An entire nation on the phone

By PETER GRIFFIN

The Korean voice jolting me from my slumber has a frenzied edge. I jump up, staring terrified at the hotel room door, expecting it to smash open.

Then I catch sight of my flashing Korean mobile phone. I wasn't trapped in some B-grade martial arts movie - someone was trying to call.

"This is the sound of the bell which is 500 years oooold!" the voice from the silvery device screams in Korean. (That's the translation an amused Korean friend later came up with, anyway.)

South Korea - if you go now, you'll notice two things: everyone's wearing red T-shirts to support the "Korea Warriors", their amazingly successful World Cup soccer team, and most people are clutching state-of-the-art mobile phones.

Korea is a global anomaly. It has a huge teen/young adult population with money to burn, sky-rocketing internet use and a tradition of adopting new technology.

Most of the world's 10 million third-generation "3G" mobile subscribers live in South Korea and Japan, and the countries are the world's mobile wireless technology leaders.

The Korean media uses words like "motizens" - mobile netizens - to describe the tech-hungry.

More than 47 million people live in South Korea, and 63 per cent own mobile phones. That rate is similar to New Zealand's, but the Korean mobile scene is gigantic in comparison.

Mobile Madness: In early morning commuter traffic, I wander through the cavernous Seoul subway.

Koreans play with their mobiles everywhere - on escalators, while having lunch or waiting in queues, and riding the subway. Many dangle their phones around their necks on necklaces adorned with ornaments.

What do they use their mobiles for, besides talking? Korean network operator SK Telecom says mobile data services users are most interested in downloading ring tones and pictures. That contributes around 40 per cent of data revenue for the telco, followed by games and entertainment on 30 per cent. "Adult" applications, which seem to consist of downloading pictures of scantily clad women, are 9.5 per cent of revenue.

Sending e-mail, dialling in to video games, downloading midi-files, group chat and mobile karaoke are also popular. Plug in your earphone, download a song and sing along to the music as the lyrics scroll across your mobile screen.

The phones are light years ahead of the bricks we carry in New Zealand. Seventy per cent of new phones sold have full-colour displays.

In Korea, local manufacturers better known for making trucks and TV screens have turned their hand to making mobile phones. You won't see too many Nokias. It's LG, Samsung and Hyundai all the way, with a few Japanese manufacturers such as Sharp and Toshiba thrown in.

Behind the popularity of mobile devices is their applications. Mobile carrier KTF's icon-based BREW platform supports around 300 applications, from mobile karaoke songs to games and news services.

World Cup On The Move: Later that week, I'm squeezing my way through the throng of "Red Devils" (Korean soccer fans) to watch Denmark eject France from the World Cup at Incheon Stadium outside Seoul.

From the stands, I was hoping to download replays of the action to my phone over KTFs video on-demand service. But KTF has disabled its video service during the cup to stop thousands of fans overloading the network.

So I settle for taking digital pictures with my phone-come-camera and e-mailing them back to New Zealand. My LG phone also has nifty games, letting me take shots at goal or set my ring tone to the football chant "ole, ole ole ole!"

Explaining The Craze: What makes the Koreans and Japanese such rabid consumers of mobile gadgets?

Escaping the thumbing tribe, I duck into a dingy bar in the sweaty Itaewan district, where I meet a Chinese tourist with a theory on the Korean digital revolution.

"Asian people have a cultural tradition of comparing," Mingjuan tells me, eyeing my sleek 3G phone.

"They compare everything they have, and will be very proud if they have the most advanced things."

So it's a geeky form of keeping up with the Joneses?

Some competitive pricing from the Korean technology giants and firm prodding from a digitally minded Government have also played their part, but the core of the explanation lies in culture.

"Many Asians are too shy to speak out about everything. They would rather send you a message instead of directly telling you how they think about you. Especially between close boy and girl friends," Mingjuan whispers with a grin.

Days later, I wander out of Auckland Airport, my spirits as drained as the batteries of the two boring New Zealand phones I had lugged to Asia and back.

I wanted to switch on to cheesy jingles and the full-colour standard with Korean phones.

But the local network operators, who have a huge financial interest in forcing new mobile technology on us, are not standing still.

Telecom is launching its "cdma 1XRTT" network, which will allow the fast data transfer speeds that millions of Asian users have already grown blase about. The real test will be whether mobile software developers can come up with something better than delivering rugby scores to mobiles.

Last week, Vodafone started its "PXT" service, which lets users with the right phones take photos and email them to friends.

Users of the stylish Sony Ericsson T68i ($1379) can buy a miniature camera attachment ($399) which takes digital pictures.

At this stage, the multimedia phones are a tad expensive - sending pictures costs 50c each. But it's a sign of things to come.

We might trail the Koreans by several years in our take-up of new technology, but as Vodafone and Telecom introduce more advanced services to stop customers network-hopping, the best of the mobile internet will come our way eventually.

Opane Mashimaro

KTF
QUALCOMM
KDDI

Samsung

SK Telecom