This study explores how mobile phone-savvy Asian college students use mobile news, especially news posted on mobile-accessible Twitter-like microblogs, to stay informed about current events. Our survey of more than 3500 college students in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan asks why young people turn to mobile phones for news and how the news-getting behavior is related to the level of press freedom in their respective societies. The results show that using mobile phones to read news and follow news posts on mobile-accessible microblogs is rapidly on the rise and significant differences among respondents in the four cities exist; press freedom was found to be negatively related to reading and following news via mobile phones. Finally, the study discusses the role of press freedom in accounting for these societal-level differences.