World Mobile Culture

Really interesting to read this article which ties in and expands on some of the issues raised by Sofia in her recent post on the American 'cellphone'. However, what struck me was the perspective being adopted here. A bit of the 'continent cut off by fog over channel' … Unlike the author and some other contributors I don't think there is a US vs Europe divide in mobile phones. Instead there is a global set of attitudes which the US (and Canada) don't share in! So mobile phones work as status symbols and express personalities (whether me as techno-savvy or me as fashionable) ALL OVER THE WORLD (don’t want to boast but to name some of the countries we've been to on this subject - … Colombia, Mexico, Brazil, China, South Korea, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, Japan, Indonesia, India, Egypt, Tunesia, Iran (!), Nigeria, South Africa, Australia, plus most of the main Western and Eastern European countries…). North America with its commoditised attitude to 'cellphones' is the odd one out - for all the reasons mentioned in the article but also as Sofia points out because of a misguided focus on price vs benefits by US mobile operators. And another thing - I think the article is really on to something making a comparison with cars. It seems that in countries where fewer people can afford cars, mobiles step in as status symbols. So in China for example, people for whom cars are out of reach are spending huge proportions of their salaries on mobiles! I'd take issue with the article though for implying that Europeans don't LOVE their cars (come on, I'm from the land of the Autobahn) - but where the US may be unique is in a combination of real emotional attachment and much more practical reliance on the automobile, which are of course interlinked. So…maybe there's just enough space for one mobile in the US ('scuse the pun!)