Mobile Phone usage

[TheGooner]

Ladies and Gents your attention please ...

I'm interested in understanding how people relate to their mobile phone, what they use it for, and how much of their internet use is on your phone as compared to other internet devices. The GPWA membership will be a switched on group, and I am expecting a diverse range of answers.

I'll go first - please use my response as a sort of template for your own response and we should get a good snapshot of the wide range of phone use.

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Paul (TheGooner)

Phone Type - Samsung powered by Android - small sized probably about 4 inches on the diagonal. I like this size because it fits in my pockets easily.

Phone Age - 18 months old
Phone Cost - Free with a 24 month plan
Plan Cost - $39 per month
Phone calls per month - 10 to 20
Texts per month - 0 to 10
Apps use last month - 0 to 10 - main ones = Livescore, Air NZ Flight App, Bloomsky (for my weather cam)
Internet browser use - less than 1 hour

Additional Discussion - I don't use the internet on my phone much, but this is because I also have a 10 inch tablet, a laptop and a desktop to create / consume online media at home - so the phone interaction is not required.

I've never used twitter or facebook from my phone - desktop only - am I missing something?

Best phone feature for me is the camera - taking scenery shots at around 2MB a shot and creating screensavers and backgrounds out of them. I am amazed at the quality that comes out of a cheap (free!) samsung mini-phone !!

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So that's my phone use - I guess you could call me a minimal adopter.
How about YOU ?

[AE-Stephen]

Phone Type - IPhone 6 32GB

Phone Age - 20 months old
Phone Cost - Free upgrade
Plan Cost - £55 per month
Phone calls per month - Tariff allows unlimited, I probably use 3-600 minutes.
Texts per month - Tariff unlimited, I probably use over 1,000.
Apps use last month - Too many to mention, most used: Bet365, PaddyPower, Racing Post, Facebook, Livescores, Sky Sports, Barclays, Instagram, Soundcloud, Uber, JustEat
Internet browser use - An unfathomable amount, tariff is unlimited with a fair usage of 1,000GB a month haha.

Additional Discussion - I rarely turn my personal laptop on these days the only thing I use use it for is Excel etc. I feel quite sad writing this out.

[eenzoo]

Enrico/eenzoo

Phone Type - iPhone 6

Phone Age - 8 months old
Phone Cost - €900
Plan Cost - equal to $50per month
Phone calls per month - 30-50
Texts per month - SMS? - 1-10
Apps use last month - ​around 30 incl. whatsapp, facetime, booking.com, deezer, xe, amazon, airbnb, forbes, translator, kalender, email, maps, linkedin, n24 news, pushup counter, skrill, skype, snapseed, vivino ... and some more
Internet browser use - about 1-2 hours a day

Additional Discussion - For my personal use, i don't need a laptop or something. banking, travel bookings etc all via iPhone. Thereto i have all relevant data from Macbook Pro, iPad and iPhone synchronized in iCloud available.

[James.Boran]

Phone Type - Iphone 6

Phone Age - 19 months old
Phone Cost - £650
Plan Cost - £12
Phone calls per month - 4-5 per day
Texts per month - Almost none only use whatsapp and FB messenger (even my mother uses whatsapp instead of texting me these days)
Apps use last month - 10 to 20 - main ones = Sky Score Centre, Sky Plus, Google News, Natwest, Facebook, Twitter, Rightmove, Skyscanner, Bet365 for sports betting, Spotify, Uber, BT Sport, A load of mFortune/PocketWin games for testing etc..

Additional Discussion - I have a laptop that I only use for work I mainly use my phone for browsing the internet. While I am in the office I prefer using a PC to anything else.

[GCG]

Attention please


https://youtu.be/aR8DBbUzQNc

[RacingJim]

Phone Type - Samsung S6 32GB
Phone Age - 12 months old
Phone Cost - 'Free' On a 24 month planwith O2
Plan Cost - £41 p/m
Phone calls per month - probably 5-10 per week
Texts per month - Decent amount maybe a few hundred, also use the FB messenger for a few people
Apps use last month - 10-20 - main ones = Google Analytics, Sky Score Centre, Sky News, Facebook, Twitter, Rightmove, Skyscanner, YouTube, eBay, Auto Trader, BBC Weather, FlightRadar24, Zoopla, Google Earth
Internet browser use - Tons, use my phone a lot when I'm not at the PC for quick browsing and checking other scores etc during football.

Additional Discussion - I do all work on my PC, I have a laptop that I don't use that much except when travelling/on holidays. Phone is for everything in between though I am finally getting a tablet soon after not bothering before.

[TheGooner]

Internet browser use - An unfathomable amount, tariff is unlimited with a fair usage of 1,000GB a month haha.

F@%K me !!

Down here I get about 750MB a month mobile data or roughly 1/1250th of you get ...
I think I am beginning to understand the mobile data / mobile phone transition in Europe / UK

[AE-Stephen]

Most UK companies are at 10GB (When you pay for unlimited) but with 3 mobile, unlimited means unlimited.

I remember once I was away in the hills on a caravan holiday, I was tethering from to the phone to the PS3 for online haha. They soon put a restriction on that.

[AE-Stephen]

Sorry for the double post,

Another major selling point of 3 mobile: When you travel abroad there is 18 destinations where internet usage comes off your data allowance , no additional fee's. So if I travelled to Spain, USA, OZ, France, Israel, AND New Zealand plus more, my internet usage is totally free.

[TheGooner]

Texts per month - Almost none only use whatsapp and FB messenger (even my mother uses whatsapp instead of texting me these days)

Why? I see Whatsapp basic value prop is not having to pay for SMS messages ...
Who pays for SMS messages these days isn't it pretty much unlimited ?

Or is there a lot more to it than I am grasping ...

[James.Boran]

I do have unlimited text messages but I just don't find myself using them for some reason.

I prefer whatsapp just because it is so much easier to send images/large files, have group chats and also if you are put of the country you only need wifi to send messages.

[pokeraussie]

Who pays for SMS messages these days isn't it pretty much unlimited ?

Or is there a lot more to it than I am grasping ...

Perhaps if you're on a plan. You pay per SMS if you have prepaid.

I don't even have a mobile data plan, I just use wifi on my phone when it's available. I am on the internet enough at home. Don't need to use it more on my phone.

[JackTenSuited]

Why? I see Whatsapp basic value prop is not having to pay for SMS messages ...
Who pays for SMS messages these days isn't it pretty much unlimited ?

Or is there a lot more to it than I am grasping ...

Whatsapp interface is far more powerful. Group chats, media etc. Also whatsapp is encrypted.

[AE-Stephen]

The end to end encryption is a major plus, although I've nothing to hide the thought of someone snooping does give me shivers.

[universal4]

Phone Type - #1 Lumia running Windows 8 (mostly private number)
Phone Type - #2 LG Motion running Android (business number)

Both phones are approximately 4 inch screens and I would not want any larger, they fit in my shirt pocket and it would not feel much like a phone any larger.

Phone Age - Both phones approximately 2 years old I plan on replacing the Android one of these days and will only replace the Lumia if I find a decent Windows 10 replacement.

Plan Cost - $40 per month each
Phone calls per month - ?? hundreds
Texts per month - 20 to 100

Apps use last month - PRTG (Server Monitoring 24/7 both devices polls every 60 seconds) GPS services mostly on Windows I like "Here Maps" few times a month - Amber Alerts/Severe Thunderstorm Warnings Enabled

Internet browser use - less than 1 hour

Additional Discussion - I don't use the internet on my phone much, but this is because I also have a a laptop and a desktop to create / consume online media at home - so the phone interaction is not required.

Although I will on rare occasion use internet on one of the phones to look something up, I will most often fire up the laptop or wait until I get home.

I feel phones are COMMUNICATION devices and although they are mini-computers, I have computers and prefer to use a computer to do a computer's job.

Rick
Universal4

[wonderpunter]

Phone Type - Samsung s6 Android - Great phone measly battery

Phone Age - 14 months old
Phone Cost - €700
Plan Cost - €30 per month
Phone calls per month - 10
Texts per month - 0 - all whatsapp
Apps use last month - Facebook, Skype, BBC News, Wexplore weather, analytics, gmail, maps,
Internet browser use - less than 1 hour

Additional Discussion - I am actually a heavy user as I like to be connected out and about, there is always something to check though battery sucks and it's time for an upgrade. I am in contact with hundreds of people across the globe so whatsapp and skype come in handy.

[TheGooner]

Great stuff so far - thanks for the contributions.


One of the really surprising things so far (for me) is the age of the phones - many happy to run phones 12-24 months old.
Makes all the product hype and phone launches a bit silly ...

[Mikew]

Phone Type - Alcatel onetouch Fierce

Phone Age - 10 months old
Phone Cost - was 100 Euros on sales back then
Plan Cost - No plan. Pay as you go.
Phone calls per month - A lot, mostly business or wifey, Spend about 20 Euro only for calling, but skype call a lot on wifi.
Texts per month - 0-10 mostly use Skype.
Apps use last month - Skype, Gmail (all the time), Twitter, Livescore.
Internet browser use - Less than 1 hour but only on wifi.

Additional Discussion - I mainly use my phone to check Emails and reports every morning plus Skype calls. Not a fan of browsing on internet with the phone, I prefer to use the laptop or desktop. I actually don't even have any song pictures in my phone, that's how much I don't care about technology or features of smartphones, but I like the size as I can perfectly read Emails.

[Renee]

Phone Type - HTC One X - Android
Phone Age - 3 years
Phone Cost - Free with a 24 month plan
Plan Cost - $79 per month (Back down to $50 per month outside contract with 5GB data, unlimited texts, calls and X amount of international calls and texts per month)
Phone calls per month - 30-40
Texts per month - 50-100, not including kik, whatsapp and fb messenger which I mostly use.
Apps use last month - - Camera, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Carsales, 2048, Gmail, Tripview, Mindbody, MyFitnessPal, Instafollow, Report, Video Collage, Whatsapp, Chrome, Skype, FB Messenger, Kik, POF, Tumblr, Carousell, Ebay, Paypal, Youtube, Maps, Foxtel Guide, St George Banking, Tripit, Adobe ReaderShazam, Spotify, Netflix, Uber. I've probably missed some off this list too.
Internet browser use - 3-4 hours

Additional Discussion - I have an ipad which I use for a few things, but I use my phone for everything. I'm rarely at home so I'd say most of my "internet" use is on my phone. The camera on my phone is one of the best in the phone market. It has settings on it that are similar to a DSLR.

I'm waiting for May when the new HTC Ten comes out. That's the only reason I haven't upgraded. That and I'm a complete commitment phobe so I have to make a quick decision to commit to a phone contract and sign it before I change my mind, and I've managed to change my mind every time I've thought about a new phone.

My only complaint is that the battery doesn't last longer. Although it's pretty good compared to the other phones that came out around that time.

I have a laptop too which I really only use for "work". I also have 2 tablets, one of which I never use anymore. I'm a bit of a geek when it comes to technology. I like to have all the stuff.

[B]Internet browser use - An unfathomable amount, tariff is unlimited with a fair usage of 1,000GB a month haha.

I think I'd give that 1000GB a run for its money. I usually use around 8GB a month and that's being careful. Probably too because I'm never home.

One of the really surprising things so far (for me) is the age of the phones - many happy to run phones 12-24 months old.
Makes all the product hype and phone launches a bit silly ...

I reckon it's because most phone contracts are 24 months. If they were only 12 months I think people would be more likely to upgrade more often.

[Progger]

Phone Type - Lumia 1020

Phone Age - 6 months old
Phone Cost - € 480
Plan Cost - 20$ Month
Phone calls per month - 20-30
Texts per month - SMS? - 0
Apps use last month - ​email,whatspp and radar warning system
Internet browser use - 3-4H month


Sometimes a lil bit Youtube or Liveleak.