Getty Images expands mobile play

Mobile may not be the final frontier, but it sure is the latest frontier for media companies looking to expand their reach. As more and more people consume media on their mobile devices, the demand for rich mobile content is increasing.
And in a medium squeezed for elbow room, a picture could be worth much more than a thousand words; at least Getty Images thinks so.
The 12-year-old image creator, collector and distributor has been eyeing opportunities in mobile for some time. Indeed, it was the first company to license imagery via the Web and almost all of the company’s visual content is delivered digitally.
Getty Images is now pushing into mobile on three fronts: licensing, personalization and information services.
“We sort of look at the mobile opportunity as an extension of our existing business,” said Brooks McMahon, VP of new products and platforms at Getty Images. “The pictures sort of tell the story.”
The company currently licenses its content to handset manufacturers and media organizations for greater play. Its personalization offerings, an area Getty Images has been working in the longest, are distributed via aggregators to wireless carriers, which usually let the aggregators determine what wallpapers, animated screensavers and themes will be made available on deck. Lastly, on information services, Getty Images is hoping to provide mobile customers with timely information on news, sports or entertainment via images that stream constantly around the world.
Getty Images has launched a pair of premium content services to further deliver on these goals. PictureCast provides mobile users with timely images that highlight major news at a fee of $3 a month. Fot