Tech-Dirt:-Believe It Or Not, People Still Use Mobile Phones For Phone Calls

Every year for the past four or five years, we've seen someone (usually whose job depends on it) declare that "this year will be the year of mobile data." There's this big expectation that there are all these people out there who want to use data services on their mobile phones. But, they keep forgetting one important thing: people still view mobile phones as phones first. Even as more smartphones are selling in the market, an awful lot of them are still used exclusively as phones, with the owner never bothering to make use of any of the data services. There are a bunch of reasons for this, including ridiculous pricing plans, walled gardens and confusing data services. However, even fixing all of those things, it's important to remember that most people are buying a mobile phone to act as a phone -- and as nice as data services are, it's the phone part that is the key selling point.