Trends of The Day

First of all, Happy Father's Day!The MobilePhoneBlog hopes everyone has a great day, whether you buy into Valentine's Day or not. My wife is a happy one this morning as she got an iPhone from yours truly. Some of my friends think I'm crazy for giving such a nice gift on a second-tier holiday but if you're at all familiar with the sacrifices ones spouse has to make to support a startup business, you'll understand that it's the least I can do. We haven't activated it yet but it will be fun to watch her use it as she has been carrying around some old crappy LG phone for years and her mobile experience is about to be blown away.

In business news, this past week was the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and there was tons of news about new phones, new partnerships and such. Far too much for us to cover, but one news bit that came out from AT&T caught our eye.During his keynote appearance Thursday at the Mobile World Congress, AT&T Mobility president and CEO Ralph de la Vega called Apple's iPhone "a game-changer," noting that since AT&T exclusively launched the device in mid-2007, mobile data consumption has grown dramatically. According to de la Vega, 95% of iPhone owners regularly surf the web, even though 30% had never done so prior to iPhone ownership."There isn't a device that's easier to use," de la Vega said. "The iPhone proves that price resistance is only as strong as the user experience is weak."Enhanced devices and improved user experiences are driving AT&T mobile data across the board. De la Vega said that 13% of all AT&T customers now own a 3G device.95% of users regularly surfing the web? Wow!