Games, the weather, Pandora…

Sounds like a few clues from the old “$100,000 Pyramid” game show. And the question would be, “What are smartphone users doing the most with their devices?”

The Nielsen Company, famous for its television ratings, today released a report on how smartphone owners purchase and utilize applications. The report, announced at the AppNation conference in San Francisco, focused on the differences between smartphone users and users of other, more primitive devices, known as feature phones. Among the revelations within the report: Smartphone users love to read about the weather, spend half of their application dollars on games, and enjoy the Pandora online music service.

The report also describes the application purchasing habits of the average smartphone user. “App users who go to the Apple App Store tend to download nearly twice as many apps as those who go to the Android Market or the BlackBerry App World Store,” said the report.

“They also seem more willing to pay for their apps: Apple App Store customers report that for every two free apps they download, they typically pay for one. In contrast, app users who frequent the Android Market and BlackBerry App World stores report downloading more than 3.5 free apps for every one they buy. Meanwhile, BlackBerry owners are the least likely to convert from a ‘lite,’ free trial version of an app to a full, paid version.”

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