When I wrote about the N-Gage Feedback Forum, a great conversation was started by Aditya Singhvi (from Aditya’s Phones) about the pricing of N-Gage games. Aditya made a very valid point concerning the fact that games are priced the same everywhere in the world and the prices are converted to the local currency using the default currency conversion rates. This meant that prices are in some countries overwhelming and unaffordable. Commenters pointed out that while games might be worth a pack of cigarettes in some countries, that is not correct everywhere around the globe. Basically the issue we’re talking about is each country or currency’s Purchasing Power.
You might think that all global companies have forgotten that what one man can afford, the other can not, especially if the first one lives in a developed country and gets paid over 5000$ monthly and the other lives in a developing country and has a monthly salary under 200$. But apparently Nokia has not and has put together a nice way to see the purchasing power of 5$ through the FiveDollarComparison.org which was pointed out by Charlie Schick from Nokia Conversations.
The FiveDollarComparison organisation asks the very simple question: “What can you buy for 5$?” and accepts answers as images emailed from people all around the world. I can only speak for my country and say that 5$ here could buy 10Kgs of fresh potatoes, 4 bags of lebanese bread (each bag contains 10 big loafs), 30 gum packs (12 gums each), 10 lebanese breakfasts of a thyme mankoucheh (highly recommended) or 3 lunches of chawarma sandwiches. They can also get you a brushing at the hair dresser or 3 local taxi rides. I highly recommend visiting the FiveDollarComparison site to make your own submission, especially if you live in countries where 5$ is worth a lot or almost nothing.
The goal is to gather research information and use it for the future, a future where mobile communication and services would cost less. A lesser cost would impact each culture and society differently according to their current standing when it comes to their purchasing power, and this is what the organisation aims to know.
While this seems only a social research project for the future, I sure hope someone inside Nokia takes a peek at the FiveDollarComparison site and thinks: “what if we take that into consideration and adjust our pricings a bit accordingly?”, maybe not for mobile phones but just for services as a start. As you see 5$ is worth quite a lot here in lebanon and if I simply think that some N-Gage games are priced around 15$, which is equivalent to breakfast for 30 days, then I am not surprised why not so many people are going to immediately dive through their wallets and buy the games.
What is 5$ worth in your country? And based on that, do you believe that Nokia’s services pricing (N-Gage, Nokia Maps and Files on Ovi) is very affordable, simply reasonnable or outrageous?
