call it texting, but in essence it is a reflection of how teens want to communicate to match their lifestyles. It is all about multitasking, speed, privacy and control. Teens in this study are crying for personalization and control of exactly what a wireless device or plan can do for them.

Devices of the Future

Teens remain excited and openminded about the wireless possibilities and their ideal future mobile devices would feature five applications – phone, MP3 player, GPS, laptop computer and video player.

Also on teens’ wish lists are phones that…

* Guarantee secured data access to the user only (80%)

* Provide accessibility to personal health records (66%)

* Present opportunities to be educated anywhere in the world (66%)

* Bring users closer to global issues impacting teens’ world (63%)

* Are shockproof and waterproof (81%)

* Have endless power (80%)

* Feature a privacy screen (58%)

* Are made of flexible material and fold into different shapes and sizes (39%)

* Have artificial intelligence – ask it questions and it gives answers (38%)

In the future, mobility for teens means mobile banking, mobile voting, location based services, personal entertainment – the sky is the limit for how mobile our lifestyles can be. Mobile use has certainly come a long way in 25 years and expect teens to be a growth driver for the industry and have a major impact on the wireless landscape for years to come.

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At the recent Mobile World Congress 2010, Dutch app store analytics firm Distimo presented their findings on the six largest mobile application stores in existence today: the iTunes App Store, BlackBerry App World, Google Android Market, Nokia Ovi Store, Palm App Catalog and Windows Marketplace for Mobile. In their presentation, they analyzed everything including store size, store growth, the most popular applications and where you can find the best deal. They recently shared some of the highlights from that presentation by way of a slideshow embedded on their blog.

For mobile industry insiders, some of the findings won’t be all that shocking, just common knowledge paired with statistics. However, there were a few surprises that caught us off guard, maybe they will you too.

Distimo collects public application data from app stores and also offers developers an analytics tool which is used to monitor their apps and those belonging to their competitors. After examining and analyzing the data, the company releases market reports detailing their findings.

Free Vs. Paid Apps

One of their most recent reports looked at which application stores have the highest percentage of free apps. Not surprisingly, the Android Market was the winner here. In an interview with Venture Beat, Distimo co-founder and CEO Vincent Hoogsteder said this was due to multiple factors: the nature of the open-source operating system from Google attracts the sort of developers that enjoy giving away their works and the open nature of the application- approval process (that is, no review board middleman exists between app creation and public release) makes it easier for casual developers to launch. Also, anecdotal evidence points to developer’s dissatisfaction with Google Checkout – paid Android apps are required to implement this payment method for purchase, a much slower process than Apple’s 1-click buying process.

The different ratios of free apps versus paid was one of the findings presented during MWC 2010. In the chart below, you can see the varying percentages by store. (Note that Distimo’s findings were focused on the U.S. market only). Android has the most free applications (57% free) and Nokia has the most paid (85% paid). The next closest store to Android in terms of free is Palm, followed by Apple, Blackberry, Windows Phone, and finally Nokia.

Another interesting finding had to do with the prices for the paid applications. Apple, Android and Palm were all in the same range when it came to the average price for paid apps ($3.27 to $3.62). However, RIM and Microsoft were more than twice as high ($8.26 and $6.99, respectively). This didn’t necessarily have to do with the different types of applications available in each store – sometimes, the exact same app was just priced higher on other platforms. For example, Tetris was $4.99 on Apple and $6.99 on Windows. IM+ was $4.99 on Apple and $29.99 on Blackberry.

Store Size and Growth: Look Out for Android!

Android is now the second-largest application store, reports Distimo, with 19, 297 apps. It’s still a far cry from Apple’s 150,998 apps, though. And other competitors are farther still. Ovi, we were surprised to discover, is the third largest with 6,118 apps available while Blackberry has a respectable 4,756. Palm has only 1,492 and Windows has 693. Apple is also the fastest growing store with a shocking 13,865 new applications added per month. Android’s growth is picking up too – they now have 3,005 new apps per month (15%). Relative to the number of apps housed, Android is actually the fastest growing store.

Games, Games, Games

Also discussed were the popularity of applications by category. On Apple’s store, games and entertainment were the most popular categories (58% and 18%, respectively). Somewhat more surprising was the popularity of games on Blackberry, the platform often used more by enterprise and SMBs than by consumers. Here, games were also in the lead with 29% popularity to only 18% for utilities. One would have thought that would be the other way around – that corporate users would be more likely download apps that helped them work, not play. Apparently, that’s not the case.

For more details on this presentation, you can view the entire slideshow on Slideshare or contact the company itself for a more in-depth marketing report.

via The Truth about Mobile Application Stores.

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San Francisco – A federal court has ruled that a cell phone ringtone sounded in public does not constitute a “public performance” under copyright law, and therefore performing rights organizations like ASCAP are not entitled to additional royalty payments from ringtones. “When a ringtone plays on a cellular telephone, even when that occurs in public, the user is exempt from copyright liability, and [the cellular carrier] is not liable either secondarily or directly,” the court said in its ruling.

Groups including the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Public Knowledge and the Center for Democracy & Technology had urged the court to reject ASCAP’s argument in a friend of the court brief submitted in the case.

“The ruling is an important victory for consumers, making it clear that playing music in public, when done without any commercial purpose, does not infringe copyright,” the EFF said in a statement.

The EFF noted that the court also rejected ASCAP’s argument that a royalty payment-triggering public performance occurs when wireless network operators download ringtones to their customers’ phones.

via Court: Ringtones Not a ‘Public Performance’; No Extra Royalty | Digital Media Wire.

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• When your phone rings, the copyright police may come calling (macworld.com)
• Ridiculous: Verizon Pays ASCAP $5M Interim License Fee For … Ringtones (techcrunch.com)

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Layar iPhone Example

Layar is a free application on your mobile phone which shows what is around you by displaying real time digital information on top of reality through the camera of your mobile phone.

Layar is a global application, available for the T-Mobile G1, HTC Magic and other Android phones in all Android Markets and now available for the iPhone. It also comes pre-installed on the Samsung Galaxy in the Netherlands

How do you use Layar?

By holding the phone in front of you like a camera, information is displayed on top of the camera display view.  For all points of interest which are displayed on the screen, information is shown at the bottom of the screen.  There are over 160 layers now available.

What do you see in the screen?
On top of the camera image (displaying reality) Layar adds content layers. Layers are the equivalent of webpages in normal browsers. Just like there are thousands of websites there will be thousands of layers. One can easily switch between layers by selecting another via the menu button, pressing the logobar or by swiping your finger across the screen.

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Each group has real-time chat and its own private forums as well as officers who get to decide membership criteria and review applications. Group affiliations also appear on users’ home pages, enhancing social ties throughout the community.

“Cellufun has become a social hub for millions of users all over the world, and they’re increasingly opting to spend time on our site rather than PC focused social networks like MySpace, Facebook, and hi5,” said Keith Katz, VP of Marketing at Cellufun. “We’ve always had informal groups popping up and posting in various forums, but one of our most frequent user requests has been to have a more formalized system for creating affinity groups, much like what’s available on various Web-based sites.

via Cellufun discussion groups let advertisers target psychographically.

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The announcement came this morning at the company’s developer’s conference in Los Angeles, where Adobe also announced that full Flash capabilities were rolling out to the BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Palm (NSDQ: PALM), Google (NSDQ: GOOG) Android and Symbian platforms over the next year or so. But this announcement is different because a Flash player is not being installed on the iPhone, meaning iPhone owners won’t be able to view Flash ads or videos in the browser. However, it does mean that developers will be able to convert content they already built for the web, like a game, and distribute it to iPhone owners via Apple’s App Store. More here.

Currently, the project, which is part of Adobe Flash Professional CS5, is in private beta, but they said they will open up the beta to the public before the end of the year. Already, some Flash applications are available in the store, including MTV’s “South Park Avatar Creator,” which allows you to dress the South Park characters from head to toe and even create hair styles.

via Adobe Has Figured Out How To Bring Flash Apps To The iPhone | mocoNews.

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At the company’s worldwide developer conference in Los Angeles on Monday, Adobe plans to announce that its Flash technology, which is commonly used on the PC to view videos or ads, will be rolled out to browsers on Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) Windows Mobile, Palm webOS phones later this year. In addition, public betas for Google Android and Symbian OS are expected to be available early next year. Finally, Adobe will also bring the Flash Player to Blackberry smartphones at an undisclosed date.

via Adobe Extends Full Flash To Just About Every Phone But The iPhone | mocoNews.

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27% of Smartphone owners (but only 2% of iPhone owners) indicate that they have not downloaded a single application to their device. Considering the main reason, 41% said they don’t see a need, 33% don’t want to spend the money, and 13% don’t know how.

60% of all Smartphone owners said they spend time looking through all the applications to discover which to download to their phone. 30% of Smartphone owners look for friends / family recommendations and 30% look to see what apps are popular.

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