The Wireless Application Service Providers Association (WASPA) is taking a firm stance to regulate SA`s R50 million adult mobile content industry, but the organisation is adamant it is not engaging in censorship.
WASPA recently finalised a code of conduct for premium-rate SMS services, which has been active since 1 September.
Dr Pieter Streicher, Bulk SMS MD and member of the WASPA code of conduct committee, says the WASP industry is relatively new in SA, and has not been regulated until now, which has allowed for "dubious" content to be distributed via SMS.
"The industry chose to implement self-regulation, rather than wait for government to regulate the sector," he says.
The code of conduct, he says, has brought about radical changes in terms of adult mobile content, which accounts for about 10% of the annual R500 million revenue generated by all mobile content in the country.
"Premium-rate SMS services generate significant revenue for media companies and content providers, creating new business opportunities. In some cases, the entire revenue model of a TV programme revolves around premium-rate SMS.
"The problem is that these services can be accessed by anyone of any age, which is great for surfers needing weather forecasts and day traders depending on financial information, but problematic when it comes to services providing adult content."
He adds that mobile technology has advanced to enable the transmission of colour pictures and soon most mobile phones will be able to download video clips. This enables users to download content with relative anonymity, spurring proliferation of adult content.
Some of the regulatory measures implemented so far, says Streicher, include a ban on the adverting of mobile adult content in newspapers, as well as a restriction on TV advertising. The latter stipulates that mobile adult content advertising, aired during adult movies, may not be more explicit than the movie being shown.
"Thus if a movie contains nudity, mobile adult content advertising may not include sex, for instance," he explains.
"This is not censorship in any way, but simply regulation. All mobile content providers have agreed to meet certain criteria in terms of the code of conduct."
Should a content provider fail to comply with the regulations, a complaint can be directed to a WASPA ombudsman, who will issue a ruling and most likely a warning. Persistent transgressors risk being expelled from WASPA and from mobile networks, cutting off revenue streams.
Streicher states that Juniper Research, in the US, predicts the global market for adult mobile phone content will reach $1 billion this year, and mobile gambling services will generate $19 billion by 2009. The biggest users of premium rate services are teenagers and many parents have found themselves on the verge of bankruptcy because of their children`s excessive expenditure on mobile content.
He says mobile service providers are investigating the viability of setting up a central database of users who have "opted in" to receive adult content and verifying that those users are older than 18.
A second possible solution is the "opt-out" option, which would allow users to bar adult content from being sent to their or their children`s mobile phones.
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