Cell phone porn to ring up $3.3 billion
"Sex sells," so adult content on mobile devices will be a multibillion-dollar market in five years, a research firm predicts.
Adult content on mobile devices will be worth $3.3 billion by 2011, up from $1.4 billion this year, according to industry analysts Juniper Research.
Europe is the biggest spender on porn, due to both its appetite for smut and the relatively high-priced nature of adult content. The Asia-Pacific region follows in second place.
The development of the adult content market will also evolve in parallel with mobile telephony technology, Juniper predicted. Currently, most adult content is text-based. As 3G wireless, which provides more capacity for multimedia services, reaches maturity, porn will switch to video delivery, Juniper said. More than 70 percent of revenue will be derived from that medium by 2011, according to the report.
"Erotic adult entertainment is big business--sex sells! What's more, the underlying drivers mean that the demand is pretty constant," the report's authors noted.
However, highly dedicated smut watchers are unlikely to be getting their content on their mobiles, Juniper said. Rather, the typical mobile porn consumer is likely to be a "lad down the pub" trying to impress his mates.
Jo Best reported for Silicon.com from London.