This BBC article looks at a report by the U.K’s communications watchdog Ofcom.”Internet take-up and use is now higher in rural areas of the UK than in big cities,according to a survey of regional communication habits.But the study reveals that rural users are often stuck with slow dial-up connections rather than the fast broadband enjoyed in urban areas.Scotland tops the list of countries with access to broadband”.The study “also examined differences in digital TV,radio and mobile phone use.It found that people in the UK are now more likely to send a text than talk to a person on the phone.On average 28 texts are sent for every 20 mobile phone calls made every week.People in Northern Ireland are the most prolific texters,thumbing on average 35 texts every week.London is the only area to buck the trend,with people still preferring to talk than text”.
Insight into UK’s digital habits
This BBC article looks at a report by the U.K’s communications watchdog Ofcom.”Internet take-up and use is now higher in rural areas of the UK than in big cities,according to a survey of regional communication habits.But the study reveals that rural users are often stuck with slow dial-up connections rather than the fast broadband enjoyed [...]
Comments
@ 22:35
Hi Jim and readers of the brilliant Smartmobs blogsite
Excellent posting, and something I had missed last week. I just posted about it at my blogsite also linking to the original BBC news item.
About the relevance. I think very many readers of the Smart Mobs site will be dubious of this, thinking it might not be really going to be happening to the rest of the world, and definitely not to “them.” I am very sure North American readers will feel strongly that this cannot possibly happen in the USA and Canada.
Think again.
It was first reported in 2001 by a Study by Nokia, that SMS text messaging is an addictive service. ADDICTIVE. I discussed it at length in my second book, m-Profits in 2002. That means, that for any users of SMS text messaging, there is NEVER any going back.
Consider any users of Blackberries. They tend to say that it is the “Crackberry” for its addictive nature. And most Blackberry users would hope that everybody had Blackberries. SMS text messaging is MORE addictive than Blackberry. Why? Because only 4 million people have Blackberries. But 2.2 BILLION people have a cellphone that can receive SMS text messaging. And already 1.4 BILLION people are active users of SMS text messaging.
There is no age limit. Like retired people in Sweden five years ago, today British grandparents send SMS text messages to their grandkids. It all will happen in the USA and Canada as well. The North Americans are just five years behind Europe on this. Already a third of American cellphone users send SMS text messages regularly. That is EXACTLY the same trends we saw in Germany and France in 2003, in Israel and UK in 2001, and in Italy and Sweden in 1999 (and in Finland in 1998).
Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. SMS is addictive. All cellphone users will join, sooner or later. Now. If the BBC tells you the majority of the British today PREFER text messages to voicecalls, and then I tell you text messages are both FASTER and MORE SECRETIVE than any other communication medium, perhaps you should also consider learning to use the tool that is the communication method of preference from Signapore, Korea and the Philippines to Italy. Israel, Finland Sweden and the UK.
More at my blogsite http://www.communities-dominate.blogs.com
Thanks for blogging about this. Its a very important milestone in data service use int he world.
Tomi T Ahonen
4-time bestselling author and consultant on mobile telecoms and IT
website http://www.tomiahonen.com