Josh Hill  wrote:
>
> A cell phone makes efficient use of bandwidth by allocating
> frequencies =A0locally and reassigning them dynamically as the phone
> moves between cells.

Moving from cell to cell lets other phones in other cells
use the same frequency.  It's fan specualtion that Star
Trek communicators work that way.  Why not have them
be subspace transmitters for example.  But inspiring a
product in the real world means using real world physics
so a subspace radio is out of the question until modern
physics is replaced by post-modern physics and the
limits of the universe change.

The concept also applies to FTL travel - Science is about
what's possible; technology is about implementing the
possible.  Higher technology doesn't much matter if your
science is at the stone age level.  You may be able to
make amazing stuff with stone age knowledge but none
of it will ever be an airplane.  This means that saying FTL
still won't exist in a million years equals saying science
will not advance like that in a million years.  Recall the
quotes from patent bureau folks a century ago that all
that can be invented had been ...

I think much of science has been inspired by speculative
fiction - In specific many scientists were inspired into the
field by speculative fiction (I want to figure out better
boats so folks can have adventures like that Odysseus
guy through I want to figure out reuseable spacecraft so
folks can have adventures like that Sheridan guy).  How the
science actually turned out is based on the actual
non-fiction universe so some inspiration sequences are
extremely indirect.  But "whatever the mind of man can
imagine, mankind can achieve" has a lot of reeality and
the mind of man includes FTL travel.

> Mobile phones of the Get Smart vintage didn't
> have that capability, and, since bandwidth was limited, they were few
> and far between.

This is why satellite phones must perforce be few and far
between - Each satellite is a cell.  I recall explaining that
to a high level executive in a cell phone company and he
just stared at me for a while trying to puzzle out what I'd
said.  But from that point on that particular cell phone
company showed no interest in moving into the satellite
field yet sustained its program of building as many towers
as its budget allowed.

If each satellite is a cell and moving from cell to cell means
switching to a different satellite, either you have directional
antennas on each cell phone and a *lot* of satellites or you
figure the price of each satellite against the price of several
hundred local towers and realize that the price of a satellite
phone can't ever go down without extremely cheap launches.
At one point in my career I had the chance to work on one
of the many private efforts to design cheap launchers and I
jumper at the opportunity.  The problem of cells can be
addressed by lots of low orbit satellites if the launch price
gets low enough.
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