Well since our last article we have come across a lot more stories on Internet access through mobile. Firstly the bad news! According to a study by SmartTrust, 53% of Indians whose cellphones have internet access don’t use it to surf the net as they feel it is too expensive. The slow pace of the Net, fear of viruses, configuration error and service, which are not used are some other reasons. This study further goes on to state that Indians buy expensive cellphone i.e. The average spent on handset in India as percentage of monthly salary stands at 42 per cent followed by China at 41 per cent, Brazil at 40 per cent and Russia at 38 per cent. However, in US, UK and Sweden it is below 15 per cent. But 58 per cent of all mobile users in the country spend less than Rs 500 on their mobile phone service every month.

Now the good news.. Firstly skype the free voice over internet software which has completely changed how people can communicate over the internet and the cost ofcourse and which has over 136 million users could be soon available on mobile phones! Hutchison, more commonly known as 3 in the UK, has entered into a partnership with Skype, Sling Media, Yahoo, Nokia, Google, eBay, Microsoft, Orb and Sony Ericsson to bring all of these services on to your mobile for a flat rate fee, it’s been called ‘X-Series’.

Customers of ‘X-Series from 3′ will be able to make and receive unlimited Skype calls with Skype PC users around the world; they will be able to engage in unlimited browsing of the Internet from their mobiles for free, and they will be able to send or receive instant text messages to/from another X-Series handset or PC free-of-charge!

The current status in India might be bleak as far as internet access through mobile is concerned but Researchers at IDC say that 1.3 billion people will connect to the Internet via mobile phones by 2008.

And this is not all you could expect mobile communication to go completely free if the Google CEO has to be taken seriously. "Your mobile phone should be free," Eric Schmidt, Google CEO said. "It just makes sense that subsidies should increase". Schmidt said that as mobile phones become more like handheld computers and consumers spend as much as eight to 10 hours a day talking, texting and using the Web on these devices, advertising becomes a viable form of subsidy.

Mobile to mobile communication absolutely free? Well not a bad thing what say?

(Source: PCworld, TOI and BusinessStandard)

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