Book description
Mobile phones are a ubiquitous technology with a fascinating
history. There are now as many mobile phones in the world as there are
people. We carry them around with us wherever we go. And while we used
to just speak into them, now mobiles are used to do all kinds of
tasks, from talking to twittering, from playing a game to paying a
bill. Jon Agar takes the mobile to pieces, tracing what makes it work,
and puts it together again, showing how it was shaped in different
national contexts in the United States, Europe, the Far East and
Africa. He tells the story from the early associations with cars and
the privileged, through its immense popular success, to the rise of
the smartphone. Few scientific revolutions affect us in such a
day-to-day way as the development of the mobile phone. Jon Agar's deft
history explains exactly how this revolution has come about - and
where it may lead in the future.
