Media Wonk

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Sony Pictures phones home - April 1, 2008

So now perhaps we will find out, once and for all, whether people will pay to watch full-length movies on the two-inch screen of their cell phones. Media Wonk's ageing eyes can barely read the caller ID info on his, so he won't be rushing out to buy one of the new AT&T phones that will support Sony's new PIX service. But clearly, the younger generation is more willing to squint at tiny displays.

Just how willing was brought home recently when Media Wonk had the misfortune of sharing a coast-to-coast flight with a horde of seemingly unsupervised high-schoolers. We all know their generation was born wired. But to appreciate just how wired, it's helpful to observe a lot of them crammed together into the narrow rows of a 737.

Once we reached a comfortable cruising altitude, their section of the plane fairly glowed with ambient light from dozens of portable electronic displays of every conceivable variety, all of them playing back video of one kind or another. For a moment, Media Wonk thought he was witnessing St. Elmo's fire, so intense was the collective radiance of iPhones, iPods, PSPs, laptops, portable DVD players and other small-screen devices. In retrospect, I'm surprised their collective RF emanations didn't bring down the plane.

Media Wonk has no doubt that demographic will watch movies on their cell phones, maybe not in one sitting but that doesn't seem to bother them. My only question is whether they'll actually pay for it.


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