M:Metrics has released the first statistics from its new MeterDirect service. The february data for 500 US and 600 UK smartphone users show that in both geographies Google is the most popular mobile web site, while after that people from the UK tend to prefer operator portals (O2, Orange, BBC, Three) while people from the US tend to prefer other brands (Yahoo, MSN, Live, Go.com). Users spend an average of 8 minutes per session using the mobile web, with the 8-5 daypart being the most popular. The research also showed that smartphone users from the US were more likely to access the mobile web on a given day (41-50 percent did so) than smartphone users from the UK (33-47 percent). Of course, smartphone users are only a small proportion of the mobile population, even if they do count for a disproportionately high level of mobile content usage. (release)
Italian aggregator Buongiorno has also teamed up with M:Metrics for a release comparing US mobile usage to that of Europe. Most of the differences can be accounted for by higher penetration of better networks in Europe, with the release claiming that lower-end content consumption (2G-2.5G) is similar on both sides of the Atlantic. Europeans tend to send more MMS (between 20 and 31.5 percent depending on country) while only 14.7 Americans did. Apparently the consumption levels of news and information is similar, but Europeans tend to prefer SMS alerts while US users prefer browsing. “There are substantial variations in attitude from person to person, but on average, Buongiorno has found that people in Europe expect the mobile to play a more prominent, recognized role in the structure of society, and many people look to the mobile as a central source of innovation. People in the US can be just as enthusiastic about the technology, but they often think in terms of utility — shrinking and mobilizing the PC and Internet — rather than an entertaining gadget to love.”
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