The Pope, mothers, psychic links...

I'm not a Catholic, but I knew every moment of The Pope's health decline. This was because I was receiving "breaking news" alerts on my Blackberry from the BBC. They placed a lot of emphasis on this particular story as it unfolded, so I got to read about it.

What struck me was the intimacy that can be achieved via a mobile, even in this case with someone I don't know. The point of emphasis here is that The Pope wasn't sending me messages. The process of being in touch with his predicament was automatic (albeit with human intervention - BBC staff - somewhere) and mobile-assisted; immediacy seemed an important factor.

What if this "breaking news" effect were possible with people we know, perhaps people close to us? How might our emotional connections be enhanced by mobiles?

This was my first thought and then...

Recently, I watched "The Forgotten", a film about alien experiments on humans. The principle in the film had her son taken by aliens. Towards the end of the film, it is revealed that they were interested in investigating the emotional (psychic?) link between a mother and child.

This got me thinking about relationships between loved ones and how mobiles might amplify non-verbal links between two people who love, or care for each other.

Getting "breaking news" updates about a loved one is probably impractical. I can't see workable mechanisms for it (although they might exist), nor I am entirely sure about what this would mean.

Is there the possibility for a "thinking of you" app (besides the usual call/messaging candidates)?

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