That 48 Percent Obviously Doesn’t Include iPhone Users
by John Paczkowski
Posted on June 26, 2009 at 5:18 PM PT
Nearly half–48 percent–of Americans would drop their mobile data service completely if they were driven to it by the souring economy.
That’s the conclusion of a new study by Strategy Analytics, which found that consumers are not so taken with mobile connectivity that they’ve completely lost site of household budgetary constraints. Especially if they’ve got broadband at home; just 10 percent of the 1,100 households surveyed would be willing to cut wired broadband service to save money.
Said Strategy Analytics VP David Mercer, “These results suggest that, while American consumers consider home broadband service to be a vital utility, they see mobile data service as simply a ‘nice to have.’”
That might be the case now, but I wonder for how long. Wireline broadband is far more mature than mobile broadband, so it makes sense that it’s viewed more as necessity than luxury. But as devices like the Apple (AAPL) iPhone and Palm (PALM) Pre become more ubiquitous, it seems inevitable that “nice to have: will become “must have.”
[Image credit: Mobile Phone Throwing World Championships]
Comments
I would seriously consider an iPod that had all the features of the 3GS (especially faster processor), but I’d still really rather have something larger, for my eyesights sake.
Some friends who got his-n-her iPhones 6-months ago with some sort of discount plan claim their rates have been going up ever since. They love the phones, but hate the service and have decided to “simplify” their lives by chucking the things as soon as they can do so without penalties. I also noticed that one of their phones was already quite scratched up in spite of the fact that they seem to always carry it in a case.
I can see why people with lots of money, or business users (someone else’s money) would consider them must-haves. Maybe that’s as large a market as Apple feels they need.
Deja Vu all over again as far as someone likely stealing the market right out from under them while they cater to the upper crust (and keep the feds off of Microsoft’s back). In that sense the company serves a multiplicity of hidden agendas.
Posted by Mac Beach at June 26th, 2009 at 9:18 pm