Synopsis
There is a massive change underway in the mobile media market, as it becomes unshackled from the operators’ portals that have dominated it for a decade, all without having made any significant inroads into the content use of mobile users. The new capped data packages, fuelled by further competition later in 2009, will see a total revamp of the mobile media market. It will no longer be based on portals but on direct services by content and services providers via open source phones and mobile-friendly Internet-based services. The next step will be the arrival of micro-payment services, as they are developed in countries such as Kenya, Philippines and India. This will create a new e-payment system for the mobile market, away from the hefty charges the carriers put on PSMS payment facilities. However there is a limit to the mobile networks’ spectrum capacity, and we will have to wait for true IP-based wireless broadband to become available before the operators can fully deliver on the promise of mass market mobile broadband.
