Archive for July 10th, 2007

Trend Watch: Mobile Phones and User Generated content

Published by Babar Bhatti on July 10, 2007 under Humour, Mobile Trends, User Generated Content, blogging, mobile phones

In the gadget world, camera (mobile) phones are all the rage. The introduction of digital cameras a few years ago provided ordinary people a new level of empowerment as it allowed experimentation and room for errors. Camera phones have taken this activity to yet another level. The decline in prices of camera phones have accelerated the trend. It is common to see people use their phones to take a picture at all kinds of places. This has resulted in plenty of user generated content and many start-ups who are trying to create businesses out of this trend.

Pakistan has a large camera phone user base. In fact I think (can anyone support this assumption?) that Pakistani usage of their phones as cameras is higher than many other comparable countries. Possible reasons which come to mind: people may not afford to buy a separate digital camera, don’t have or care for a pc, they are perfectly happy with keeping and exchanging photos and videos on the phone.

The situations and scenarios for camera phone usage can be endless - and not all are appropriate (technology has always been abused). Being a personal device a phone is always or mostly with the individual so the probability to take a picture of something unexpected or fortuitous is much higher with a camera phone than with a camera. Here I am going to tell a story about a Pakistaniat blog post which would fit a scenario where mobile phone would make it easy to capture something which could be otherwise missed.

This is when the Czech prime minister visited Pakistan in May. Someone confused the Czech flag with the check flag - that is the checkered flag as in racing. Adil Najam took a photo and posted this story at ATP. Interestingly this story was picked up by the Czech media and went viral, resulting in lots of interesting comments and traffic spike for ATP. In the end it turned out as a chance for Czech and Pakistani citizens to exchange stories and some laughs.