Virgin Radio will become the first station to offer pictures with sound when it launches a new "visual radio" service in the spring, available via Nokia mobile phones, writes The Guardian.

Developed by Nokia, visual radio works by sending images to mobile phones which are synchronised with the station's play list.

Listeners using their mobile phones to tune into Virgin will be able to vote for play lists, rank particular songs, take part in competitions or buy ringtones and tracks by clicking on the various images, rather than sending texts.

Nokia, which is introducing two new visual radio enabled mobile models to kickstart the service, claims there will be 100 million of the sets worldwide by the end of next year.

The head of new media at Virgin, James Cridland, hopes the service will increase the length of time listeners tuned in on their mobiles, and provide key demographic information to advertisers.

Kiss FM in Finland will be the first station to launch the service in February of 2005.