Research says crossing the road with a mobile is dangerous for children

Children who are talking on their mobile phone when crossing the road are at greater risk of being involved in an accident, according to research from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA. Pretty obvious when you think about it. Psychologists who used a virtual reality software program found that all of the children tested (aged 10-11) were more likely to exhibit risky behaviour when they crossed the street while talking on a mobile phone, even when the children were familiar with mobiles or were rated as highly attentive. Children using mobiles took an average 20% longer to cross the road, gave themselves 8% less time to cross safely in front of traffic and were 43% more likely to be hit by a vehicle or to have a close call. [Press release]

President Obama to keep BlackBerry

In November we reported that Barack Obama would give up his BlackBerry when he became president - but now it seems he'll be hanging on to it. His email address will remain confidential, his email addresses will apparently be designed not to be forwarded... and pretty much everything he says will be archived. [Sources: NYTimes.com; Seattle Times]

Mobile set-up too complicated for most users

A survey of mobile phone users in the UK and the USA says most people get annoyed when they set up a new handset. 85% of users said they were frustrated by the difficulty of getting a new phone working, with 61% saying it was as challenging as moving bank accounts. The survey, by mobile device management software company Mformation, also revealed that 95% of people said they would be more likely to use new features if the initial set-up was easier. Most people expected to take 15 minutes to set their phone up but found the actual time was around an hour. [Sources: BBC News; Computerworlduk.com]

5% of American mobile users watch video

Talking of mobile multimedia, a report from The Nielsen Company says 10.3 million Americans currently watch videos on their phone each month - that's 5% of all mobile customers (compared to 3% in the UK). The majority of users - 66% - say they watch their video through the web, rather than downloading clips to their phones. The Apple iPhone is the most popular phone for mobile video consumers, comedy is the most popular mobile video content and waiting for someone or something is the most popular occasion for video usage. [Report (pdf)]

35% of US households to get mobile TV this year

The Open Mobile Video Coalition (OMVC), which is an alliance of commercial and public broadcasters in the USA, says 63 TV stations will launch mobile digital television services in 2009, covering 35% of US households that watch TV. Services will use the ATSC Mobile DTV standard and can only be received on a compatible device. [Press release (Word document)]

Palm unveils new phone and OS

Palm has revealed its new 'Pre' smartphone and a new 'webOS' operating system. The operating system claims to integrate information from multiple calendars, contacts and messaging applications - recognising people who are listed in multiple accounts - while the Pre has a touch-controlled screen and a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. It's due for a USA release in the first half of 2009, although there's no mention of a UK date. [Press release]

Reports say train crash engineer regularly used his mobile

The engineer allegedly responsible for the fatal Los Angeles rail crash on 12th September 2008 was known to regularly use his mobile phone while operating trains, according to reports that quote a lawyer acting for several victims. [Sources: Cellular-News.com; NYTimes.com]

More mobile ads seen via WiFi

This story seems almost inevitable to me, although it's been covered in fairly excitable terms elsewhere. Mobile advertising company AdMob says 8% of all advertisements it delivered to UK mobile devices in November were served via WiFi rather than over a conventional mobile network. That's up from 4% in August, with over half of the ads coming from Apple iPhone users. It's a similar story in the USA. [AdMob report (pdf)]

17.5% of US homes are mobile only

The latest National Health Interview Survey from the USA shows that the number of homes with only mobile phones continues to grow. More than one out of every six homes in America (17.5%) only had mobiles when surveyed in the first six months of 2008, up 1.7% from the previous six months. [Source: cdc.gov]

The Key to Safe Driving?

Sounding rather similar to the Aegis Mobility service, Key2SafeDriving is a wireless device designed by the University of Utah that does its best to stop young people from driving while using their mobile phone. The Key2SafeDriving (k2sd) device holds the ignition key and puts the driver's phone into 'Driving Mode' when the key is released for use. This causes the phone to display a 'Stop' message and also prevents the phone from ringing when someone calls. [Press release via Media-Newswire.com]

Name-calling for textlemmings

Here's the perfect antidote for our previous story. Professor Peter Norton from the University of Virginia says mobile phone users who walk into traffic while texting need to be given a derogatory name. He says it worked to dissuade jaywalkers - a term that entered the dictionary just ten years after it was devised - and wonders whether ‘textlemmings’ would work. [Source: Cellular-News.com]

Mobile social networkers love their mobiles(!)

Social networking site itsmy.com has conducted a survey that shows how much its 2.5 million members rely on their mobiles (although it's only published results from its 15,000 most-active users worldwide). 95% from the USA and 96% from the UK use the mobile as main means of communication with loved ones... and the average user browses through 160 mobile internet pages per day. [Press release]

Mobile usage hasn't changed for 5 years

Research from connectivity specialist AppTrigger reveals that 57% of UK adults and 30% of North Americans say they've not changed the way in which they use mobiles since 2003. Voice calls and text messages are still the main applications. [Source: Cellular-News.com]

Hands-free conversations are more distracting than talking to passengers

The December issue of the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, which is published by the American Psychological Association, says drivers make more mistakes when talking on a mobile phone than when talking to passengers. The study looked at 41 mostly young adult drivers paired with 41 friends. The results of the experiment, which was conducted using a driving simulator, showed that mobile phone users were more likely to drift in their lane, kept a greater distance between their car and the car in front, and were four times more likely to miss pulling off the highway at the rest area. Passenger conversation barely affected these three measures. In addition, the passengers took an active role in helping the driver, often talking about surrounding traffic. [Press release; PDF of article]

El Paso is the top town for texting in the US

Scarborough Research says El Paso in Texas is the top US city for text messaging, with 57% of mobile phone users sending texts - compared with a national average of 48%. Residents of Grand Rapids, Missouri, are least likely to send text messages. Apparently texters are more likely to be young and from Hispanic or African-American backgrounds, which the research company says helps to explain the geographic results. Texters also spend more on their mobile bills, play more sports, shop online and love technology more than other people. [PDF press release]

Barack Obama to give up his BlackBerry?

Never mind his plans to change the world... the current story on everyone's lips is the likelihood that US President-elect Barack Obama is going to stop using a BlackBerry when he takes office. Despite wearing the device on his belt during much of his election campaign and frequently sending messages to friends, he's likely to ditch mobile email when he takes office in January. Not only is security a risk, his messages would all be recorded under the Presidential Records Act. But he wouldn't be the first president to stop using personal email. Current president George W Bush sent his friends an email before entering the White House eight years ago, explaining that he was going to stop corresponding in cyberspace because he didn't want to risk any private conversations being published. [Source: NYTimes.com]

Customers happy to pay extra for decent cameras on mobiles

Research company Strategy Analytics says consumers in the USA and Western Europe are most willing to pay extra for a camera on their mobile phone. Over 60% of all respondents said they'd be willing to pay extra for a quality camera on their mobile. Other popular options included a video camera, music player and removable memory cards. Customers aged 35 and older were less willing to pay extra than younger consumers. [Press release]

Smartphones are driving customer satisfaction

Customer satisfaction with mobile phones is increasing in the USA as smartphones become more popular. The link between the two bas been made by J.D. Power and Associates, which has just published its latest Wireless Mobile Phone Evaluation Study. They measured customer satisfaction by looking at design, operation, features, durability and battery life. Their results showed that average prices have risen because of the increased popularity of smartphones and other highly-featured phones. Customers are also spending more per month - yet overall satisfaction has improved significantly and is higher among younger handset owners who are more inclined to own feature-rich phones. [Press release]

Mobile phones used for traffic monitoring

Nokia and the University of California have just launched the Mobile Millennium project, which combines anonymous GPS information from mobile phones with data from existing traffic sensors. From today, any San Francisco Bay Area resident will be able to automatically submit and receive traffic information between the San Francisco Bay Area and the Lake Tahoe ski area, either on compatible smartphones or iusing a PC browser. [PDF fact sheet]

Smartphones driving increased mobile search

This is probably another of those "it's obvious when you think about it" reports. Researchers at The Kelsey Group have linked the increased purchase of 'smart' mobile devices with an increase in searches - particularly for local information - from mobiles. They say 18.9% of mobile customers in the USA now use a smartphone, with 49.2% of all respondents planning to buy a smart mobile device within the next two years. In the last six months, 17.6% of US mobile users have downloaded or looked at maps or directions (up from 10.8% in 2007), 15.6% have searched online for products or services in their local area (up from 9.8% in 2007), 14.3% have searched online products or services outside their local area (up from 6.4% in 2007), 13.7% have searched for entertainment information (up from 8.2% in 2007) and 9.6% have connected with a online social network (up from 3.4% in 2007). [Press release]