Wireless Wonders

No news, just comment about mobile phones and services, from a veteran practitioner...3G, GPRS, WAP, Bluetooth, WiFi, etc...

Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Poetic texter...(idea #72)

I love words. I am not that good with them, but I love them. We all struggle with words. It is part of the human condition. The evolution of words brought about by texting has caused consternation in some quarters. Apparently we face an outrageous decline in our language. It is tempting to agree now that we exchange cards with greetings written in "textspeak". However, it is not easy to define the "decline" of a language, nor our usage of it.

Let the grammarians, linguists and self-appointed language guardians slug it out. We don't generally think of the change from using "cw" to the Franco-inspired "qu" as a decline, so perhaps writing "gr8" instead of "great" is not such a big deal either.

Dumbing down (there's that "decline" metaphor again) of language is not inevitable. Perhaps technology can help (as well as hinder). Why not introduce a "poetic text compiler" into our mobile phones, allowing us to select from various snippets of beautifully composed prose and a whole gamut of wonderful words? The thumb is mightier than the pen.

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New and interesting book...

Thumb Culture has now finally been published. Here's how the editors introduce the book:

"Mobile communication has an increasing impact on people's lives and society. Ubiquitous media influence the way users relate to their surroundings, and data services like text and pictures lead to a culture shaped by thumbs. Representing several years of research into the social and cultural effects of mobile phone use, this volume assembles the fascinating approaches and new insights of leading scientists and practitioners. The book contains the results of a first international survey on the social consequences of mobile phones. It provides a comprehensive inventory of today's issues and an outlook in mobile media, society and their future study. "

I contributed a chapter about the future of mobile in the "3G Era", but the book is worth it alone for the output from Stefan Bertschi's Delphi report that surveyed mobile experts on their views of the industry. If you like to read widely about the mobile industry, considering the views of social scientists and technologists across the globe, then this is a unique and interesting book. I have found some of it fascinating.

I had previously promised to release my chapter via the Web, but not until this book was published and given a chance to circulate.


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