A report from EE Times Asia indicated that consumers in South Korea have been reverting to 2G because of a lack of killer apps for 3G. Is this of concern? In Europe, consumers haven't really taken to 3G - most consumers of 3G capabilities have been enterprise users. So any thoughts on where consumers are heading next and what the impact of that might be on device management?

It gets even more interesting when you bring Wi-Fi and WiMax into the picture.

Ultimately it comes down to pricing. Fast surfing might be killer enough for most people at this stage but how soon will the operators grasp this?

I think that in the US the iPhone might prove the same case for "killer hardware" with "Killer apps". With Wifi and easily the most beautiful UI currently available folks are more apt to sacrifice some mobile speed for overall enjoyment. Once the device is updated and enhanced it will only get better.

I am biased of course and love my iPhone. LOL

Greg, I agree. People respond to utility and ease of use, maybe even more so than pricing depending on their circumstances.

I have been reading the various iPhone reviews and commentaries and I am keen to see what form it takes when it hits Europe, and more importantly, what reception it gets. We have heavy operator subsidies in many markets but we also have a very strong independent (SIM-free) sector in most markets.

I don't think the public see a real distinction between 2G and 3G at the moment. Video calls didn't really take off in Europe given the high cost of this, and to date the networks appear to have been actively disuading the user from the killer feature of 3G: enhanced data transfer rate. By making the cost prohibitive, adding usage restrictions on using as a modem with laptops etc and starting off with the "walled garden" approach of 3G internet access to their own content only, I think they've turned the public off to mobile internet.
Now devices with bigger screens and a potentially richer mobile internet experience are surfacing, this could change but I must say I think the phone networks really shot themselves in the foot with this one, and it's taken devices like the iPhone (which admittedly doesn't even support 3G, but I'm sure next year's model wil!) to tap into the latent demand in the marketplace for mobile internet.

To the phone companies: bring down data prices. Acceptable monthly charges for pretty much unlimited access is the way forward: it also opens up secondary revenue streams selling music/ringtones/location based services etc. None of this is going to happen to any significant degree until data charges are low enough to make it usable. In the future, at least in the US, the 700MHz spectrum cell off could make the phone companies a bit of an irrelevance when it comes to mobile data if they don't do this now...

I agree. The public knows fast downloading or fast surfing when they see it, but I'm not convinced that they care whether it is 2G, EDGE, 3G, HSDPA or WiFi. I think the industry is often too caught up in its own jargon.

I do not have a 3G card for my laptop and although I have had several 3G phones, I have made very little use of 3G. So how can this be? Well, r.harris has put his finger on one of the major problems I have had: pricing. However, for me the even bigger problem is the lack of price transparency. Fair enough, some operators have introduced flat rates, but the transparency problem still remains for the situations in which I would find 3G (and for that matter data services in general) most useful, namely when I roam.

I am still amazed how difficult it is to get straight answers - or in some cases any answer at all - to the question of how much it will cost me to use the data service in each of the 5 countries I visit most frequently.