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Mobile Madness

“I went to the opera the other night to watch ‘ Madam Butterfly’ and just as she was about to kill herself, with the knife above her head, a mobile phone started to ring somewhere in the opera house”.

British people seem to have gone “mobile mad”. 20% of British people spend an astonishing quarter of their day on mobile phones. We have become so obsessed with the little gadget that we can't leave our house without it! One in three people confess to having used their mobile in the bathroom! The question of mobile telephone addiction is now being taken seriously in many countries. Special clinics are now offering therapy to people who cannot live without their mobile. A Scandinavian driver had to receive treatment in a specialized clinic for his addiction to SMS texting (short message services). The twenty-five-year-old worked nights and spent his daylight hours sending an average of 217 text messages per day. His quarterly mobile phone bill quintupled to 12,000 crowns (£967) – unaffordable on his Danish driver's salary, in Britain, a nineteen-year-old girl asked for help because she would rather spend money on pay-and-go vouchers for her mobile than on food or clothes. She admits to sending around 1,600 text messages a month. “I only feel happy when I hear my mobile beeping. When I don't have any credit left I become depressed. I need to check my mobile every two minutes. I stopped going to classes at college because I couldn't answer my phone”.

Young Users

Over half of children with mobiles prefer to text rather than chat to stay in touch, and there is one report that claims that the thumbs of young children are getting bigger and stronger because they spend so much time texting and playing computer games. It is true that children use their thumbs more than adults nowadays. Adults use their index finger to dial or text, press the button in the lift, key in information on the computer or calculator and so on, but most young children will use their thumbs.

The mobile phone industry claims that it does not target the under-sixteens. But it is true that the adult market is beginning to slow down. OFTEL, the industry regulator in the UK, maintains that three quarters of the adult British population now own a mobile phone. To increase sales of mobile phones to the younger age groups, mobile phone companies have created a range of gimmicks to attract young children – fancy ringtones using the latest pop songs, screensavers using popular cartoon figures such as Harry Potter, Spiderman, and even Winnie the Pooh. Many companies now offer short videos, photographs, even online jokes! Not surprisingly, the number of very young mobile users, between the ages of five and nine, has jumped from 80,000 in 2000 to nearly 1,000,000 now. 33% of children between the ages often and fourteen now have their own mobile.

Music or Mobile?

Young people used to spend large amounts of money on music, but the latest studies reveal that people under the age of twenty-five now spend five times more money on mobile phones than they do on music. A recent study found that this age group annually spends £3 billion of its disposable income on mobile handsets, calls, and data, compared with just £600 million on CDs and other music formats. Under-25 are spending £107 million on mobile music in the UK each year; equivalent to 75 million ringtone downloads. In contrast, music industry figures indicate that CD single sales have fallen “30 to 50%” during the same period.

Mobile phones and accessories account for almost 70% of British under-25s'spending. On average people in this age group spend £238 on their mobile phone compared to only £49 on music.

With the constant advances in mobile telephony, these figures can only increase.

Business One: One, Oxford University Press

Reading Comprehension