As per International Telecommunication Union1
(ITU) ICT facts and figures, 2011, there are about 6
billion mobile-cellular subscribers. Mobile-broadband
subscriptions have grown 45% annually over the
last four years and today there are twice as many
mobile-broadband as fixed broadband subscriptions
(Fig.1).
• Total 159 economies worldwide have launched 3G
services commercially and the number of active
mobile-broadband subscriptions has increased
to almost 1.2 billion.
• While people in developed countries usually
use mobile-broadband networks in addition to
a fixedbroadband connection, mobile-broadband
is often the only access method available to
people in developing countries.
• Percentage of the population covered by a
2G mobile-cellular network is twice as high as
the population covered by a 3G network. 3G
population coverage reached 45 % in 2011.
This passion for mobiles by common man has
thrown ample opportunities for libraries to create
mobile-friendly library and information services,
which may lessen the risk of exclusion. The libraries
need to switch over from ‘physical places’ to ‘virtual
places’ to embrace and serve ‘netgens’ and ‘digital
natives’2 who prefer their libraries to be where they
are and prefer to access and share information
from anywhere at anytime.