Free video to mobile phones became reality on Wednesday in cell phone-crazy Italy, where Vodafone users with certain late-generation smart phones can now watch video content from Internet TV operator Babelgum, free of data charges.

The twinning of Babelgum's content with Vodafone's service is a next step toward realizing the full promise of smart phones, which integrate the Internet with the mobile phone.

The Italian launch will be followed by the rollout in Britain on Thursday, with other countries, including the United States, to follow, Babelgum said.

The Babelgum-Vodafone alliance will offer Babelgum's content free with no additional data charges to Vodafone clients with an iPhone 3G, Nokia N95 or 6210, and will eventually be supported by advertising.

Bocconi media professor Carlo Alberto Maffe said the Babelgum project is well adapted to European tastes, where mobile broadcasting never took off the way it has in places like Korea and Japan.

"It's a video snack," Maffe said, noting players like YouTube already are attracting mobile viewers in Europe. "It is time for a new kind of Internet access and content, the fruition of the process (being pursued) by all major media and technology companies."

Babelgum, launched by the founder of the Italian telecommunication company Fastweb as a website that streams video for free, has set itself apart from sites like YouTube that are partially outlets for amateur video by providing only professionally produced content. Its mobile offerings will be generally shorter videos, including comedy, music videos, short independent films, animation as well as selections from its on-line film and video festivals, and will vary by country, depending on copyrights.

Source: AP News