New research shows global sales of camera phones hit 25 million in the first half of this year, surpassing digital camera sales and marking perhaps the most notable event in the mobile-phone industry in recent years.
According to research firm Strategy Analytics, mobile-phone makers sold 25 million camera phones in the first half of this year-leap-frogging the 20 million digital cameras sold in the same period. Indeed, sales of camera phones are skyrocketing: only 4 million camera phones were sold in the first half of 2002. However, industry watchers don’t expect camera phones to impact the digital camera market anytime soon, although camera phone technology is rapidly catching up to that of digital cameras. Asian users are already seeing camera phones with 1-megapixel capabilities.
NEC Corp. and Matsushita Electronics Industrial Co. each claimed 15 percent of the camera-phone market, largely on sales in Japan and South Korea, according to Strategy Analytics. Nokia Corp. scored the No. 3 spot with 14 percent.
Carriers are keen to increase sales of camera phones, hoping the devices will spur the use of wireless data and message services. Handset makers expect camera phones to drive handset replacement sales.
“The booming camera-phone market, a $49 billion global opportunity by the end of 2008, will open up new battlegrounds for not just cell-phone makers, but DSC, CMOS / CCD camera module, memory, battery and display vendors, too,” said David Kerr, vice president of Strategy Analytics’ Global Wireless Practice.
According to Strategy Analytics, 65 million camera phones will be sold worldwide this year, driven largely by frenzied growth in Japan and Korea. The firm said camera-phone sales will account for 13 percent of the global handset market this year. Future Image recently predicted that sales of camera phones would not only overtake sales of digital cameras, but sales of both digital and film cameras combined.
With such massive sales, the question arises: What will all those people do with their camera phones? Carriers are today promoting picture messaging, allowing users to send images to family and friends. But picture messaging may just mark one of several camera-phone applications.
For example, there is a new word floating in the collective lexicon of the tech-savvy-moblog, a combination of “mobile” and “blogging.” Blogging is a sort of Internet diary, a collection of regularly updated thoughts and opinions. Moblogging combines the diary aspect of blogging with the visual aspect of camera phones to create a visual record of a user’s life.
“It’s a new, fun thing to do,” said Richard Doherty, director of consulting firm Envisioneering Group.
Several Internet sites have sprung up recently to support mobloggers in the United States and abroad. Textamerica.com, Mlogs.com and Moblogging.org allow users to create their own sites and then update them through camera-phone pictures. Most follow the lives, lunches and pets of younger users, but some are maintained by middle-aged mobloggers.
“It’s reaching a whole new class of customer,” Doherty said. “Everybody wants to belong to something. People like to be part of a community.”
Further, some moblogs detail recent news events, such as the Emmy awards show, the MTV video music awards, the recent East Coast blackouts and even hurricane Isabel. One moblog, dubbed Stop RFID, is described as a grass-roots campaign aimed at “fighting retail surveillance schemes.” The site is sponsored by Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering (Caspian) and features the picture of a baby holding a sign that reads “please don’t tag my toys!”
Moblogs could also be linked to another nascent trend, flash mobs. Recently highlighted by major news outlets, flash mobs are a sort of public performance art. Typically organized through e-mail, flash mobs gather at pre-determined places and times to perform seemingly random actions, like pantomiming a game of Ping-Pong. The crowd then disperses as quickly as it formed. Mobile phones and text messages are also sometimes used to organize the events.
Some see moblogs as a potential new form of civic journalism. Indeed, a recent article for the Poynter Institute, a school for journalism, pointed to camera phones as part of a new frontier for amateur and volunteer journalists. Doherty said moblogs could also become a sort of advertising vehicle, with companies sponsoring their own moblogs and inviting users to join in.
However, Doherty said, “No one’s figured out the business model yet.”
