... Now, if only AT&T would get their act together and improve their network speeds as they keep promising, things would be truly wonderful.
You are spot on with that! The US is virtually 3rd world when it comes to cell phones. Japan is at the apex of cell technology, Korea, Taiwan and China close behind. All are small countries with govt driven cell phone industries. The US is free enterprise, capitalism driving the cell industry. Back that up with the US cell market spread over a gazillion sq miles and the cost of updating the cell network (originally a US technology) is staggering, not going to happen unless there is a profit to be made.
I was glad when the iPhone was released because it would put pressure on the US cell phone industry to update the infrastructure that could not support 3G technology.
Here's what a Japanese cell will do:
- 2-lines, one cell phone, 2 cell phone numbers.
- video conferencing
- internet access
- watch TV on your cell phone -- some phones store multiple episodes of the broadcast series you select.
- the cell phone will receive and store up to 5 voice messages
- the cell phone acts as a credit card (invented by Sony) -- swipe you cell phone to make purchases. You can connect to your bank to transfer "money" to the cell phone if you are making a big purchase.
- and my personal favorite -- the cell phone reads QR code.
QR code (invented by Toyota to track parts for car assembly):
These codes appear in the corners of magazine ads, movie posters, all over the place. Select QR mode and pass the cell phone camera over the QR. The phone automatically reads it (like a bar code reader) and goes to the internet webpage for that item or brings up email composition to send email to destination defined by the QR.
Ad for new Mercedes -- yeah, you have to choose, a new S2 system or a new Mercedes.
Note the QR code at the bottom of the page. It's there for cell phone QR reading only.
And NONE of that is in a "smart phone" -- just regular old cell phones.
The iPhone is just the beginning. Cell phone advancement in the US has a vrey long way to to, but it can't get there unless the infrastructure can support the features. And the infrastructure won't get there unless there is money to be made updating it -- and it is a vast area that needs to be updated, will take a lot of return on that investment to motivate the cell phone gods.
ETA: out of curiosity, I ran my cell phone over the QR code I linked to above. To goes to:
www.japanmarketnews.com.