Mobile user-generated content to be funded by ads

A new report from Juniper Research says advertising-funded social networks will provide most of the money for mobile user-generated content sites by 2013. It says the total value of the user-generated content market - social networking, dating and personal content delivery services - will rise from nearly $1.1 billion in 2008 to over $7.3 billion in 2013, with social networking overtaking dating by 2009 to become the largest revenue-generating segment. Advertising will account for more than half of mobile social networking revenue by the end of the forecast period. [Press release]

Mobile Content Tools worth over $8 billion in 2008

Companies that offer mobile services - including music and electronic game publishers, television broadcasters, video production companies, content aggregators and telecommunications networks - are expected to spend more than $8 billion on the tools needed to create, edit, manage, and load content onto mobile devices by the end of this year, according to new market research from The Insight Research Corporation. [Press release]

O2 and 3 to merge user-generated video services

O2 and 3 have said they're going to combine their existing user-generated video services in the UK. 3's SeeMeTV and O2's LookAtMe! will become a new service called EyeVibe and will now be available to any UK mobile phone user. The service will continue to pay users when their clips are downloaded; the two individual sites have currently seen 32 million video downloads, earning over £800,000 for users who have submitted over 60,000 clips. [O2 press release]