Virgin Mobile USA teams with Intercasting for social networking access

Virgin Mobile USA L.L.C. has partnered with Intercasting to offer its customers direct access from select handsets to a range of social-networking sites. The service is initially available on three handsets, with more to come.
The sites include general blog and networking sites such as LiveJournal, Rabble, Vox and Xanga, as well as sites aimed at specific demographics, such as AsianAve, BlackPlanet, GLEE (Gay, Lesbian and Everyone Else) and MiGente, an English-language site for the Hispanic community.
“There is a growing number of social-networking sites that reflect different lifestyles and interests,” said Dominick Tolli, VP for Virgin Mobile USA’s Mobile Data Services division. He said the company was committed to “enabling customers to create their own individual experiences, determining how and with whom they want to communicate, whenever they like.”
Virgin Mobile USA customers can choose to pay for access to the sites by the day or month and/or by data volume, according to the mobile virtual network operator. Each site can be accessed for $1 for 24 hours or up to a half megabyte of data. Customers can also choose a monthly payment option of $4 for five megabytes of data. An initial 10-cent fee allows users to gain access to the MVNO’s XL service from which the Anthem platform from Intercasting can be downloaded.
Anthem provides a “Web-like, media-rich interface,” according to the companies, as well as a “consistently simple user interface” regardless of which site the customer chooses to visit. Virgin Mobile USA’s Cyclops, Slider Sonic and Switch_Back handsets can access the Java application.
Virgin Mobile USA said that a proprietary survey of its under-35 users revealed that 63% said they had a profile posted on one or more social-networking site. Those who used social-networking sites frequented well-known sites such as Facebook and MySpace.com, but Virgin Mobile USA said that 43% named other sites as their favorites. Sixteen percent of Virgin Mobile USA’s customers who use social-networking sites named Xanga as a favorite, and 5% specifically listed BlackPlanet.com. A vast majority of social networkers-92%-said they visited their favorite site at least once a day; one-third of users said they spent between 15 to 30 minutes on the site, and 14% said they spent more than 90 minutes per day on the site.
In related news, a recent report from research firm In-Stat indicated that mobile blogging offers a new opportunity to wireless companies to derive revenue from camera phones. The company noted that the “abundance of Web sites dedicated to moblogging and photoblogging indicates there is a growing interest in combining social networking with camera phone technology.”
In-Stat found that software developers had an opportunity to develop mobile Internet applications to enable such uses, and also noted the wide availability of camera phones. The company said that more than 60% of U.S. mobile phone users have cameras in their phones, compared with about 40% in 2006. In-Stat predicted that more than 1 billion camera phones would be in use by the end of this year.
“This growing focus provides financial opportunities for mobile device networks, social networking site operators and software developers,” said In-Stat analyst Jill Meyers. “Mobile device networks can benefit through traditional methods of data plans, as well as per-message and per-photo charges.”