Media obesity

Back in the day

I encountered the mobile phone for the very first time in 1991 when our sales manager walked into our office with the biggest grin you can imagine after having the new device installed at a specialist carphone installation company in Amsterdam. The entire office staff gathered around the meeting table where he had placed the newest technology in the centre so everyone could have a good look at the device. It was the size of a shoebox took 10 hours to charge for 30 minutes talk time. The only reason our boss had made this, significant, investment was because he could now call the sales rep whenever he was on the road and didn't have to wait for him to call the office from client- or public pay phones (remember those?). Although we were all in awe of the technology and indeed the price tag associated with it I could not imagine this big and heavy device becoming an integral part of our lives so quickly and in such a significant way.

1980s Motorola DynaTAC Promotional Video

My first mobile phone

I cannot remember exactly when i got my first mobile phone and I certainly cannot remember why I got one either. It was probably 1997/1998 and it was an Ericsson GA628. I didn't really need a mobile phone either for work or personal reasons and I rarely used it as hardly any of my friends / family had a phone and I certainly couldn't afford to make calls or send texts. Calls with Esat Digicom (now O2) cost from 20p a minute to 80p a minute.  So why did i get it? Well simply because I am a trendsetter although that sounds a little pompous and I certainly couldn't call myself that nowadays! I am more comfortable with the term 'early adopter' and would only apply that to the tech purchases in my life rather than anything else like fashion, music or cars. 

Mobile phone growth

In 2008 it was estimated that one in two owned a mobile phone and between 1990 to 2011, mobile phone subscriptions increased from 12.4 million to over 6 billion. That is staggering really isn't it, I mean, can you think of any other product or technology for that matter that has grown the same amount in a similar period? 

Game changer

And then the iPhone was released. I was very fortunate to have been close to the centre of the product launch as I was working for Apple in Cork, Ireland at the time. Those were exciting days! Not only following the development of the iMac and iBooks but also the iPod. It was, and is, astonishing for me to look back and see the impact of those products on the consumer market and the development of the mobile phone market.

Not only from a technology perspective but more so on how we as people interact with technology and through it with each other as people.

When we look at the amount of time we spent on mobile devices (phones / tablets / e-readers and laptops) on a daily basis and how much information we consume it is staggering. Compare this with the amount of time we spend communicating directly with people we have to wonder whether the information we consume is not in fact making us 'media-obese'. It is like we have just discovered fast food and just cannot get enough regardless of the substandard quality of what we consume.

It is kind of ironic in that regard to Coca Cola came up with this ad