Forget about games, because email and social networking are the most popular mobile pastimes, says our poll

Over two thirds (67 per cent) of mobile users in Britain use the mobile Internet these days. But unlike in Japan, games are less popular. Email and social networking completely overshadow the more sociopathic option of playing games, says our study.

The Mobileb2b study revealed of Mobile Internet users, 67per cent were on it to email or network with friends. Which is pretty much what we predicted back in 2007.

We interviewed 2.000 online users from January to May this year. The sample was taken from passengers on South West, Virgin and Silverlink trains.

Checking email was easily the most popular application, with 39 per cent in total using the mobile net for this purpose. The figures were even higher for the 25 to 40 year old demographic, where 70 per cent used the mobile net for email.

Unsurprisingly, social networking was much more popular among younger users, with forty per cent of younger users opting for this application. Overall, 16 per cent of all age groups favoured social networking. 

Ring tome are still amazingly popular, with around ten per cent of mobile Internet users admitting to downloading ringtones.

Other applications, such as voice to text messaging (offered by Nuance and Spinvox) appear marginal, and wareness of their existence is low.

"The way we use the mobile net is changing. I expect Twitter will have seduced a lot more adults in social networking by this time next year," said MobileB2b's research director Mark Murphy.