Pew: Hispanics, Blacks Leading the Charge with Mobile Media

Most people think I’m pretty geeky, but in truth so far I’ve been on the wrong side of the digital divide—the one that’s really starting to matter: Mobile media.

Maybe it’s because I’m white.

According to a new study from the Pew Internet and American Life project, Mobile Access to Data and Information, currently African Americans and English-speaking Hispanics are noticeably outpacing white Americans in 10 key non-voice uses of cell phones and other mobile devices (text or instant messages, taking or sharing photos, net or e-mail access, etc.).

Some race-related trends indicated by this research…

“On a typical day, more than half of English-speaking Hispanics (56%) do something on their cell phone that might involve sending or receiving data.” (Blacks, 50%; whites 38%)

Also, a majority (65%) of English-speaking Hispanics and African Americans (54%) have used a handheld device or laptop to access the internet away from home or work—compared to only 49% of white net users.

A related Pew research memo also released this month, indicated that mobile content and services may have more fast-growth potential than online services that require a computer:

Mobile is becoming THE must-have media.

Another intriguing trend that crosses race lines: According to Pew, 54% of English-speaking Hispanics, 51% of African Americans, and 49% of whites polled said their cell phone would be the hardest media tool to give up—making it the top priority across all three racial groups.

It’s about age, too.

According to Pew, 73% of people 18-29 perform at least one non-voice mobile activity on a typical day. For ages 30-49, this drops to 57%; for 50-64, 23%; and just 9% for 65+.

“Roughly the same share of ‘under age 30’ adults (60%) on the average day use a handheld device for text messaging as sends or receives e-mail (62%). These numbers suggest that, while alternative forms of digital chatter (e.g., texting) are important to young adults, e-mail remains a part of their daily electronic communication activities, although it may be less central for young adults as other applications compete for their attention.”

Wealth is not necessarily an advantage.

Apparently, earning $20-40K per year is the current sweet spot. In this income bracket, 23% have ever done at least one of the 10 non-voice mobile activities examined by Pew—with 21% doing at least one of these activities on a typical day. Those are the highest percentages for any income bracket covered in this study.

The ‘burbs love mobile.

Across all age, income, and ethnicity groups, more suburbanites (45%) tend to do non-voice mobile activities daily. This is just slightly ahead of urbanites (43%), with rural dwellers lagging at just 12%.

What can mobile mean for your news org

Looking over this information, most news organizations that wish to reach out more effectively to communities which are not primarily white or wealthy might benefit over the long term by making mobile media at least as high a priority as their online efforts.

Do you agree with this assessment? How is your news org faring with its mobile strategy? What barriers are hindering progress on this front? Who else might grab the mobile content market locally, if not your news org? Please comment below.

Going Mobile: Reaching Hard-to-Reach Communities

Want to gain an edge in reaching African American, Hispanic, and low-income communities with your news? According to some new research from the Pew Internet and American Life project, a good bet might be to increase your mobile content and services.

In Seeding the Cloud: What Mobile Access Means for Usage Patterns and Online Content, Pew’s John Horrigan writes:

“Cell phone users are more likely to be found in groups that have generally lagged in internet adoption, such as senior citizens, blacks, and Latinos. In our December 2007 survey, 50% of Americans age 65 and over had cell phones compared with 36% who used the internet. Some 84% of English-speaking Hispanics reported having cell phones and 71% of blacks had cell phones, compared with 78% and 63%, respectively, for online access.

“More striking than access patterns is usage. For use of non-voice data applications on handhelds, Hispanics and African Americans lead the way relative to white Americans. Half of African Americans and 56% of English-speaking Latinos with cell phones, on a typical day, do at least one of 10 non-voice data applications such as taking pictures, accessing the internet for news, playing music, or texting. By contrast, 38% of whites do these kinds of activities on a wireless handheld device on the average day.

“Even lower-income Americans with cell phones (61%) are active in using non-voice data applications on cell phones; 44% of cell users in households with incomes below $30,000 annually do one such non-voice data activity on a typical day. 

Want more details? Check out Pew’s Mar. 5 full report on Mobile Access to Data and Information

Do these numbers surprise you? They surprised me!

Based on this information, do you think you’re using mobile offerings effectively to reach currently under-served populations in your news coverage area?

Mobile Television: The Emergence of a Personal-Mass Media Platform

Television through your mobile phone.  Sounds interesting.  However, the way it currently exists might be more of a headache than an actual convenience.  You get television streamed directly to your mobile phone and you watch it whenever you have free time during the day. If you’re a commuter who spends 3 hours in the metro in New York City, mobile TV can be a godsend, but if you spend the majority of your time in LA traffic like I do, it can be pretty useless.

Currently a very small number of people use mobile TV in the United States.  When comparing it to countries like South Korea, where 1 in 7 people are active Mobile TV users, we are pretty behind in the times.  However, looking at the United States as a whole, we are not a country who is big on public transportation.  Therefore, the things we need on a mobile platform are inherently different. 

Also in some ways, current mobile TV is going against the current trends in television.  People want to watch television on their own schedule… so what good is to have a mobile TV if all you get is commercials? or for that matter, that boring early afternoon programming?  By the time all the good shows come on, the majority of the people are already home.  If these mobile TV companies could come up with some kind of on demand system, where you get to pick what shows your mobile phone gets, that would definitely be worth looking at.

Overall, it doesn’t seem that mobile TV is going to catch up in the US any time soon.  If the companies want to reach an audience past the 20-something year old techie, they will have to come up with innovative programming that will surpass anything we have currently seen. 

Twitter coverage

Blogger Amy Gahran recorded thoughts and events at the Total Community Coverage in Cyberspace seminar live using Twitter. Click here to read her record.

One person’s take from all this

If you don’t adapt to your community’s diverse needs and don’t present interesting, engaging and essential content using all the tools the Web has to offer, you can kiss your readership goodbye. 

Reading into some things

As it turns out, many journalists don’t even read their own publications. Note to general public - don’t do this. 

Journalists not reading??

I know exactly what Cory Haik means when she says no one is reading the paper.  I had a subscription to the Los Angeles Times but found I couldn’t get all the way through it on a daily basis.  I now go on-line.  Is this a poor substitution?  As Robert Hopwood points out, part of the job of a multimedia journalist is to ensure the on-line product is as informative as what we find in print.  It shouldn’t be looked at as a substitution but as THE product.  Somehow though, I still find myself missing my subscription to the Los Angeles Times.  Is that wrong? And if journalists aren’t reading?  Why do we expect our readers to? 

ESL features on news websites

To further Amy Gahran’s point on providing simplified english text on news websites, check out the BBC’s “Learn English” section. 

What about the content?

Cory Haik from the Seattle Times brings up a good point.  With all the new fancy tools cropping up are we losing sight of what we are really doing?  Are websites loaded with options just a cover-up for flimsy content?  Are we helping reporters not want to invest the time, energy and single mindedness that is needed to produce a quality story? 

Latino for a year

I really liked Ron Gonzales’ idea of producing a year long multimedia project on what it’s like to be a Latino living in California. As Gonzalez pointed out, Latinos are increasingly joining the middle class.  Yet, no one is writing about this upward movement.  What’s it like to be someone who has worked hard to establish yourself in the states, is a responsible citizen but still carries with you cultural and perhaps, language barriers?  I think readers would be as interested in this kind of project as the gang and immigration stories more regularly published.  The series could also help change the perception of Hispanics.  And isn’t that what journalism is all about?

Asian American audiences

Cory Haik’s presentation on targeting the Asian population in Seattle reminded me of EastWest magazine, a hip Asian American publication. 

UGC

Call me crazy, but do people really like reading user generated content? I mean, sometimes the random outlandish comment is kind of funny, but how much is too much? 

Usability as an Issue to getting Info to users/readers

Many presenters have talked about having content that is not viewed, accessed, commented on, etc. Perhaps the issue is web usability and the structure/architecture of the site in presenting information.

Lots of questions about how to present and segment content on site(s) or new sites to reach different audiences. Some of these questions may require looking at web usability issues.

SEO Compliance

Samaruddin Stewart made an excellent point regarding search engine optimization for news organizations. Many people today find their news online via search engines. If a news site and its photos are well optimized, it will have a much greater presence among news readers who use search engines to find their news.

Generation Gap

I think a news organization must decide which generation of Spanish speakers it wants to attract before implementing Spanish language features. I would think the only demographic who would actually be interested in bilingual features, rather than Spanish-only, are the younger folks who were raised amongst two cultures and aren’t as set in their ways as much as the older folks.