About 10 percent of users in the U.K. say they now regularly access the Internet on a computer using a mobile phone connection, despite such services only having been on sale for less than a year, according to YouGov researchers. Of those, up to a third now connect their computers to the Internet solely through the mobile network.

 

To put that into perspective, about three percent of U.K. broadband users report they have cut the broadband cord. In the U.S. market, perhaps seven to 15 percent of households have likewise "cut the cord" for voice services.

 

It is impressive if ireless PC access using either a data card or a mobile has reached three percent penetration in a year or so. That is rapid adoption indeed for a consumer service.

 

As you might predict, some users are more likely to among the early adopters. The You Gov poll found that mobile broadband was most popular with students and other "highly mobile" people who are out of the house a lot.

 

Price now is a bigger attraction, as mobile broadband now costs about the same as a fixed line connection  (£15 a month). In some cases, even-lower prices are possible. Existing customers of mobile provider 3 can buy a broadband access package for £7.50 a month.

 

Tiscali's lowest fixed-line "broadband and talk" package costs £9.99 per month.

 

This is going to lead some people to predict that wireless 3G connections will surpass fixed line connections over a short period of time; say two to five years. That is unlikely for many reasons.

 

When video is an important end user application, a fixed line still works best. In fact, even when video consumption is a two-minute news clip viewed once or twice a week, the limitations of wireless bandwidth often are painfully obvious.

 

And fixed line service still will make most sense for multi-person families who can use WiFi to share a single connection, instead of buying multiple mobile device connections.

 

Indoor coverage is another issue easy to overlook, unless one spends a lot of time using 3G cards in various settings.

 

There is a segment amenable to wireless-only access, of course. But it is a niche, not most of the market. And there is no way mobile broadband overtakes fixed broadband anytime soon, if ever.