It’s Big. It’s Very, Very Big! Did I Say It Was Big?

Jeff Becker said: With its immediacy, relative universality...‘voice’ is far superior to text as a communications mode.

Jeff, I think that you actually hit on the right point, but I disagree with the inference you make from it. By choosing the words above, you were reflecting a unique context, and your inference on the general superiority of voice is dependent on that context generally being the dominent one for most people.

Clearly one's mode of communication depends on one's context - this drives the superiority of any mode over any other mode, and with the world becoming a busier place, immediancy may be being replaced by convenience for both parties. As for universiality, voice may have an advantage today over some modes, but certainly not over SMS.

In many instances my own convenience trumps an emotional connection of a voice call. I can send an SMS between activities where I may not want or have time to engage in a discussion. While not being as personal of a connection, it can also be more respectful of the other person's time as well, as it waits to be received at the best time for them.

A broad generalisation, but technology seems to be outweighing traditional customs in younger societies where they no longer think of the connection through physical communication as a necessity. (A bad thing, IMO) In this SIM-city world, Tomi's statements are not that surprising. Voice will never go away, but it will also not maintain its spot as the defacto superior choice either. Instead, it will only be one of many equally considered choices from which to pick as you fit your immediate context.

SMS will increasingly be the best fit for the "modern" context, and thus I think Tomi might be right.

Of course, I can do little but defer to Tomi's expertise on this topic. I understand and agree with what he's (you're) saying, but what I meant to say was less about the medium, and more about the mode.

Here's what I mean:

With its immediacy, relative universality (far more people can speak than can read/write), flexibility and emotional payload, 'voice' is far superior to text as a communications mode. (would love to hear anyone's comment who disagrees!)

If there was no difference in the cost of the two services and the bursty, one-way style of SMS could be mimicked (Services like BubbleMotion go some of the way in that direction), do you think that text messaging would continue to be preferred over voice by a significant and growing segment of the mobile population?

Hi Russell and all readers of MobHappy (my number one must-read blog every day about mobile.. its not just mobile, its mob-HAPPY stories about mobile..)

(thank you Russell once again for the kind mention of the numbers and the Pearls eBook etc)

I saw the comments before, toothbrushes, brilliant. I also noted Jeff's comment, and that made me pause, and felt I do need to post.

It is totally true, that when the mobile phone was developed, it was done to allow mobility to that very useful technology we had, the telephone. And the only mass-market communication on telephones back then in the 1970s was voice calls (no internet, and even the fax was very rare high tech).

Today, however, there is a dramatic shift in how the phone is being used. In most advanced and many mainstream markets, the majority of users say the number one need for a phone is no longer voice calls, it is text messages. So the phone is shifting from a voice "conversations" device to a text messaging device.

We've seen all kinds of national regulators already report on this trend. It is near-universal already, from Ireland to literally the opposite side of the planet, New Zealand (you can't get more apart than that ha-ha).

So here is the amazing part. We are starting to see a shift, where some users are NOT making ANY outbound voice calls on their phones. In India the percentage is 30%. My company TomiAhonen Consulting tracks this trend and globally its about 8% and I report it in my new Tomi Ahonen Almanac 2009 among hundreds of other stats and facts.

But yes, that is a gradual trend, but some people do not initiate ANY calls. They do send messages and they do receive calls (sometimes, some of them). Some do this for poverty reasons, cannot afford to make calls, so their wealther relatives give them a prepaid phone subscription and hand-me-down used phone, and then the rich relative calls the less wealthy one, to carry the costs of the conversation.

But this is ALSO a trend of preference. Many young people do not like to talk on the phone at all, they prefer to SMS, to twitter etc.

I don't mean the voice killer app is in any way dead, so Jeff you are totally right. Mobile voice is worth 600 billion dollars (and fixed landline voice nearly as much)where SMS, the biggest mobile messaging service, is worth 100 billion and all advanced mobile media content, adding both the mobile operator revenues and the service owner revenues, is only worth about 70 billion dollars. Mobile advertising is only worth about 3 billino out of that.

So yes, voice is very big and clearly the cash cow for the industry. But it is starting to lose its edge. 76% of the total planet's phone subscribers already send SMS text messages and now only 92% of all subscribers place voice calls (that number used to be 100% a decade ago, obviously), so we can see the start of a trend.

I'll keep monitoring it, and there are years and years of big revenues to come from voice calls. But Jeff (and readers of MobHappy) please note, you heard it here first, the time will come when the primary use of the phone for the majority of mobile phone subscribers on the planet, is no longer voice calls, but is messaging. And that date will come in the next decade, so we'll still be seeing it in the time we work in this industry.

Greetings from the Communities-dominate.blogs.com blogsite

Tomi Ahonen :-)

Tomi's analysis is fascinating! We in this industry should be humbled by the enormity of it all. But before we salivate too much over the 500+ billion SMS messages and ~20MM smartphones, let's not forget the real "Killer App"...good old-fashioned voice calling.

More mobile phones than toothbrushes? Someone needs to figure out where those two 'technologies' converge.

It really is incredible. The number of people without mobile phones is roughly in line with those who suffer from some form of malnutrition in developing nations. Definitely some out of whack priorities out there. The fact 100 years of land lines have already been matched by the number of computers is also meaningful. At least no one can steal your credit card while you read a newspaper or check your balance at your local bank though. There is still a large gap we need to close regarding internet security as this digital revolution expands. We can get help using this* security information site as a start at least.

The best comparison I've heard is that the number of mobile phones roughly equals the number of toothbrushes worldwide.

Think about it; yuck!

I personally believe we're very close to a revolution. Maybe, in some parts of world it's already happening. Tomi's post just confirm it.

Cheers!