The income gap among users and non-users will narrow as camera phones become increasingly affordable. According to IDC's study, less than 4% of those surveyed who had annual household incomes under $50,000 used a camera phone. This compares to 10% of respondents with $100,000 or more in household income, and 12% with greater than $200,000 in household income.

If predictions hold true, we could see more than 25% penetration in the under $50,000 bracket by the end of this year, as more affordable models come to market, especially in the US. Camera phones have been a huge success in Japan and other parts of Asia, and that success maybe replicated here even though US consumers are less-fad driven than their Japanese counterparts.

But what about other combinations, such as the PDA and mobile phone? While this combination looks like a winner in some circles, there were an equal number of respondents that still prefer a two-piece solution and just as many who haven't made up their minds yet.

The problem with PDA phones or "smart phones," as others call them, is that they don't play to your emotions like the camera phone does. They focus more on the utility of having the best of both devices in one design. But for many consumers and business people, the cost of the devices are still too high and they may not perceive that all of that functionality is valuable to them.

Many are simply not willing to pay more for what they see as increased complexity and features they don't expect to use; kind of like how users perceived the old videophone idea. Cool, but is it really necessary?

We'll be watching this area closely. More on the future of the videophone in another article.

William Ablondi examines technology convergence in the consumer, home office, small business, and education markets in the US and abroad. In his role at IDC, Mr. Ablondi drives the company's thinking on technology convergence, digital new media adoption, and consumer and small business market segmentation and clustering. He looks at the interplay of such technologies as home PCs, video games, interactive TV, home use of the Internet, as well as the demographics and behavior characteristics of the work at home and telecommuting market, the home and virtual office, and the K-12 and higher education markets.