Mobile phones will become the primary personal computing devices

Abstract

A merger of the lowly USB memory stick and the mobile telephone provide a new platform for information solutions. Microscopic portable memory with capacity similar to today’s PC disk drives will spark a transformation which will then be driven by new use models for mobile phones and a new class of “computer user”, one that has no “personal computer” at all. Since more people carry phones than laptops the PC will fade into a role similar to today’s view of the once mighty mainframe. Laptop-loving dinosaurs at the workshop will protest that phones will never replace their favorite machines, in much same way the mainframe developers scoffed at PCs throughout the 1980s. We still have mainframe developers, but the PC created new categories of computer use. We need to understand what new uses will emerge with the computer-phone.