The cell phone is likely to bring about quite profound changes, more than we anticipate. While most adults see it as an additional convenience today, it has much more implications for the youth. It is not a mere telephone any more.

For the ICT-savvy society, the mobile is already a strong influence on people’s lives. Apart form being a voice and text mail system it is a watch, a camera, a video game. Doctors are checking the laboratory results of their patients on the mobile by connecting them directly to laboratories, people are reading or listening to the news and will soon be watching television on it.

In places like the U.S., Europe, Singapore, and Japan they are developing software so that the mobile can direct motorists to car parks with empty lots and collect domestic service bills. The mobile, because of its popularity, is dominating the advertising world both as the content and as a medium for advert

For us the challenges are very basic. The most popular topic for today’s Druk Air passenger is the specifications and cost of mobile telephones. Everybody needs to bring a few back home but which model do we buy? How do we carry this gadget past the customs officials? At the same time we ask ourselves, when will the benefits of this wonderful wireless facility reach our majority rural population? The government is mandated to take telephones to the geogs but setting up large and expensive towers and posts over the rugged mountains is a less friendly proposition.

Another major change in the trend is that, the past it was the older generation, with vast education and experience, who innovated change. One almost had to be old to be a scientist. Today it is the youth who are making breakthroughs. Highly qualified adults all find that their children are much more at home with the little gadgets.

What does not change, however, is human nature. Children can now use the mobile to cheat in the examinations by logging into data bases, people spread rumours effectively on the mobile, and some people buy the latest models with all the trappings not because they know how to use it, but to show off.

All this means new behaviour,

Some topics in this essay:
Singapore Japan, , Asia Pacific, Druk Air, mobile telephones, percent world’s, cell phone, mobile telephone,