The ArgoGroup conducted a comparative study of World Cup content offerings from the major carriers in the UK during last week's England vs Paraguay match. Overall the outlook wasn't very favourable, with marketing failures leading the problems. One operator mentioned but not named had a football alerts service available, but only for the recently concluded local premiership, not the World Cup, and another had a Mr Men promotion on the front page of their WAP site at kick-off.

Overall, the ArgoGroup's test showed some problems with the content services on offer in the UK, although 3 did manage to deliver an edited video clip of David Beckham's goal-scoring free kick before other operators had managed to send out their SMS alerts.

David Frodsham, Argogroup's CEO, said there was a serious point to this testing exercise. "Everyone in the mobile industry needs mobile data services to succeed," he said. The World Cup is the largest show on earth. What our tests show is that operators across the board need to improve the data services they are offering to the public. That depends on a commitment to constant improvement of the user experience by putting testing at the heart of their offerings."

The ArgoGroup will be continuing their monitoring of World Cup content services throughout the tournament.

Thanks to Guy Kewney for the info.