Cellphone news, next big thing in media

Spread of news and advertising content via mobile phones and social networking are the two areas that will shape the newspaper industry in the years to come, said speakers at a round table at the World Newspaper Congress and World Editors Forum on Monday. Newspaper publishers and editors from organizations all over the world have assembled here for the meeting that will discuss the future of the newspaper industry and the issues facing it. The annual digital media round table was on 'The Internet-A Maturing Medium' and was addressed by Martha Stone, director, Shaping the Future of the Newspaper Project, USA; Stephen Quinn, professor from Australia; Are Stokstad, executive vice president, A-Pressen, Norway; Valerie Levechenko, director, Ria Novosti, Russia; and Dietmar Schantin, director of WAN-IFRA and moderated by Eamonn Byrne, director, WAN-IFRA. Mobile advertising in the US is slated to touch a revenue of $ 3.33 billion in the US alone by 2013, said Martha Stone. According to her, there are 600 million mobile phone connections worldwide as of today and that Europe continues to be the digital hotspot both with regard to mobile phone and Internet and that mobile texting is the most fetching revenue.