A visual history of mobiles: Past, present and future

Sometimes I can’t help but think back to my first cellular phone back in the mid-1990′s. But the history of mobiles started a decade prior, when phones were beyond the means of most consumers. Now we have countries with more mobile subscriptions than people and the phone itself is used less and less for it’s original purpose: Voice calls.

This infographic, courtesy of Savings.com, brings together historical datapoints showing the decreasing cost and size of mobile devices, in conjunction with more capable hardware and services.

Interestingly, the “phone of the future” will support HD graphics, electronic payments and can be used as a game console. Galaxy Nexus owners are already living in the future then as the smartphone with its NFC chip can be used as wireless wallet, is great for watching HD videos and connects to console-quality game services in the cloud, such as OnLive, right now.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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  • Connected world: the consumer technology revolution
  • A Global Mobile Handset Platform Forecast, 2011 – 2015
  • Virtual Worlds: Trends and Opportunities



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