I have been doing the usual round of year-end phoners with executives in the mobile world, surveying them on the state of the industry, the emerging trends, yadda, yadda. My impression is that except for one major trend, we will spend a lot of 2007 in wait-and-see mode for the sexier developments.

I was going to devote this installment of my series of mobile content check-ups to cell phone gaming. But then I realized that there hasn't been much excitement at all in recent months over this once-promising category. There have been precious few mobile titles that excited anybody, even the PR guys who are supposed to flack this stuff. From what I could see, the usual gusher of press releases surrounding each and every title started drying up earlier this year. Man, when the kids in PR lose interest, you know something is up.

Nothing enjoyed more hype and less real innovation than mobile video. I have had both Verizon's ridiculously overpriced VCast and the scattered mosh pit of Sprint TV in my pocket for months, and for the life of me I never remember that I have them. Revisiting the platform after a number of months, it all seems eerily familiar. Apparently there are entire divisions of emerging media that didn't get the memo about advancing at breakneck speed.