Lack of a Cell Phone
I personally don’t own a cell phone. I have had one before, and I know many people that do have them, including my younger brother, and my fiance, but I don’t currently have one.
You might be wondering why, but the answer is very simple: I don’t need one.
Shocking isn’t it? In our society there are increasingly few people that don’t have a cell phone. Some people have more than one, so why can I live without one currently?
It is not that I can’t afford it, but instead is mostly because most of the people I know, I don’t talk to on the phone, be it on a landline or something else. We talk through e-mail, over instant messaging clients and in person.
It is funny that a technology that is as pervasive as cell phones is starting to see laws and rules against them as we move forward. People are tired of cell phone users not following the proper etiquette when using one, as well as the fact that they can be distracting when driving or trying to concentrate on any task really.
What would I need a cell phone for? It could be nice to have it so I could co-ordinate with my fiance, but since I work from home, that kind of situation does not come up often.
I am probably the perfect person for a BlackBerry or other device that would allow me to access my e-mail or even better, the MSN Messenger instant messaging service, where I have the bulk of my friends and contacts.
As I watch the cell phone market grow and change, I continually watch devices add more and more features making them convergent devices that people have been talking about for a long time. I am the type of person that owns a MP3 player, and a digital camera, and so I wouldn’t need those devices wasting my cell phone’s battery life.
Will I ever buy a cell phone for myself? Probably, but it will most likely not be until I have a family, a car, and more of a need. If nothing else it sure is fun to watch them evolve over time.
My Mobile Wishlist: A Cellphone I Could Hack
I consider myself to be quite the mobile phone junkie. Since I was young, I’d always been fascinated with anything that could let me communicate with other people while untethered with wires. Unfortunately, I was born at a time when mobile phones were still just objects of luxury to most people, and unattainable to the common person. Handset costs were otherworldly. Service costs were equally unbelievable. You’d have to pay an arm and a leg–and sometimes even more–in monthly fees just to maintain anywhere, anytime-connectivity. Wait, that wasn’t even anywhere connectivity as dead spots abound, and celular roaming was iffy and expensive.
But that didn’t stop me from hoping and dreaming. And it didn’t stop me from exploring, the born hacker I was. I was tinkering–disassembling, rebuilding, experimenting–with my toys and gadets since I was a toddler. And I had a firm resolve to be as curious and exploratative on what would be an expensive hobby.
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3G - changing social habits
A study commissioned by British 3G cellular provider 3 has come up with interesting ideas involving the use of the new technology, as BBC reports.
3G will change the way people socialize, the study concludes. Because of the way people are able to exchange data such as digital imagery and video, mobile users tend to utilise their handsets to “document their lives,” among a host of other uses that previously were only figments of the imagination.
Increasing use of 3G mobile phones can change the way people communicate and create new social trends and tribes, a behavioural study has suggested.
The study said the combination of still and video cameras on modern phones, and the advent of high speed data transfer, can inspire a generation of users.
The new class of mobile users is now called Generation C, with C standing in for “content.” The wired–and wireless–world is, after all, moving into this era called “Web 2.0,” where content is king and prosumers rule, meaning, we ourselves generate the content we consume. And it’s no longer just the news that matters, but the conversations that go about them are even more important.
But these changes are likely to come full circle when the current generation of phones and mobile technologies (such as GSM) wane in popularity, and get replaced by newer systems. Then, of course, cultural factors may also bar any of these behavioural changes from happening anytime soon, as our present set of mobile users have grown fond of talking and texting and are not likely to switch to videoconferencing that easily.
At any rate, any new technology that gets popular enough is likely to change how people socialize. Take email, for instance, or even the telephone. The world is evolving, and whatever benefits 3G has in store for us is part of all that. Pretty soon I’d expect everyone to be communicating by telepathy!
5 Ways to Improve Your Camera Phone Pictures
Coming from Microsoft.com is a list of 5 tips to improve the images you take with your camera phone.
1. Adjust Image Compression
The JPEG format used by digital cameras is flexible in that it allows you to decide how much detail you want to preserve. If you want to preserve every last detail because you want to make prints, you should select the “super fine” quality level. Just be aware that you won’t be able to fit many pictures in your camera’s memory.2. Frame Your Shot
You may miss a zoom lens. Few camera phones have a zoom lens, though many offer something called a digital zoom.It’s better to use your camera phone the way it was designed: as a wide-angle lens. You’re going to have to get close to your center of interest—don’t try this with the moose—but the camera’s wide view will give you perspective.
3. Get Artsy
Even though the average camera in a Pocket PC or Smartphone won’t compete with a state-of-the-art digital camera, there are other possibilities. Set your camera on grayscale or sepia and play around with light and shadow.4. Move Your Images from Device to PC and Back
You can also copy pictures from your PC to your device using a memory card. Insert the memory card into the memory card slot on your device and then copy the pictures from your PC to the folder you created on the memory card.5. Share Your Images
Once you’ve captured your images, it’s time to share them with the world. If you keep a blog, you may want to use a program like PicoBlogger which automatically generates your moblog entries for you. Read more about mobile blogging, usually called moblogging.
Though I don’t know how sharing your images or moving them around will imrpove them, they are great tips none the less.
2MP Cameraphone Shootout: Sony Ericsson’s K750 vs. Nokia’s N90
Here is a great idea: take two camera phones and pit them against each other. Well that is exactly what Mobile Burn did with their look at the Sony Ericsson K750 versus the Nokia N90.
Ever since the Nokia N90 and Sony Ericsson K750 were announced, people have been speculating as to which device would take better 2 megapixel photos. Would it be the N90, with its Carl Zeiss designed optics, or the compact K750 with its parent Sony’s electronics? Both devices have pretty similar specs when it comes to their cameras: both are 2 megapixel units, both have auto focusing capability, and both have a history of cameras in the family (Sony’s digital cameras and Zeiss’ lenses). The K750’s camera has a slightly wider field of view, and seems to be a bit “faster” than the N90’s (meaning it needs less light), but otherwise these two cameras are pretty evenly matched.
While Sony Ericsson’s megapixel cameraphones have always been among the best available, I have to admit that I figured that the N90, with the backing of Carl Zeiss engineering, would end up being the superior camera - at least when it came to optical quality.
But that didn’t happen.
On Your Cell at 30,000 Feet
It looks like as soon as 2007, the sounds of ringing and buzzing cell phones could be filling the cabins of what were previously much quieter areas (atleast when it came to phones).
Airline passengers, already underfed, over-crowded, harassed by security and surrounded by crying children, probably thought they were seeing the last straw on the horizon when — ta-taa! — the airline companies announced they are going to test the use of cell phones in flight.
Until now, cell phone use has been banned for fear that they might interfere with planes’ navigational electronics. But where there’s a will, there’s a technical way. Two European airlines will test a system next year that uses on-board equipment to relay calls from phones to cell networks below. If it works, widespread access could begin in 2007.
So there goes the last public place on or off Earth free from the clamor of ring tones and overheard conversations that predictably begin with “Guess where I am?” This creates new opportunities for airborne rage and passenger conflicts.
It looks like using this service will have a hefty fee behind it to hopefully lessen the ringing to the first class area, but as the system no doubt becomes more widely adopted, it will become cheaper, and thus more wide spread.
I don’t know about you, but I think they should atleast make it so everyone must have their phone on vibrate. I get frustrated enough with my flying experiences, and I don’t want to hear your latest MP3 ringtone of some new hit pop song.
Source: delaware online
Police Use Cell Phone to Track Robbery Suspect
I love when technology is used to stop crime, or atleast reduce them. I think that cell phones, as they become more integrated into our lives might let “big brother” in, but also protect us when we are in need of help.
ksl.com has the story:
Police investigating a robbery that involved a safe being yanked out of a business and a stolen forklift thought they had a pretty good idea how to find the suspect. He apparently left his cell phone behind.
“We got lucky, I figure, then my guys ran with it. I’m glad they buckled down and got them,” Lehi Police Chief Chad Smith recently told the City Council.
There were three known addresses for the cell phone’s owner, so police officers staked out each location after the Oct. 2 robbery. Two days later, Ryan Ferguson arrived at his home in Sandy, noticed the police and took off. After a car chase, Ferguson ran away on foot but was cornered by officers, who arrested him.
Things You Didn’t Ask the Vendor but Wanted to Know
Cellphone9 has an amusing look at the questions you wanted to ask before purchasing a cell phone, but probably didn’t.
My gosh, if you could drop the phone to test its durability then do so. Some sales people actually do this. I remember a Samsung guy opening a clamshell and getting a mallet. He pounded the hinge where the screen and keypad were connected really hard just to prove how durable it was. I almost fainted.
I just wanted to add a little story of my own along the same lines…
When I worked at a store that sold cell phones we had one person come in and take nearly the whole thing apart. He took off a few small pieces that easily come off and was stopped short of ripping the whole body open. People do the strangest things to “test” durability.
Reasons Not To Have a Cell Phone
A hilarious look at why you should not have a cell phone comes from Carole Moore over at The Daily News.
There are excellent reasons to own a cell phone. They come in handy in emergencies, like when you’re running from the bulls in Pamplona. But let’s not forget all of the other, equally great reasons to tap into the cell phone generation:
If you own a cell phone, you:
- Can’t hide from your kids. It doesn’t matter whether a masseuse is pounding the stuffing out of your back or you’re 3 under par for the first time in your life, be assured that if you have a child and a cell phone, they will go off simultaneously.
Then the child will share life-impacting information that cannot wait until you get home, like the fact that her brother has eaten an entire bag of Cheetoes and she didn’t get a single one. Or she forgot her homework and unless she turns it in within the next five minutes, she will fail, be held back and live with you for yet another year.
Read the rest of the reasons to have a good laugh.
Hacking the Motorola A780
I know almost everything has linux or can have linux ported on it these days, but regular old cell phones? Well, Engadget has the details on this…if you can understand what they are saying, you probably use Linux, or know computer terms pretty well.
The Motorola A780 is a Linux based quad-band GSM phone. Kernel hacker Harald Welte has picked up one of these phones and started poking around in the system. The first thing of note is that the phone doesn’t use the typical lightweight tools found in most embedded systems. Instead of busybox or uClibc it uses their heavier counterparts. The phone also has a 2.4 kernel and switching to the 2.6 kernel is a long term goal. Harald has successfully built a compatible toolchain and has netfilter/iptables running on the A780. It should be possible to construct a firewall between the GPRS and the USB connection. Other hackers are working on adding the stock Linux Bluetooth codebase; this may be one of the first phones supporting A2DP stereo headsets.
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