Ashley Bowers

Mobile content is any type of media formatted for mobile phones, like ringtones, graphics, games and movies. As mobile phone use has grown since the mid 1990s, the significance of the devices in everyday life has grown accordingly. Owners of mobile phones can now use their devices to make calendar appointments, send and receive text messages (SMS), listen to music, watch videos, view Microsoft Word document, and so forth. The use of mobile content has grown accordingly. Ringtones, for instance, are currently (2005) the most widely used mobile media forms. A mobile game is a piece of content that is installed on mobile phones so that the user can play the video game right no their mobile handset. A wallpaper is simply a graphic that is formatted to fit the screen of hand held devices, mainly cell phones.

Since the late 1990s, mobile content has become an increasingly important market worldwide. The Japanese, followed closely by the Europeans, are heavy users of their mobile phones and have been attaining custom mobile content for their devices for years. In fact, mobile phone use has begun to exceed the use of PCs in some countries. In the United States and Canada, mobile phone use and the accompanying use of mobile content has been slower to gain traction.

In the years ahead, mobile phone content will play an increasingly larger role in the lives of millions across the globe, as users will depend on their mobile phones to keep in touch not only with their friends but with world news, sports scores, the latest movies and music, and more.