Week 9 Telephone to Mobile Phone

Okay well here goes my first online post of the weekly posts I should have already started for my digital communication class. Sorry I know they're out of order/mixed up and late but ah well better late than never right? I hope so.......... Well i might be off to a good start because this one isn't late, right on time in the right week (not a catch up post). Anyway this week I'm discussing how the phone represents interpersonal communication and my own personal use of phones in my house from the telephone to mobile phone. Sorry will eventually get the hang of writing it so my posts don't sound like a question and answer survey.

Well firstly the phone is closely connected with interpersonal communication. The phone connects people in personal voice communication that transcends geographical and time barriers. Which in time of the telephone back in the day of its introduction was a pretty amazing feat. It connected people on a much more personal level than the letter, as people communicated using their voices as in a real conversation. People could thus react and communicate personally with different voice intonation, sounds, etc. It was almost instant too and thus way faster than the letter. I remember reading some where about some fears people had about the telephone disintegrating the value of the written word and changing the English language. Also there were fears about the social and moral implications of the telephone as there were theories that the telephone quickened social relationships, as in the faster the communication between two people, the faster the relationship progresses. While there was some basis in these theories, generally they were a little dramatic and overexaggeratory. But then again there are always these initial fears in society when new technologies emerge. These fears similarly reoccurred with the mobile phone, text messaging or SMS was disintegrating the value of the written word and language, being mobile equalled more faster connectivity and communication between two people and therefore faster relationships. The interpersonal features of the telephone similarly transcended into the mobile phone except now the Mobile phone is more mobile and portable. Thus people are more likely to be connected in communication but this also impedes a little on personal space and privacy. The Mobile phone socially, is expected to always be on and therefore connected, so people can contact you anytime anywhere which can be a little invasive. Wow didn't realise how much I had written and there are still many more issues about mobile phones to discuss!

Anyway better be moving on to the next paragraph. It was amazing to read the Goggin article (2008) 'Re orientating the Mobile: Australasian Imaginaries' because in detailing the history of mobile phones in Australia, it was exactly detailing the history of the phone in my house! In the early 90s, my family had one telephone and it was one of those old turn the dial ones, i know how vintage, lol. Anyway a couple of years later we went the next step and got a push button telephone which was like wow. The in about 1995, my mum got a mobile phone for work, she worked in an office as a human resources manager and it was one brick of a mobile phone that was connected to our car, with push buttons and a tiny screen to show you the numbers of the incoming calls. In about 1999-2000 my mum got an actual 'mobile' phone a Nokia 3310? i think? it was the model before the massively popular 3315 (which my sister later got). She used the phone for work and we were allowed to contact her in emergencies only! lol her having a mobile phone at the time I thought was sooooo cool. When my sister got a 3315 which everyone in highschool was getting at the time, i think began the transition of mobile phones, from work tools to social accessories, for my anyway. I got my first and only mobile phone when i was in year 9 of highschool (i was 15), which was a Nokia 3200. Not only was it my first mobile phone, which was a reason for wowness, but it was the first commercial phone to have Internet capabilities and polyphonic ringtones which was another reason for wow. However, like a year later a better phone with those capabilities came out and now after having the same mobile for 5 years now, my mobile is archaic and should be in a museum! lol I never updated just because i never had the money to and it does the job i want it to do, which is simply to txt and call people and connect with them.