Mobile Phones - Mobile Phone Books

All the rage in Japan though yet to take off in the UK is books published directly to your mobile phone. They are called, surprisingly enough, Mobile Phone Novels. Each chapter is an individual text message. It started in 2003 with a somewhat risqué novel called Deep Love. We won't go into any of the details here, but it went like a storm in Japan and nearly three million copies were sold to mobiles. It was a great example of viral marketing as it spread like wildfire through social groups and networks.

Authors can distribute the books chapter by chapter as they write it. The readers can even participate in determining the direction of the plot by sending messages to the author, who may or may not bow to popular demand. Alternatively there are currently hundreds of books available for purchase.

Testimony to the growing popularity of mobile phone novels is the fact that in 2008 they made up half of the ten best selling novels in Japan.

Although they are very popular, they mainly tend to be lacking in literary merit and have been severely criticised by more traditional authors and critics. However there are others who believe the phenomenon to be a great movement forward in encouraging creativity. Many people who have never before written anything creative are now churning out popular novels.

Many of the authors achieve cult status, and can achieve massive circulations and kudos though not necessarily a great deal of money.

It is probably unlikely that this will become big in the UK. The Japanese youth culture is heavily into Manga and other comic books featuring mainly adventure, romance, fantasy and adult themes. The mobile phone novels lean heavily on this culture, and build on similar themes. It is an interesting phenomenon but probably not for us, not yet anyway.

The growth of the mobile phone industry has given rise to a host of online mobile phone shops - leaving the consumer inundated with prices, ranges and information on new releases, may phone shops now offer insentives such as Free Nintendo Wii etc