Cell phones are the first screen in China

Cell phones are often called "The Third Screen" after the TV and Computer screen. But in China the cell phone is the first screen of choice. The New York Times says "Internet Boom in China Is Built on Virtual Fun".

The NYT story is about Tencent, a Chinese Internet company that offers an all-in-one package of entertainment offerings and a mobile instant-messaging service which has reached more than 100 million users, or nearly 80 percent of the market. There are several quotes in the article that are striking and thought provoking;

While America’s Internet users send e-mail messages and surf for information on their personal computers, young people in China are playing online games, downloading video and music into their cellphones and MP3 players and entering imaginary worlds where they can swap virtual goods and assume online personas.

Another distinguishing feature is the youthful face of China’s online community. In the United States, roughly 70 percent of Internet users are over the age of 30; in China, it is the other way around — 70 percent of users here are under 30, according to the investment bank Morgan Stanley.

If you look at the really successful Internet companies in the USA they have all been started by college kids, or very young first time entrepreneurs. The technology adoption is much faster and deeper with young people than with Baby Boomers or the older crowd.

I have said many times I think the cell phone is the future personal computing platform. Most of the applications and data will be on servers "in the cloud" but they will be viewed and updated by PDAs and cell phones. I rarely need my laptop anymore when I am traveling. My Motorola Q-Phone has my email, calendar, contacts, text messaging, photos, and I can even view Microsoft Office documents. I can get stock quotes and even make trades.

The big money on cell phones is ring tones, games, music, and in the future, video. Who woulda thought that silly ring tones would be a $5 Billion business? Not me...I totally missed that because I am too old.

I do know that Mobile Search and Local Search will be huge markets...and the cell phone will be the platform of choice.

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Comments

[Peter Cranstone]

Hi Dan,

Some LBS stuff for Mobile for you. We've added a Geo-Tagging option for cellphones that can take pictures and embed GPS data.

To see a live demo (no client required) go this site: http://www.5o9inc.com/mobile.html and click on Geo Location. Select the third option "Choose from one of our sample images" and hit Go.

Peter

[gzino]

In the developing world, I completely agree with you. At least until they can have a distributed platform comprised of large computers (e.g. laptop) and small computers (e.g. mobile computer w/ voice functionality), logically tied together by web-based identities, profiles, communities, etc. I'd argue the distributed platform is the model here in the US and other developed nations. Most of us won't have to choose between one or the other, and won't be able to exclusively use one or the other. Depending on where we are, where we're going, and what we're doing, we'll simply use the part of the platform that best meets our needs. That said, I agree there is more growth in mobile (though the carriers are currently constraining it with their walled garden approaches), and interestingly we can look to developing nations for indications of how the mobile space will evolve.

[Rahul]

Mobile usage in India and China is integrated into daily life to a degree we are not familiar with in the US. In the case of India, two stats are indicative:
- Last year mobile phone subscriptions doubled from 75m to 150m.
- In the same period, fixed-line subscriptions decreased from a paltry 48m to 40m

Unlike China, India has a relatively small internet user base, so most innovation is happening in mobile, not the web.

[Lucky]

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