iPhone 3G dominates mobile data in Australia

Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 23 September 2008 12:40

Your IT - Mobility

iPhone owners use far more data than do users of other mobile devices, according to a new study.

There are basically four factors that influence mobile data use.

First is cost: the availability of 'unlimited' data plans at reasonable price will generally mean more data is consumed, as people don't have to worry about whether any particular use will incur excess data charges - which can be swingeing.

Secondly, there's connection speed. Imagine spending 20 minutes of your commute reading the news on your iPhone. If you're a reasonably quick reader, the limiting factor will be the page load time, so the faster the connection, the more pages you will read and the more data will be transferred.

Thirdly, does the device support the 'real' web or is it only suitable for accessing mobile-specific sites? This cuts both ways for the iPhone. While its Safari browser allows the display of full-sized web pages on a handheld device, there is a lack of support for Flash and some other commonly used technologies.

So iPhone data use is boosted through the use of regular web pages, but it would be even greater if Flash videos embedded in web pages would work on the device.

Please turn to page two for reason number four.