Fry Ramblings on the state of mobile

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Yes, Stephen Fry's blogging is as erratic in scheduling as an intercity train in Outer Bongoland, and yes, his prose rambles quite a bit with (often) little sense of actual structure, but his writings are always interesting, especially so when he tackles mobile technology. Like me, Stephen's tried just about every handset out there and so comparisons can be put into decent context. With a dash of history and a large dollop of self-admitted Apple fandom, 'Four and a half years on' is a good rambling read over a cup of something this morning....

From the piece:

Post 2007 trauma

The aftershocks that rippled out when the iPhone was launched are still being felt. Palm and Sony Ericsson have ceased to be. BlackBerry has effectively bowed and left the stage, billions of dollars poorer. Nokia and Microsoft are making a recovery after a very, very rocky few years in this sector. Google thrives off everything, off the Apple ecosystem and its lion’s share of the Android world. HTC and Samsung continue to lead the field as original equipment manufacturers, with LG and Motorola as blips on the OEM screen that may be fading or growing. It is hard to tell. And of course, Intel has now staked a claim in the territory too.

The future

In another four and half years, the power and memory and capacity and functionality of the computers in our pockets will have transformed these fascinating devices yet again. Near Field Communication and other forms of interactivity will doubtless cause a revolution in the way we work, play and shop in the real world. For I think the next step, as we continue to reap the rewards of Moore’s Law, will involve integrating small devices, quite as powerful as today’s most top-spec smartphone, into elements of cars, fridges, shop counters, airports, railways stations, art galleries, sports arenas and restaurants, whether through NFC or biometrics, which will mean that we will be able to take our Cloud with us and our bank account too, wherever we go.

But what do I know? I thought I’d never type as fast on a virtual keyboard as on a physical one. I thought that green shirt would look good on QI. I thought so many things…

Make it a large cup of something, mind you -  'Four and a half years on' is long. We're talking Tomi-Ahonen long, ball of string long, river Amazon long.

But you'll enjoy it anyway. And, as always, it's just great to have a TV celeb who actually has a real grip on technology.

Source / Credit: The New Adventures of Stephen Fry