According to Juniper Research, the worldwide mobile music market will hit $17.5 billion by 2012. Much of the growth will be by rental music services as well as downloads.

Juniper also said that Asia will be the largest marketplace for mobile music over the next five years, accounting for around 43% of sales per year. Ringtone saless, they say, will fall; they currently account for 62% of the mobile music market but by 2012, Juniper expects it to account for only 38%.

The company said that the popularity of the iPhone is pushing the mobile music business. But I wonder how many people use the iPhone as their music player. As a phone, it works well but as a music player it’s not quite a replacement for your 160GB iPod Classic. Although it does come with 8GB ($399) and 16GB ($499) versions, it can’t hold all your music. So many people will have both an iPhone and an iPod.

I would buy an iPhone tomorrow if it had at least 80GB for my music. My current phone, the Spring Mogul, also acts as a music player, but I’ve never treated it as one. I do hold a handful of songs, but it’s mostly for fun and showing off to friends and family. It only has a 512MB mini SD card, so it doesn’t hold very much. But I use my phone as a phone and Internet-enabled device. And I have a separate iPod for my music.

Popularity: 16% [?]