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The purpose of this paper is to identify several measures that reflect the diffusion of the mobile internet.

The measurements are implemented with a newly developed handset‐based mobile service research platform that provides a novel way to accurately identify trends taking place in mobile service usage. These measures are demonstrated in a case example comparing Finnish early‐adopter smartphone users between 2005 and 2006 (500 and 695 users).

The results indicate that the mobile internet has not yet emerged on a large scale in Finland. On the contrary operators have slightly increased their power, potentially because handset bundling with mobile subscriptions is now allowed in Finland.

The measurement framework can be further utilized in both cross‐sectional and longitudinal study settings in evaluating the emergence of the mobile internet. No other empirical research method provides the accuracy and scope of usage measurements done with the handset‐based research platform. However, the shortcomings of the new method should be realized.

The paper suggests that the mobile internet has not emerged widely, even in early‐adopter user segments.

This paper contributes to the measurement of mobile internet service usage. Mobile internet services are currently emerging in early‐adopter user segments. These services might shake the dynamics of the mobile services industry by introducing different kinds of technical innovation and business logic.

The purpose of this paper is to identify enablers and inhibitors to the adoption of mobile internet services by socioeconomically disadvantaged people: an understudied population adversely affected by digital inequality.

A qualitative study combining a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. In total, 32 socioeconomically disadvantaged people explored mobile lottery services and subsequently were asked a series of semi-structured questions about their perceptions of the technology.

Users’ attitudes toward mobile internet services were ambivalent. They experienced some advantages of smartphones (including escaping spatiotemporal constrains, fashionableness, privacy, and cost-effectiveness) and conceived of mobile internet services in terms of social advantages (including their ubiquitous nature, fitting in socially and fear of being “left behind”). However, they also experienced barriers and concerns, such as limited mobile data packages, external barriers from mobile services (including security concerns, complex online help tutorials, irrelevant pop-ups, and a lack of personalized services) and internal psychological barriers (including technophobia, self-concept, and habitus).

The findings are of limited generalizability due to the small size of the sample. However, the study has implications for understanding the acceptance of technology among socioeconomically disadvantaged people.

The study has social implications for bridging digital inequality in terms of socioeconomic status.

While previous studies have primarily focused on enablers of adopting mobile internet services by active users, this study reveals both the promise of and the barriers to the use of such services by inactive users who comprise an under-served population.

Prepaid mobile Internet is one of the most profitable services that are composed of multiple attributes. The overall utility of Internet service can be broken down into the sum of the utility of individual attribute levels. Based on the multi-attribute theory, rational consumers choose the service that yields the highest utility from a number of possible alternatives. Determining the optimal attribute levels that satisfy consumers' preferences and maximize the total revenue of the firm is a challenging multi-attribute decision problem for any mobile operator. When designing mobile Internet services, adopting a robust composition of services against different realizations of competitors' strategies can bring advantages for network operators. The purpose of this study is to determine the optimal attribute levels of prepaid mobile Internet packages with the aim of maximizing the total revenue of the firm by considering the paradigms of multi-attribute utility theory about consumer choices and the issue of uncertainty in counterpart services offered by the competitors.

This paper formulates the problem of multi-attribute pricing and design of mobile Internet plans in a competitive environment by developing deterministic and robust scenario-based mathematical models and considering the paradigms of multi-attribute utility theory about consumer choices. The proposed robust scenario-based models are based on three different paradigms, including maximizing expected revenue, minimizing the negative deviation from expected revenue and minimizing the maximum regret. A comprehensive numerical analysis is conducted to evaluate and compare the efficiency of the proposed models.

The evaluations reveal that deploying recourse policy can result in higher revenue for the firm when facing uncertainty. By doing sensitivity analysis, this paper shows that consumer preferences for brand attribute and consumers' purchase frequency can influence the revenue of network operators.

This paper develops a novel deterministic multi-attribute product line design (PLD) model to address the problem of determining the price and composition of prepaid mobile Internet plans. Furthermore, the issue of uncertainty in counterpart services offered by the competitors is studied for the first time in the PLD literature.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate US consumers' adoption of mobile services from the perspectives of channel extension (mobile vs internet) as well as with considerations of ethnic and gender difference. Specifically, this paper examines the effects of gender and ethnicity in consumers' current usages in different types of mobile services, the relationships between consumers' current internet and mobile service usages, and how current usages of internet and mobile services predict future intentions to use mobile services.

Online survey method was employed to collect the data. A total of 492 responses were obtained from current mobile users.

The mobile services most (e.g. sending and receiving text and picture messages, checking e‐mail) and least used (e.g. gambling, educational services) were similar between both male and female respondents, yet male respondents showed a higher use of mobile services. Among ethnic groups, African Americans were the most engaged users of all mobile services, and European Americans were the least engaged. In certain service categories (e.g. informational services related to business/finance), both gender and ethnicity were shown to have significant effects on consumers' current usages of both the internet and mobile services and intentions to use mobile services.

Gender‐ and ethnic‐specific marketing strategies should be based on the types of mobile services. Special attention should be paid to African Americans that have expressed great interests in using the services that are offered through mobile devices (e.g. informational services related to health and business/finance, payment/billing services, and purchasing products). Understanding current internet use of each mobile service is a key to the success of the potential use of mobile services.

There is a lack of previous research addressing consumer issues relevant to specific types of mobile services. This paper provides a meaningful insight into consumer adoption of various types of mobile services from the perspectives of channel extension (mobile vs internet) as well as ethnic and gender difference.

The research goal of this study is to explore the factors influencing the adoption of Android smartphones and the intention to pay for mobile internet services.

The present study proposes a framework based on theory of reasoned action (TRA) from the perspectives of software (interface convenience and perceived content), hardware (perceived infrastructure), design (design aesthetics) and perceived value (emotional value, price/value for money, performance/quality value, and social value). A web survey was conducted, and data were collected from a total of 881 users of Android smartphones in Taiwan. The casual model was validated using partial least squares (PLS) techniques.

The results indicated that the influence of the factors on the intention of the mobile internet users and non‐users were different. Surprisingly, the effect of design aesthetics was not significant in all of the groups. Male users were found to be more likely to read e‐books on their smartphones, as are people with higher personal incomes.

This study contributes to a theoretical understanding of the factors that promote mobile internet users' and non‐users' intention to adopt Android smartphones and pay for mobile internet services. The proposed framework can be used by mobile internet service providers and smartphone manufacturers to design the products and marketing strategies.

The primary value of this paper lies in providing a better understanding of users' and non‐users' concerns about Android smartphone adoption and subscription of mobile internet services.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze standard setting and how a critical mass of users emerged in an industry in which multiple interface standards co‐exist and a critical mass of users was created multiple times.

This paper is based on research conducted for almost ten years using the case study approach. Data were gathered through more than 100 interviews with Japanese firms and through analyses of published sources.

The paper finds that growth in mobile internet services required agreements on multiple interface standards where some of these interface standards exhibited interdependencies and thus required integral design, while others have been built on top of these “basic” interface standards. Agreements on the former interface standards enable basic data connections between phones, services, and content and this required integral design. The latter interface standards connect the mobile phone with content and applications from other industries (e.g. music, video, publishing, broadcasting, and payment) and each critical mass of phones, services, and content for them partly builds from previously created critical masses.

The research focused on a single industry in a single country.

This paper helps scholars and practitioners better understand how interface standards and critical masses for them emerge.

This is the first paper to analyze multiple interface standards in a single industry and the emergence of a critical mass of users or complementary products for these standards.

Outlines Japan’s journey to third‐generation mobile (3G). Posits a number of factors have been responsible for driving Japan in the direction of 3G. Examines developments in 3G mobile phones and the situation reached in that country. Sums up that there are a number of lessons to be learned from the Japanese experience, notably on market structure.

The purpose of this paper is to chart the evolving internet‐mobile internet relationship in Japan.

The approach takes the form of a case study.

The original i‐Mode‐based model for mobile internet in Japan was largely an ordered system except for relatively marginal unofficial web sites, which unlike official web sites were not listed on the browser, where an element of chaos reigned. The introduction of Google search engine changed the ecosystem by giving the unofficial web sites new visibility.

The interface between the internet and its wireless extensions is a potential source of powerful influences both ways and needs to be watched.

The paper looks at the little studied interface between the chaotic internet and its mobile extensions, largely ordered systems, to see whether the chaos of the internet will spill over to its mobile extensions or whether the order of the latter will march on to the former.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the market potential for internet services interacted historically with the diffusion process of fixed line and mobile telephony.

The authors evaluate the historical interactions between internet, fixed line and mobile telephony using the International Telecommunications Union data set from 1991 until 2003 for 214 countries.

It was found that between 1991 and 2003 mobile and internet services were fully complementary; fixed line facilitated the diffusion of internet service, but internet diffusion did not affect fixed line telephony. The authors discuss the implications of these results in the light of current developments of the telecommunications industry.

Internet adoption should be analysed in close relation to the adoption of other telecommunication services, such as fixed line and mobile telephony.

The paper shows the interconnectivity of the internet with other telecommunication services and emphasizes the asymmetric nature of these interactions. Telecommunication services interactions are discussed in the light of recent industry developments.

The aim of this paper is to investigate the perceived obstacles to the adoption of mobile banking services among Brazilian internet users and search for patterns according to socio‐demographics variables.

Data were collected through an online survey involving the internet banking customers of a major Brazilian bank. A total of 3,585 usable cases were collected from customers who do not use any kind of mobile devices (cell phones, PDAs or Smartphones) to access electronic banking services. The main reasons for rejecting the service were explored using multidimensional scaling, while chi‐square tests were used to assess differences between socio‐demographic variables.

The results indicate that the majority of respondents do not use any kind of mobile banking service. Perception of cost, risk, low perceived relative advantage and complexity were revealed to be the main reasons behind the reluctance to use the service. The influence of other background factors is less evident.

The research has practical implications, as it suggests guidance strategies and presents directions for service enhancement as a key to overcoming the perceived obstacles to m‐banking adoption.

This is the first empirical research exploring mobile banking resistance factors in Brazil.