Pascal Schmidt wrote in a message to Roy J. Tellason:

 PS> Hi Roy! :-)

 RJT> I can't believe that there's that much of a demand for cell phones,  
 RJT> though if they continue to add features maybe that would account for 
 RJT> some of it.

 PS> Well, around here it's hard to find a kid older than 9 that doesn't
 PS> have a cell phone.

There is that.  Of all of the grandkids,  only one,  one of the 13-year-old
ones,  has a cell phone.  So does her mother.  And the only reason this kid
has one is because her other grandfather happens to run one of those little
stores that sell them...

 PS> I don't use mine as a telephone most of the time - I use the 
 PS> built-in calendar functions as an alarm clock and to remind me of 
 PS> people's birthdays. The other function I often use is SMS, sending 
 PS> short messages of up to 160 character to another mobile phone.

Hmm.

 PS> There are games on them things, on newer models you can even 
 PS> upload new ones (written in Java, of all things) into the phone. 
 PS> New ones have high-resolution color displays and built-in digital 
 PS> cameras are also quite common.

That's the sort of thing they've been advertising a lot on tv around here
lately.  Some of the commercials are pretty funny,  too.  But I haven't
kept up with the rest of what's been what with those things,  mostly by
choice. (Yeah,  I had heard about the games,  etc. but...)  You can hardly
go into a shopping mall without running into bunches of places that sell
the darn things,  they're all over.

 PS> For the "below 20" crowd, having a rather new and flashy cell phone
 PS> is considered a must-have.

I'll bet they're the primary market for those places that just sell new
covers for them,  too.

 PS> Older than that, lots of people need them for work. My mother has 
 PS> one for emergencies, which is also the reason why some parents buy 
 PS> a cell phone for their kid.

One of the things I do like about them is that even an inactive phone can
be used to dial 911.  Though my old bag phone probably won't work for too
much longer as it's analog and they seem to be doing away with that system
in these parts.

 PS> This way, the kid can phone an ambulance or home if need be, and 
 PS> also the parents can phone their kid in case of something 
 PS> happening at home or just if they want to know where their 
 PS> son/daughter is right now. ;)

Yep,  that works pretty well.  The kid that I mentioned that has it doesn't
use it during the week but I have a lot less discomfort at her going out
nearby and hanging out with her friends if she's got that phone with her.

 PS> I even saw an old lady (75-80 or so, I'd guess) in the bus last 
 PS> week who was having a nice long chit-chat with somebody via her
 PS> cell phone. :)

I don't have any problem with that,  it's the ones that do that while
driving that irritate me.

 RJT> I overheard a conversation yesterday where a lady in a store said as 
 RJT> to how she didn't have a regular phone any more,  they'd gotten rid 
 RJT> of it just keeping the cell phone.  I hope for her sake the network 
 RJT> never goes down.

 PS> Well, here it is an option if you live in a big city. I haven't
 PS> seen a mobile phone network problem in the last 2 years, while the
 PS> regular phone had a lot of them in the same time.

I can't say for sure one way or the other what the problems might have been
in either case.  I don't remember any with the land lines here,  since
we've been in this place,  and that's 4-1/2 years now.  Though battery life
is a consideration as well.

I also understand that when 9-11 happened the cell phones in NYC didn't
work for quite a while.

 PS> Not an option for me since I need an Internet connection for work
 PS> and university, and those always come combined with either an
 PS> analogue phone or ISDN around here.

I'm not in any hurry to go there either.  I also object to a lot of the
plans that are being offered,  or at least were,  the last time I looked.

 RJT> And there was also a bill passed recently here which lets you 
 RJT> keep a phone number even if you move from one company to 
 RJT> another,  not sure if that applies for landline to cell though.

 PS> We have that for landline and cell here, but seperately. You can
 PS> keep your landline number when changing providers, and you can keep
 PS> your cell phone number when changing providers (at least that
 PS> should be possible, don't know whether all providers are up to it
 PS> yet). Landline and cell numbers are complety seperate.

I'm not sure how that's going to work here yet,  haven't seen the details...

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