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During the November of last year, ABI Research carried out a survey of more than 1000 adult consumers in the United States to identify their attitudes toward netbooks and Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs).
Some companies have sold MIDs as mobile phone replacements and apparently that marketing worked like a charm, with almost half of respondents agreeing with that pitch. On the other hand, 34% of people surveyed said they would continue to use a mobile phone.
ABI Research believes that some people will value a separate device with a bigger screen for the web browsing, that they can choose when to carry. They went on to add that more interesting promise offered by MIDs without cellular voice will be their repackaging in the form of specialized Internet-connected devices such as media players or PNDs.
According to ABI’s Philip Solis this is going to become a question for MID vendors and consumers alike. “There will be little difference between a smartphone such as the Palm Pre which uses an OMAP 3 processor and a MID with cellular voice, except for screen size. Understanding of what consumers want from stand-alone MIDs without cellular voice will be important,” he added.
The results of the survey are summarized in a Research Brief titled “Consumer Impressions of Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs)” and you can get more information about it from here.
About The Author
Dusan Belic
Dusan has been using smartphones since their introduction and is now following the latest trends in the industry. The "convergence" is what he's most excited about, and writing about it is the next logical thing to do. He thinks that using a smartphone is what everyone who cares about their time should do. In addition to his interests in mobile phones, Dusan also loves to experiment with the latest web and mobile 2.0 services. The idea of accessing and managing your information from any device no matter where you are simply amazes him. Whether it's an online to-do list, note taking service or a video sharing social network, he's there to try it out. He admits though, he's still searching for the ultimate web-based organizational tool, which "sings" perfectly with the mobile PIM application. Dusan used to run SymbianWatch.com which later became part of IntoMobile. He lives in Serbia, South-East Europe, from where he edits the site on a daily basis.
