Whatever people thought the first time they held a portable phone the size of a shoe in their hands, it was nothing like where we are now, accustomed to having all knowledge at our fingertips.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I think most people in the developed world would admit to carrying some sort of handheld device, whether it's a laptop or a cell phone, at all times.
There was a time when nails were high-tech. There was a time when people had to be told how to use a telephone. Technology is just a tool. People use tools to improve their lives.
My father had a big brick cell phone, before anyone had a cell phone, because he was really just into that kind of thing - communication devices. I grew up between my father's laboratory and my mother's library.
I've used a cellphone exactly twice. Things move on. The world changes. And I don't know it.
For me personally, the technology that has taken the most unexpected turn in my lifetime is what I refer to as 'the device formerly known as the cell phone.' I still remember many predictions that by 2000 there would only be about a million cell phone users. Boy, were they ever wrong!
I think the iPhone was as significant an invention as the Gutenburg press, in terms of the future of humanity.
Kids don't know what life was like without cell phones.
People's behavior will change with technology. I know very few young people who can't type out a text message on their phone with one thumb, for instance.
Nokia and Research in Motion needed a modern operating system. They could have bought Palm or Android before Google did, but they didn't. Today, it's probably too late, and at the time they would have been criticized for overpaying, but as they say - shift happens.
It used to be that we imagined that our mobile phones would be for us to talk to each other. Now, our mobile phones are there to talk to us.