Do any of you remember the time BEFORE the mobile phones?
How did we use to keep in touch, arrange the meetings and appointments, inform others about the emergencies? Well we did. And we did quite well. For centuries.Perhaps we were better organised, punctual and reliable than we tend to be now.
I was in the High School when the wave of GSM started slowly conquering the souls of young people. The handsets ceased to be of the size that could easily classify them as the weapons of mass destruction. And by that I mean not only the annihilation of the large quantities of user's brain cells. The 'analog brick', oversized and heavy could serve as a tool designed for the assault on the fellow human being.
And then of course came the price that would allow rather average teenager to afford a newest model.
Amongst my friends, the good old Alcatel was on the top of the list, not because it was such a brilliant phone but because the network providers gave it away for free, when largely unaware parents, dragged to the store by their offsprings, signed up for the 1-year (oh yes! those were the times) contract. Other models, also popular: Ericsson (no, not Sony Ericsson), Nokia and Simens. At that stage you would rather want to avoid Samsung with his HUGE handset, that recalled the analog models. And most likely caused a brain tumour.
Unlike with the analog technology, the GSM had several network providers and the competition was fierce. Some of the companies in order to lure clients, offered 5 first seconds of the conversation for free.
From that moment onwards (for at least another year) all my friends got highly specialised in the conversations that lasted 4 to 5 seconds. We even copied our physic homework from one another using 5 seconds calls.
But of course you were doomed to made mistakes and miscalculations! - I answer before you ask - Especially when drunk.
I remember my friend's father saying to him: If you got so many 6s in the Lotto, we would be bloody billionaires!
However most of the bills I saw at that time, followed the pattern: 665 phone calls, duration of each of them 5 seconds, 0 PLN to pay. The scheme was scrapped very fast.
As the phones became smaller, more colourful and multifunctional, everyone jumped on the band wagon of the digital technology. Forget about the mobile phone that serves it's purpose, i.e making a phone calls. It also had to have a calendar, a note pad, a camera, a voice recorder, games, WAP and so on.
Before the era of smart phones even begun, the book sellers in South Korea reported a massive dip in sales, correlated with the wide-spread of phones with digital cameras. What's the point of buying, if you can just sit down with your coffee and take photo page by page and then share with your friends on line or through MMS?
What is the future of mobile phones then?
I remember my 16-year-old friend begging her dad 13 years ago, to give her his own Alcatel and promising to pay him off from her pocket money. To which he answered:
Honey, by the time you would pay me off, there would be such phones that you don't even require to dial the number. You think about calling and you are calling already.
You can think this is far fetched, but I seriously think that this is the future. More and more technological integration in one device would lead to multi-operational technology that then would conjoin variety of functions. The size would become smaller and smaller and the prices will be lowered year by year. Not only for devices themselves but also for the access to the Internet and data transfer the prices here will steady decrease. There will be more chargeable services however.
Your multi-operational device will measure your bodily functions and send the alerts to your private medical companies who will automatically get onto your shared calendar and set up the appointment in the time suitable for your needs and condition. Several monitoring factors will be taken into account so that your device would easily know that you are running low on iron and will mention it next time you are making your shopping list with it. Everything that you see, feel or hear, can be automatically send and shared on any social network, if you so wish. And yes, you would be able to call and text as usual, but you would just have to say it, or think about it, as your braincells would be also used to operate your multi-operational not 'smart-phone'any more, but more like a 'genius phone'.
Just to give you an example.
Have you seen Futurama and the episode on eyePhone? Well, that in my opinion is not a distant future.
William Webb (The future of mobile phones: A remote control for you life - Magazines, Student - The Independent) argues that in around 10 to 15 years we would have a device that would replace many ordinary things that we now cannot think of leaving the house in the morning. The device that would actively engage and interact with our day-to-day routine, much more than just a communication device - more like a remote control for your life. You still call it a "mobile" from habit, but it is an organiser, entertainment device, payment device and security centre, all developed and manufactured by engineers.
On a typical day it will start work even before you wake. Because it knows your travel schedule it can check for problems on the roads or with the trains and adjust the time it wakes you up accordingly, giving you the best route into work. It can control your home, re-programming the central heating if you need to get up earlier and providing remote alerts if the home security system is triggered. It is your payment system - just by placing the phone near a sensor on a barrier, like the Oyster card readers in use on London transport, you can pay for tickets for journeys or buy items in shops. With an understanding of location, the mobile can also provide directions, or even alert the user to friends or family in the vicinity.
And I largely share this view.
But I think and strongly believe that the shift will happen in the way we are charging and powering our devices. And I am also convinced that the solution would be quite surprising, like charging your phone with the electrical impulses that your body produces of some totally out of the box innovation related to the new energy sources that would be implemented shortly before or after 2020.
But for now, sit back, relax, watch your TED or Youtube, chat with friends online, write a business e-mail, record your thoughts, play games, read a book, take some pictures on your smart phone and just wait for the future. The future that obviously is bright.
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