eBay’s Usage Dominated By iOS And… WAP? [Updated]

Gizmodo AU

This I did not see coming. Not so much that the predominant platform that eBay Australia sees its mobile commerce through would be iOS; the iPhone and iPad’s market position make that pretty much inevitable. But WAP coming in just behind iOS? Did we skip back to 1998 and nobody told me?
Update: It seems not; eBay’s just contacted me to clarify their mistake.

eBay Australia’s released a bunch of interesting stats today about its smartphone users. A brief rundown; we buy fashion, technology and home & garden products through our phones, buying on average one item every four seconds in Australia in 2011. Somebody bought a Mercedes Benz SL350 via eBay for $50,989, making it the most expensive phone purchase. In terms of biggest spenders by location, Melbourne takes the crown, followed by Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Newcastle, Gold Coast, Wollongong, Gosford, Canberra and the Sunshine Coast. Which makes me wonder; what’s all that mining money in Perth being spent on that they didn’t make the top ten?

Still, it was the statistics on the top five platforms for accessing mobile eBay that really got my attention. How many WAP users are there out there any more? Or are eBay counting lots of random browsers as WAP because they flat out don’t know?

Update: No, it seems like it’s not so much that they don’t know as that somebody made a mistake in sending out both the release and the graph; WAP apparently refers to mobile browsers; everybody else in the graph is using a specific eBay shopping app. We can rest easy; WAP’s still dead and buried.

Discuss

(13 Comments)
  • [–]

    Luke

    Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 10:36 AM

    WAP… i didnt know that was still on phones these days.

    I remember WAP on my very first mobile, the Nokia 3330, i never used it but still, that

    • [–]

      Luke

      Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 10:37 AM

      DAMN YOU LAPTOP!!! it cut me off mid sentence.

      • [–]

        Jackson Bison

        Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 10:47 AM

        Well, at least finish it then

      • [–]

        donny

        Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 12:50 PM

        must have been using WAP, lol connection lost. reestablishing

  • [–]

    StevoTheDevo

    Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 10:48 AM

    The lack of Perth (and Gold Coast) on the cities list make the statistics look unreliable.. Add in WAP and they look like they’ve been completely misinterpreted.

  • [–]

    Gabriel

    Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 11:03 AM

    What the hell is WAP?

  • [–]

    attila

    Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 11:19 AM

    You guys are whack – I use WAP on my Nokia 7110 all the time to buy stuff on ebay. And search for things using Alta Vista.

    • [–]

      The Gremlin

      Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 12:53 PM

      Be sure to check my geocities page

      • [–]

        awallafashagba

        Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 12:59 PM

        heeehee

  • [–]

    MotorMouth

    Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 11:50 AM

    What migh tbe more interesting is to see how the total compares to desktop purchases.

  • [–]

    Ozoneocean

    Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 1:20 PM

    Re- The Perth mining money:
    The super rich don’t tend to buy their stuff through e-bay ;)

    • [–]

      Deb

      Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 1:38 PM

      by super rich you mean cashed up bogans? yeah they don’t know how to use computers other than to look at p0rn… haha

      • [–]

        Ozoneocean

        Wednesday, November 16, 2011 at 3:00 PM

        Janet Holmes à Court, Gina Rinehart, etc.. I think you’re getting your bogans mixed up… ;)
        Besides, “Cashed up bogans” are exactly the people that would be buying most stuff from E-bay using iphones.

Join The Discussion