Cellular Technology

CELLULAR TECHNOLOGY AND IT'S MERITS & DEMERITS

Farooq Raza Qadri

Right from the beginning human is trying for the Latest, for the best and this race is still on and seems not stopping. It is well said that "Necessity is the mother of invention". It's human nature to strive for more and more and for the best. For the sake of this natural habit human beings invented from huge to tiny. By looking around us we can see how much work has been done in this regard, Planes, Ships, Telephone & Cellular Phones, Personal Computers & Laptops, and many other things are the proof of it.

Use of cellular phones has tremendously been increased during the last few years. According to a report, in 1994, 16 million Americans subscribed to cellular phone services. CTIA an International Association for the Wireless Telecommunication Industry says that there are 250,146,921 Estimated Current US Wireless Subscribers. Some experts predict that worldwide subscriber ship will reach 4 billion people by 2010. Today, more people have cell phones than fixed telephone lines, both in the United States and internationally. At the end of 2006 there were more than 2.68 billion cell phone subscribers worldwide. This compares to 1.27 fixed line subscribers and 1 billion internet users worldwide. China's mobile phone market, already the world's biggest, has passed 400 million users. Americans spend, on average, about seven hours a month talking on their cell phones. Wireless Penetration Over 70 percent of total U.S. Population. More than 60 million teenagers now carry cell phones, and most take them everywhere they go.

Anywhere, anytime communication is now demanded by all generations of mobile users who no longer want to be chained to their PCs. In Pakistan the trend is the same as in other parts of the world. Far-sighted government polices during the last few years has provided the considerable growth to the telecom sector in Pakistan. According to PTA cellular subscribers in Pakistan reached to a figure of 55.6 million by the end of March 2007. Figures released in March 2005 from the London Business School reported that Africa has seen faster growth in mobile telephone subscriptions than any other region of the world over the last five years. At the end of 2004 Africa's largest mobile phone firm, Vodacom, had 14.4 million users while MTN had 14 million subscribers.

MERITS:

We all know that cellular phone is a big help to keep in contact with our loved ones, and co-workers and other people. Secondly, cell phones help us in organizing our life like reminders, alarm clock, notes for any job, calculations etc. It also entertain us with games, music etc. and it is like a PC in your pocket because you can check your email via GPRS, you can surf & search on the net. An Israeli company says it has developed a system for managing traffic by tracking driver's cell-phone signals. Based on the idea that most people keep their mobile phones on while driving, Lod, Israel-based Cellint created the Traffic Sense system to detect the cellular signals and use them to create a real-time moving picture of what's happening on the roads. Through cell phones many companies raise funds for good causes like in Pakistan many NGO's and Mobile Phone companies raised fund for the Earthquake victims. In the late 1990s, in Bangladesh, Grameen Bank, a Dhaka-based for-profit enterprise long known in Bangladesh for making micro loans to fund micro enterprises by villagers, set up Grameen Telecommunications, a non-profit organization that provided low-cost phone services in rural areas. Using money borrowed from Grameen Bank, village entrepreneurs purchased mobile phones which they then used to sell phone services to customers -- other villagers -- by the call. The result: mobile phone entrepreneurs -- 95 percent of whom were female -- made a tidy profit while villagers reaped the benefits of instant communication. These benefits included communicating with distant family members, making it easier to find employment opportunities, having more options during emergency situations, enabling farmers to check prices in different markets before selling produce, and eventually allowing the quick and easy transfer of funds. The mobile phone micro enterprise platform spread rapidly through the country and stimulated other economic activities among the rural poor, who have proven to be much more technology-savvy than many originally anticipated.

DEMERITS:

Apart from the growth of cellular technology it has some demerits too. Firstly, it enhances our responsibilities like where you ever go your office calling you to do this and do that. Truly you can't find time for yourself if this is the case. According to many recent surveys cellular phones generate radiation which can cause brain cancer. Few years back a study found that Radio waves from mobile phones harm body cells and damage DNA in laboratory conditions, according to a new study majority-funded by the European Union, researchers. The so-called Reflex study, conducted by 12 research groups in seven European countries, did not prove that mobile phones are a risk to health but concluded that more research is needed to see if effects can also be found outside a lab. The greatest risk established to date is from the increased risk of accidents from using a cell phone while driving. One of the increasing problem these days with mobile phones is fraud cases, many "Jerks" in the world are making fool of innocent people and making people lost there money and time.

By concluding I would like to say that like everything, Cellular Phones have some merits and demerits, it depends on us how we use this new technology. We can use it to make life easier and beautiful or it can be use to make life like a hell... the decision is ours!!!