Usage patterns - mobile phones

When piggy chops say shaking her bootie, "it’s not just phone, it’s who we are", it does make a lot of sense.
On an average, the time we spend on phones is reaching the point where it will match other competing media like cable TV, broadband computer. There lies the big opportunity. This comes as a boon to the so far poor ignored baby of the group will be more than happy if eyeball ear-time seeking corporations pay for their usage at the cost of embedded ads.

If mobile phones are the defining innovations of this era, then missed call is our own Indian low cost contribution. (instead of an Indian phenomenon of our generation) It’s about many things like affordability, power structure - "let him call when he is free - I can wait", who needs the most - "it’s his work, let him call me."

I don’t like model of this missed calls. it has too much redundancy.
It involves disconnecting the call, redialing it back. Why not to get rid of this by allowing to have "collect call" option,
I see my phone ringing and it says "collect call from xyz" and I receive, but it gets charged as if I called him. Simple. saves my navigation time.

India is fast becoming urban and the shock of change is softened by this cell phone bridge. Sam Petroda did it with 1 Rupee coin box and that is nicely augmented by “receive only” cell phones. This is the bridge that connects a displaced laborer to its remote village, and an IT nomad to his near and dear.

if you ask a house maid, a dhoodhwalah, an IT guy, a college goer to draw the navigation as you perceive it will all be so different. each got different level of stickiness with different features.
For doodhwalah or paperwalah, his contact list may be his clientele.
For a illiterate, last three numbers is the identity of the person on the other end. A clear design implication could be numbers shown in the way that uses this fact.

Cell phone is a shadow that follows you, gives a best way to excuse yourself from a group whenever you want, how much long you want it.
its an easiest self analysis tool for aspirants in interviews and leave it on and later on find where you lost the plot.
its a best and easiest spying tool for wives and girl friends. just pick up the phone and see what he or she is up to.

We still lack many things ... we don’t see things or we don’t want to see them as it does not fit in business model... incumbents would never try it and entrant faces uphill task. What one need is a innovation cell within giants that keep eyes are ears open to the usage trends in the emerging markets.

Why don’t we build a multi-user feature... typically for lower middle class where a phone like a PC is shared asset and it is carried by 'who needs it most at this hour" basis. So you get a number and its derivative and with a OS level change, these derivative numbers will kick in as per user selection in the phone.
Like a evolution of computing from personal to cloud, when I see how mobiles are evolving, they are driven by marketing than user needs, they want to mimic handheld PC than inherent mobile ubiquitous needs. whatever can be stuffed in that form factor is finding its place in final stank list. oh I can easily fit in a IR device, ...who uses it for crying out loud.

Like Mercedes Benz defines the farthest point in the stylizing for a generation. Rest of the herd try and aim their trajectories to it in surface styling. We need pioneers of that kind who set the bar high enough. iPhone did that with touch factor to some extent.

I strongly feel, Need to hold something to ear is one big No No for me.
this is first to get rid off when you want to put that farthest point.
I have seen a projector based keyboard sometime back, can we build the same for the phone.

Imagine a face appearing with whom you can talk. projector resides at the inner band of wrist watch and lets you project it on palm of other hand.
For hands free version you just put it down and project it on any surface.

I saw an ad today of multi-touch that lets you play piano on touch-screen of the phone. Imagine with the projector the limitation of 4 inch by 3 inch goes away. You can even play drums on this.

It can easily port the content of web with least changes in the wrapper “container of the content” since now the form factor is “stretchable”. You can browse web like in a dual monitor J

What I am writing must already be invented the way far eastern countries are adopting the mobile tech. But appropriateness for its audience is the key thing in design and one just cannot lift up a design and use it here in Indian market.

Google has a knack of doing the right thing at right time. They are entering the emerging markets when whole world is focusing on deep pockets US/EU markets.

Google started it with a voice enabled service on its no. 80041999999, for India and it give results with a fair amount of accuracy to normal queries like cab service etc. I don’t know what they plan to do next but I see a big eco-system of services evolving around it. It’s a baby with big hopes and big potential. Imagine once you establish a phone number in the heads of one million people, you need ways to “extend the brand”…may be last 3 numbers will change to search specific commodities like hotel, bus, electrician and all you need is register it back to Google’s server that I am an electrician operating in such and such area. It would capture the un-organized sector which is right now “loosely connected” with cell phones.
Do you notice how Volve bus operators optimize using a bunch of jobless people with cell phones and a shrewd orchestrator plus a scheme well understood by all (I know at the cost of frustrated and annoyed customer). In India cell phones made these people “intelligent agents that transmit back information” in an multi-agent system. Google can hold it all together and can orchestrate a productivity revolution in this market. Airtel / Idea etc are not thinking out of box. They are happy with margins and customer base. Some are moving or making a cautious attempts to move to holy grail of convergence when broadband-mobile telephony-entertainment will be through single pipe. Don’t know when will this happen. With recession dawning the bitter truth to these companies, it is now more farther than it was.

Like any other ‘stuff’, cell phone is a status-quo. I am not saying anything new here. Earlier days, having a house used to give that respect and social standing. It’s an extended identity and sense of permanence which so many people of different strata search and find in different things. For the lowest rungs now cell phone is doing it. Having a number is something. It’s getting counted. Its license to be included. I feel we are not doing enough. We are not doing it right.

Euphoria around good cause like literacy projects are just ad gimmicks used by leading cell phones companies. Nobody generates content and such things remain white board ideas or idea whose time has not come because I want some other ‘thought leader’ to come and show me how.

A mature Devnagari text or Indic script messaging is still a distant dream. Far east did not let go their past and heritage in their idea of development and progress. Middle east can afford it so long oil is there. No other BRIC nation is doing it. But we devalue our cultural markers in the name of progress. It’s like once my friend Anchal said, to drive faster and lose weight dumbass driver is shedding carburetor and engine. What will be left and how far will you go.