The most eyebrow raising data from the BuzzCity report is that 70% of mobile web use occurs at home<\/strong>, compared with11% at work and less than 6%\u00a0 outdoors or while on public transportation.\u00a0 I initially found this hard to believe but it actually makes sense partly given BuzzCity’s demographics and the way the survey was conducted but also because it probably is true.<\/p>\n Source: Buzzcity.com<\/p><\/div>\n BuzzCity is based in Singapore and its advertising platform primarily targets users in Asia, Africa and the US.\u00a0 The 15 countries represented in the survey were;\u00a0 Brunei,\u00a0 Egypt, Indonesia, India, Kenya, Libya, Nigeria, Philippines, Pakistan, Romania, Thailand, United States and South Africa.\u00a0 Except for the US, these all emerging economies where PC usage is relative low.\u00a0 Only 7% of the survey respondents were from the US.<\/p>\n BuzzCity’s core business is actually the mygamma.com<\/a> mobile social network. The company says mygamma’s core demographic is “the unwired<\/em>“, which it defines as\u00a0 “…the newly connected emerging middle class in developing It’s easy to jump to the conclusion that the high rate of mobile web use at home is because most of the survey respondents don’t have home computers.\u00a0 But that would be wrong, as even in the\u00a0 US, where 82% households do have PC Internet,\u00a0 survey respondents reported that 84% of their mobile web usage occurred at home!<\/p>\n Even if you factor in that over half the US respondents earned less than $2000\/month and are thus less likely to have a home PC, it’s obvious that there is a lot of\u00a0 mobile surfing is going on in homes where there ARE internet connected PCs available. And when you think about it, that’s not surprising.\u00a0 The mobile is something the user always has with them and it’s always turned on and ready to surf.\u00a0 I have several PCs to choose from at home and yet I frequently use the web on the phone to do things like check Twitter,\u00a0 Bloglines, news headlines\u00a0 and this blog’s comment moderation queue in bed or during the commercial breaks of TV programs.\u00a0 I almost always check the weather forecast using my phone because it’s faster and easier than with a PC.\u00a0\u00a0 As phone screens get bigger, mobile browsers become more capable and easier to use and mobile network speeds increase, we will see more and more web use moving to\u00a0 mobiles.\u00a0 If the web experience is good with the device that is always with you why use anything else?<\/p>\n The BuzzCity report is 75 pages long and packed with statistics and charts with the data broken down by country.\u00a0 It’s fascinating reading for anyone with an interest in the state of mobile browsing particularly in emerging economies.\u00a0 Here are few highlights:<\/p>\n There’s also a lot of demographic information (gleaned from the participant’s mygamma profiles) included in the study. Most survey respondents are in their 20’s and 60%\u00a0 have some education beyond secondary school at a\u00a0 college or trade school. 19% have a university degree.<\/p>\n BuzzCity wasn’t the only company releasing mobile web statistics at MWC.<\/p>\n A lot of folks are worried about the recession’s effect on mobile data usage and growth. The future actually looks pretty bright according to a Nielsen survey<\/a> commissioned by network services vendor Tellabs. <\/strong>Neilsen asked users in the US and the five largest European counties about\u00a0 their\u00a0 planned use\u00a0 of\u00a0 mobile data services over the next two years.\u00a0 Current mobile data users expect to increase their use by 58% in the US and 55% in Europe.\u00a0 In addition, 27% of European and\u00a0 28% of US mobile subscribers who do not use mobile data services now intend\u00a0 to start using them in the next two years<\/strong>. In the US, the service they are most interested in is the mobile internet. In Europe,\u00a0 it’s\u00a0 MMS followed by the mobile web.\u00a0 Here’s a table from the study indicating the services current non-users say they intend to use in the next two years:<\/p>\n![\"BuzzCity](\"https:\/\/wapreview.com\/images\/BCwhere.JPG\" "\\"BuzzCity")
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\nmarkets and the blue collar sector in developed regions.<\/em>”\u00a0 The BuzzCity study was conducted on publisher sites across the advertising network in addition to on BuzzCity itself. However the incentive for users to participate in the survey was that they received “Gamma Dollars”, mygamma’s virtual currency, as a reward. So I think it’s safe to say that the vast majority of survey participants were mygamma users.<\/p>\n\n
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