I remember as a kid playing with my brother, using two cups and a lot of string, in an effort to communicate from a long distance of maybe 5 metres away. Just the other day, I called him to his mobile phone to wish him a "Happy Birthday" from the other side of the country. A great- grandparent in their years would have laughed and thought you were crazy if told that someday in the future they would be able to talk to some family member on a rainy day in Europe while enjoying a beautiful golden sunset on Bondi Beach.
Sometimes, I look at my slick new iPhone 3GS and think to myself, "This the future we are living in", with all these great features that my old phone did not have, and the applications that I could add to it. Then I remembered that my great- grandfather, as well as everybody else's great- grandparents, must have thought the same thing in their days when witnessing how one could pack the sun in a bulb, or listen to a stranger's voice in a small box called a radio, or when the telegraph, and then the telephone, were first introduced. "This is the future we are living in", I am sure was in their thoughts indeed.
The future of mobile phones is an exciting prospect indeed. With connectivity becoming faster and more available, and handsets become more and more like mini computers, mobile phone technology is limited only by the imagination.
Some designs for mobiles of the future include a device that would be implanted behind your ear and become a part of you. When you want to dial out, you would use its voice dial feature to automatically dial the number you wish to call with the tone of your own voice. Others are the size of a credit card and hang around your neck. You could have a mobile phone that you can wear as a ring, or a wrist watch a la James Bond. Some mobile phones of the future could be environmentally minded, and reward you with extra credit if you minimise your carbon footprint. The mobile phone of the future could also be a real companion for travellers, and double as a photo frame with pictures of friends and family when not in use.
Design aside, faster connectivity is on the way and will probably be on the market before you know it. 3G, the third generation of mobile standards, allows you to connect to the web watch videos, make video calls and send data at a decent speed. When it was released, the mobile world heralded that the future of the phone was here. That is no longer the case as 4G connections, boasting speeds of up to 100Mbps, are currently making their way across America and Europe. With 4G you will be able to watch television live and connect to the world in a way never seen before.
Even with the advent of 4G, the future of mobile phones is yet to reach its peak. As long as there are great minds, thinking, and moving forward, we will always have a future to aspire to, and to be inspired for. The mobile phone has come a long way looking back at history, and there is an even longer way ahead.