Bluetooth growing in popularity - but not everyone's interested

Mobile phones containing close-range Bluetooth wireless networking chips are becoming increasingly popular - though not everyone is turned on by the standard.

A poll of 440 silicon.com readers asked 'Do you use Bluetooth to connect phones, PDAs, laptops etc.?'. A considerable 42 per cent answered 'Yes' - for one thing implying, as we long knew, silicon.com readers are a fairly tech-literate bunch.

Thirty-five per cent said they don't have Bluetooth capabilities but perhaps the most interesting responses were yet to come. Nineteen per cent of respondents chose 'No - have it but don't use it' and 4 per cent ticked the 'Blue what?' option, implying just under one in 20 silicon.com readers have yet to have been touched by the personal area networking standard of the day.

The latter result is perhaps surprising. Separate research out today by search engine marketing company Agence Virtuelle shows that, among telecoms terms, Bluetooth scores highly in UK web searches, second only to 'mobile phone'.

It is above terms such as Wi-Fi, ADSL, GPRS and VoIP, suggesting interest is strong.