There’s been large echoes in the press about the NOP survey that found out that 80% of people had never sent multimedia messages.

Let’s put aside the 45% of the surveyed who do not own a camera phone, even among the remaining ones, many expressed concerns about the cost of MMS, and 17% admitted they simply ignore how to send picture messages.

MMS traffic does not really compete with SMS traffic. Email and Instant Messaging on mobiles are more serious challengers, mainly because of the costs involved: the average price of an SMS is 0.15 euros, an email costs 0.02. But while MMS prices are getting more affordable, one should also bear in mind that in 2003, many MMS were sent because the introductory launch phase made the service free.

Now the industry is not pessimistic either. First of all, more than half of European mobile phone users should have an MMS phone next year. Then just like MMS adoption in Asia rose thanks to the 2002 football World Cup, upcoming Euro 2004 and Athens Olympic Games are expected to have the same effect in Europe.

Of the 21% who have sent and received MMS so far, the majority used their phones to send pictures of friends and family. Music clips were the second most popular use of MMS, then sports clips.

But if a part of MMS traffic is generated by users themselves, a lot is still to be imagined and produced around the content that consumers are keen on like sports or music.

Read BBC Technology.