N2NH
04-03-2013, 01:43 PM
Cellphone history was made 40 years ago today. That first call also signified the invention of the first working cellphone too...
It is 40 years this week since the first public mobile phone call. On 3 April, 1973, Martin Cooper (http://www.economist.com/node/13725793?story_id=13725793,), a pioneering inventor working for Motorola in New York, called a rival engineer from the pavement of Sixth Avenue to brag and was met with a stunned, defeated silence. The race to make the first portable phone had been won. The Pandora's box containing txt-speak (http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/shortcuts/2012/may/11/davidcameron-rebekahwade), pocket-dials and pig-hating suicidal birds (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/angry-birds) was open.
Many people at Motorola, however, felt mobile phones (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/mobilephones) would never be a mass-market consumer product. They wanted the firm to focus on business carphones. But Cooper and his team persisted. Ten years after that first boastful phonecall they brought the portable phone to market, at a retail price of around $4,000.
Thirty years on, the number of mobile phone subscribers worldwide is estimated at six and a half billion. And Angry Birds games have been downloaded 1.7bn times.
This is the story of the mobile phone in 40 facts...
Some interesting factoids at the link.
Forty mobile phone facts: cellphones for dogs, 'butt-dialling' and Ernie Wise (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/apr/03/forty-mobile-phone-facts-cellphones-dialling)
It is 40 years this week since the first public mobile phone call. On 3 April, 1973, Martin Cooper (http://www.economist.com/node/13725793?story_id=13725793,), a pioneering inventor working for Motorola in New York, called a rival engineer from the pavement of Sixth Avenue to brag and was met with a stunned, defeated silence. The race to make the first portable phone had been won. The Pandora's box containing txt-speak (http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/shortcuts/2012/may/11/davidcameron-rebekahwade), pocket-dials and pig-hating suicidal birds (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/angry-birds) was open.
Many people at Motorola, however, felt mobile phones (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/mobilephones) would never be a mass-market consumer product. They wanted the firm to focus on business carphones. But Cooper and his team persisted. Ten years after that first boastful phonecall they brought the portable phone to market, at a retail price of around $4,000.
Thirty years on, the number of mobile phone subscribers worldwide is estimated at six and a half billion. And Angry Birds games have been downloaded 1.7bn times.
This is the story of the mobile phone in 40 facts...
Some interesting factoids at the link.
Forty mobile phone facts: cellphones for dogs, 'butt-dialling' and Ernie Wise (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/apr/03/forty-mobile-phone-facts-cellphones-dialling)