Are cellphones taking over?

cgraz

Is it just me, or are cellphones taking over?

http://www.msnbc.com/news/937132.asp?0dm=C27AT

Now you can even watch tv on them????

I have a Motorola v60. It's about a year and a half old (I believe). Anyways, I dropped it in water and had to get a new one. I ended up with the Motorola T720. The new cellphones now have all kinds of things. I personally only use mine for phone calls and text-messaging. But now they have internet access, cameras, email, texting, and now you can even watch tv on your phone. I even saw one that is a palm-pilot/cell phone. They're making these things to be little laptops.

The t720 didn't have the camera, but I don't like all those extra features. It went way to slow. Anyways, what does everyone else think? Does anyone have all these features on their phones? Do you use them? What do you think will be next for cell phones?

Cgraz

dalecosp

Well, I sure as heck get a bit ticked in some elevator or meeting or church service or funeral or whatnot and hear some wave file of the ocean or sample of reggae music because someone with a new phone doesn't even know how to go to "silent" mode...

😃

The_Chancer

Surely a mobile PHONE should be just that - a PHONE you can take with you.

It rings, you answer it and have your PHONE call. Then hang up.

I have a PC if I want to E-Mail, why would I want to do that at any other time, especially when you can get serious RSI in your thumbs from texting too much, god knows what will happen with people who can not only text, but E-Mail as well.

As for a TV in it - I can see the advantage of it for those commuters who can spend hours travelling each day, but for anyone else - especially kids in schools it will be another reason for them to buy the phone - AND get it confiscated at school for watching TV in class. Not only that, but has everyone forgotten the microwave radiation from phones.. ??? If the phone is going to be that much of a pull now, god knows what it will be like in 2005 when you can watch TV on it !

I think I'll make do with a Cat or Dog translator ( as quoted on the BBC news today - no web link as yet) But that is only in Japanese....

piersk

I like the fact that I can use WAP to check train times and read the BBC website for news if I'm bored on the said train.

I'd like to be able to check my email using my phone... maybe that should be something I look for when I upgrade.

frog

I don't use my mobile much, it's really just an emergency thing such as if a bus or train is late and I have to let someone know; for that it is really useful. I read somewhere that mobiles fulfil some sort of primeval human need. In the days when we were all hunter-gatherers living in large groups one might hail another across the plains with "hey big forehead, how many rabbits you got today?" Of course, today it is always "Hello, I'm on the train, where are you?". The popularity of mobiles is probably linked to the increased sense of alienation a lot of people have.

planetsim

I actually read in the paper that they planned in the future that the mobile phone would be like a bulter with your TV, camera etc included

But the butler bit of it would buy things for you, make reservations. At first it will prompt you on say, "Do you want milk?"

Then you will go yes/no then say what brand etc.

Itd get saved, in memory or something, and may ask you again if you set the perference, if not, it will automatically order things for you.

To me if it gets to be like that itd be nice at first, but itd be the start of the end.

cgraz

Have any of you read Brave New World (Aldous Huxley) or 1984 (George Orwell)? Sometimes a bit scary to think about...

Cgraz

dalecosp

Yup. Both of 'em, AAMOF. Insightful gentlemen, I suppose; good authors, of course. Sometimes wondered if Huxley was looking forward to his BNW...but I never read much about him, personally.

Of course, if I want scary, I could just read the Bible...

An end will come. I dunno when. I'm not too pessimistic about it, for my own sake; but our culture does worry me --- I worry about my family in general, for example.

BTW, that first sentence "you can even watch TV on 'em".... you can even watch TV on your watch... and I think Sanyo started that one before you were even born....

cgraz

wow. I had no idea they had watches that you could watch tv on.

There is one feature I wish my cell phone (and mine alone had) 😃

A button you can push when you don't want to talk to anyone anymore. When you push it, the button will slowly make it seem as if you have little service and cut your voice out little by little.

Anyone else ever wish their cell phone had any features like that?

Cgraz