You know that smartphone you love, that ultimate expression of handheld convergence that some would call a mobile computer? It's crap. Or so says octogenarian, Martin Cooper, former lead engineer at Motorola said to have invented the handheld cellphone -- really, his name is on the "Radio telephone system" patent and he's credited with making the very first private handheld cellphone call from a busy New York City street on April 3rd, 1973. Well Marty doesn't like those newfangled handsets. In fact, according to our sterling Mr. Cooper, "Our future I think is a number of specialist devices that focus on one thing that will improve our lives." Words uttered this week during a conference in Madrid. Imagine it: a future where we carry a portable radio, film camera, wind-up watch, Kaypro luggable computer, HP calculator, and Atari handheld... oh wait, that was the eighties.
posted Nov 6th 2009 3:37AM
Does he own stock in Peek?
It's always fun to see overt age discrimination/mockery is alive and well on Engadget.
What he most probably meant was: Cellphones have become too complex ..for him ...
No, but his other cell phone is a Jitterbug.
i bet Edison would say the same thing about his cell phone. buttons? that's far too complicated!
If its to complicated, you're too old!
"Moooooooommmmm, Grandpa's into the cell phones again..."
He looks like Santa after Jenny Craig.
I really think we should boycott engadget until they regain some credibility. With their late night talk show appearances and mentions in Apple patents, they have really let it get to there head.
@Freakin Ijit - True that. Is it that hard to imagine that some people just want a phone that will just, you know, make calls? My job necessitates being on e-mail all the time, but for people like my parents, there's just no need for it in their day to day lives. Additionally, many people who live in small towns don't need the bells and whistles of a smartphone, they just need something they can call their SO on to see what to pick up at the grocery store.
He is being misquoted. He was implying that most modern cellphones are too complicated in the sense that it takes a new user a while to get anything about the device. He meant that calling someone meant you press the numbers and the dial button. Nowadays you have them hidden with sliders, buried with qwerty keyboards, touchscreen technology etc... How is some moron who has never seen an inphone in their life going to dial something if they cant get the virtual keyboard to display?
He was also implying that phones are becoming like "one phone to rule them all". Meaning they keep adding features that are supposed to reduce the redundancy in life but don't actually do it that well.
You can call someone but battery life becomes a problem in the day because the phone caters to other things, You have mp3 capabilities but not as good as an iPod etc... You can take pictures but they are nowhere as fast or as good as standalone cameras, you have internet browsing but it doesn't compare with a computer, etc.
Also, show the man respect. What have most of you done in your life that you can thumb your noses down at him? Thumbs down to engadget writers for misquoting the poor man.
Before the heavy Apple lovers here at engadget chew me alive, I meant iphone. I wish there was an edit button on engadget.
'inphone' is a pretty awesome Freudian slip.
My god, the snark in this post is just overwhelming. The guy INVENTED the cell phone. Without him, you guys would only post half the stuff you do.
That doesn't make his comments any less ridiculous.
While that is true, its bordering on, like, disrespectful.
No, without him, someone else would have invented it
Snark attack! Everyone out of the water!
@ agentstarke
Yeah, eventually but at a later date. If he didnt invent it when he did Id be stuck here right now with a Nokia 5190 thinking its the shit.
Those were the days...
Far, FAR less than half, Sasuke.
“Whenever you create a universal device that does all things for all people, it does not do any things well,”
Far different from "smartphones are crap".
I understand this is a blog and you guys try to do this with humor, but you still need to be careful of putting words in others mouths.
THIS is what I mean by engadget could suffer a bit more journalistic quality.
Still, it got me to click a link, and that's what it's all about, no?
@ Trey
Mmm...good point
what's ridiculous? that specialized devices do jobs better than convergence devices?
when there's no longer any growth left in convergence devices, some marketing/design genius is going to start the next "revolution" with a "simple" device.
since era worship always seems to always go back 2 decades, expect it to become fashionable in a few years to wear several electronic devices in fake leather cases of one's belt while playing 32-bit platform games on your wrist emulator.
cWj:
Exactly.
Mobile phones these days are quickly becoming Jack-of-all-trades, masters-of-none.
Think about it: A decent (but not great) camera, Acceptable (but not outstanding) web browser, Basic (but not very useful) GPS, Not bad (but not good) MP3 Player. Etc. etc.
I still carry my iPod around with me, because I want to listen to music in decent quality, without having to worry about special headphones if I want to make a phone call. I also carry around a Digital camera, because I want to take photos that can be blown up to a decent size without losing quality. I (usually) carry around a laptop, because I want to type out emails and homework, and browse the web, without having to worry about eyestrain and thumb-carpal-tunnel.
I still HAVE a pretty divergent phone (a G1), but nothing beats a dedicated device.
sorry, I meant to say 'Convergent', not 'divergent'
Hei this is Engadget, what did you expect? They have this need to sound superior to others even if they never achieved anything else in their life expect to cash that monthly cheque.
Come on, the guy didn't invent the cell phone. He might have invented the hand held cell phone, but we had cell phones in Sweden in back '56.
Yeah, somebody else would have invented it. But they didn't. He did. Respect.
Convergence isn't always a good thing:
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/tools/8b97/
If invented means the lead engineer that mostly just oks other people work(An entire team) but gets to put his name on everything because he has a fancier title in the company and the first to demo it in public/press... than ya this guy invented mobile cell phones. >_>
> If invented means...
Ah, so THAT'S what Jon Rubinstein did with the iPod!
The average home computer has in many ways achieved this convergence of technologies as you say. Perhaps if the average cellphone attained some sort modular upgrade capability where components that fit the needs of the consumer were interchangeable with the cheap junk commonly integrated in todays cellphones, perhaps convergence can be achieved in this area as well.
It's the Miner-49-er
Miyamoto is a king among game developers, but he hasnt made a sane statement in over 10 years.
Respect only carries so far
He sounds like my sister. She always has to say something negative whenever a commercial for a cell phone comes on.
Your sister sounds hot. Tell us more
Sounds like he's in the market for a twitterpeek.
maybe he is now in the business of utility belt?
I keep getting this chain email in which the cellphone and voicemail are described as having been invented in Israel.
and I keep getting emails from Nigeria describing the millions of dollars that are invented there
bow to the jedi phone master...lets all go smoke some weed and wear our cool tyedie engadget shirts.....puts a new meaning to words "can you hear me now?"
Rock N Roll IS too loud, the colour red is too bright, and kiwifruit is too redundant.
Yeah, but I can't push my cell phone volume low enough to make it comfortable to listen to my conversations...I can't imagine anyone turning the volume on high.
Haha, kiwi... fruit... I see what you did there.
our future cell phones will require us to download patches on day 0.... :(
If they're from Palm.
SteveB says : "Wrong dude. Our future patches will make you want to download new phones, on day 0".
Awwww, look at the little puppies.
I agree
Well excuse us for being able to surf the internet, keep up with Engadget on the go, watch movies, listen to music, check our Email, play video games, Twitter, etc...etc.... Oh, and make phone calls as well on our iPhones, Droids, HTC Touch Pros etc. Yeah, LIFE SUCKS!!!!!!!!!! :-)
@torontodirk:
I did all of that with some tethering yesterday and my HTC Diamond battery lasted 2 hours :(
Batteries SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!
In defense of Dr. Cooper, although I cannot prove it (I was not at the conference) I am convinced he is being misquoted. He may well be referring to the fact most phones are too fiddly for the elderly and/or those with poor eye sight. And he is right. And he has already done something about it. Google 'Jitterbug'.
a) Every device uses a different operating paradigm to others (consider Android - every phone has it's own UI!), so the minute you switch devices, you have to learn all over. And if we can leave being rude to them aside, people in their prime of life find it harder to re-learn any process. Consider your own relatives.
b) Performing even basic functions on most phones requires several steps and the only reason young people manage is because they learn the process out of pure desperate need to communicate. (Sending a text message from a Samsung used to be a multistep nightmare! It's taken them years to simplify the process.) Wait until you're 40+ and you'll find learning hard - your brain will be occupied with all the 'baggage' of life, just as one collects more physical stuff with age. But you'll be wiser. :)
c) The VCR is an example of how complex tech put people off. The VCR did not succeed because it allowed us to record TV programs, it succeeded because of the rental market. 1. Insert cassette. 2. Hit PLAY. 3. Watch! On the other hand, could you change the clock from a flashing 12:00 in order to use the machine to record a program? If so, you were in the minority. And the DVR was born.
d) Now, with regards to all in one devices, with the exception of the Pre, Dr. Cooper is correct here too. They do not yet tightly integrate the experience or offer the instantaneous ease of use of separate devices. Phone camera shutter releases are often tiny little buttons with little tactile feedback, and then, the shutter release is 3 or 4 times slower to activate than a stand alone camera. This makes 'Kodak' moments difficult to capture - such as Grand kids looking cute. Music players and radios are often burried in a layer of icons or folders. (The Sony Ericsson K800i - best phone ever made? - has a PLAY button hidden on the top left - something few probably notice, but it is very useful for starting the radio or music player. Only downside is the button is a bit small, but it makes a difference. These little things count!) Apple dealt nicely with this issue on the iPhone/iPod Touch by upgrading the OS such that double clicking the (only) button brings up a mini playback control. BACK - PLAY/PAUSE - NEXT. Next issue for them to tackle is the camera.
The idea that old people have a hard time learning is a fallacy. They either don't have as much experience with the technology, or they've gotten used to telling young people to fix it for them.
While many of your points are valid, the truth is that most people will either give up in 30 seconds or pay loads of money to have problems fixed. That's how apple makes a lot of their money, hence the "debuttonization" and "de-menu-ization" of their products.
Get off my lawn!!!!
Well, in his defense, I think iPhone and N-Gage have proved that gaming on a cell-phone is crap and there's still a market for dedicated handhelds like DS and PSP. I also still carry a Canon instead if using my crappy iPhone camera and still use a video-camera on holidays. And for surfing the web I prefer a laptop above any cellphone.
I think that now has come the time to make phones smaller again instead of putting in more features. Personally, I never asked for a camera on my phone. I really loved the small size of my Nokia 8210, and that was 10 years ago!
Ah, the 8210, lovely and small - and you could use the infra red to tether to a PowerBook! That was when Orange (UK) offered:
1. Replacement insurance on every phone (I went through about six 8210s). A guy on a motorbike would turnup with a box and a new phone. Simply gave him the old one.
2. No knobling of the OS to make tethering harder.
Ah, way back then...
2001 to be exact.
:)
When I was young I had a dream to make computers as easy to use as a telephone.
My dream has come true, now I can't work out how to use my telephone.
Can't remember who said that its true though.
Way to act like snarky condescending dickheads again, Engadget. Did your egos get in the way from seeing the difference between "smartphones could be simpler to use" and "a phone should just be for calling people" or what?
I agree with most previous comments made regarding using specific devices for specific functions. i.e. I too prefer using my Sony Cybershot for taking pictures, my PSP and DS for portable gaming and even using my Zune for music on the go. But I have to admit, it's much easier to just use my iPhone for all of these functions when I'm just in transit traveling on a daily basis. Just seems to be less hassle than carrying around a half dozen devices everyday.
Love the tie! That alone is an act of heroism.
"portable radio, film camera, wind-up watch.... 80s"?!? 1880's?
Yeah; i also find endgadgets posting is far to sarcastic here.
We all like sarcasm about Microsoft or Apple or Sony because sometimes the sarcastic way is the only way left to deal with all their insane, comon sense ignoring "enrichments" to or our daily life.
But in this case it's more like "Hey, we are endgadget, we have got the ultimate knowledge of the future and whatever Mr. Cooper says is wrong/stupid/funny".
I mean - hey, the guy invented the cell phone, he has achieved great things and great things are usually done by people that think different or have got different opinions which usually are not shared by common people. And if he does share his opinion with us then I tend to believe him more than someone that has not achieved so much already.
I may be old fashioned for my young age, but I still prefer a standalone photo camera or a mp3 player or my tomtom or my netbook over my "can-do-all" prada II.
What I want to say is - after integration always follows a time of separation and specialication, so there is some real point in what Mr. Cooper said.
We seem to prefer the all-in-one solutions nowadays, but as many have said before - all-in-one is like nothing-whole-at-all and I think we may very well going to want the whole cake again soon in the upcoming years and not only tiny pieces of every taste fixed together.
And last but not least, we have to respect the opinions of others, even if we don't like it at all, especially if it is an online opinion which is read by thousands of readers. And if we know (or thing to know) that an opinion is 'stupid' then it should be a matter of our own personal magnitude to still respect it and honor it.
i have one of those relics. they hold water pretty well.
My next device will be a pocket full of universal nanotech assemblers.
I agree.
zach bell called..said he wanted his phone back damit!
That's no phone, its a urinal for midgets.
I do agree with him. I have a Sony Ericsson Cybershot mobile phone but I still prefer to use my Canon camera to take good quality pictures.
Oh my god!!!!!
I still use my F3 film camera, I wear a Omega wind up watch, and I use my HP 12C RPN calculator everyday.
What does this all mean? :-(
Anybody who thinks a "convergent device" has replaced the need for a stand-alone calculator obviously has lost touch with their quantitavtive/engineering/scientific roots.
Yes, you could perform complex calculations using mathematica (mathcad), or load a scientific calculator into my PDA/smartphone. But a calculator with dedicated tactile-response keys allows me to do those type of calculations about 10x faster. So I carry a calculator in my briefcase in addition to a smartphone.
I will race you if you don't believe it.
And when I go someplace with my kids, I carry a digitial camera. It is almost impossible to image small children as anything other then a blur with the smartphone camera... even now that you can get them with autofocus.
And a dedicated mp3 player is much more convenient in the car... using my almost buttonless smartphone to listen to audible.com books is a recipe for a car crash... dedicated tactile rew/ff/fast speed buttons make it much easier to manage the device's library without having to even look at the device.
GPS on a smartphone for driving directions? uh huh. Enough said.
The man is a genius. And those who mock him are deluding themselves. A convergent device can everything... just not do a very good job of it.
That's the iPhone 4G prototype, with a keyboard !
LOLOLOLOLOLOL !!!!!!!!!
yea hes bringin it back... not really. i still wanna use it in public and see what people would say, id love to rock that, if i can get a hold of one:-/
Some day all of you will be old.
Some day, all of you will be going to bed at 8:00 PM on a Saturday night, and when you read engadget, you won't get the jokes. Leave this poor man, Dr. Cooper alone! We, at my institute have decided to hire him for the Linus Pauling Chair for Advanced Research. GPS is part of the world wide scam to fool you into not realzing that the Earth IS flat.
Make them voice activated that WORKS and then you'll have something.
Mad Men reference noted. Nice work.
Consider this:
In this day and age, when making a cell phone, the very last thing they look at are:
1) Reception
2) Call quality
3) Sound quality
4) Any sort of quality relating to actually using it as a phone.
So, yes, this guy is right.
It's also amazing how my cell bill has increased steadily in the last 7 years, yet I have no real increase in service area, text messages or minutes. If anything, I'm paying more now for less of everything. I don't included data in this, since it's a separate cost, though required for my phone..
totally agree
Snark doesn't automatically equal wit. What have you invented, Thomas Ricker?
no kidding.
Where is the button that we push to inform the "editors" that the article (instead of the comment) is offensive?
Its almost certain he is wrong. its like ken thompson(unix creator) who said linux would fail bcos too much code is written by incompetent developers during late 90's.
Future is going towards convergence. I can see voice based input taking over once the software is smart enough to understand all the accents.
But a convergent device is one big compromise. We could potentially have a dedicated phone with 30 hours talk time and weeks of standby time. Instead we are living with convergent phones with few hours of talk time and require daily recharge. Also all cellphone cameras suck compared to $100 digital camera. cellphone browsing will not match laptop browsing in near future. I expect 90% of cars to have built in GPS in 5 years.
Instead of:
Or so says octogenarian, Martin Cooper, former lead engineer at Motorola said to have invented the handheld cellphone
Try:
Or so says octogenarian Martin Cooper, former lead engineer at Motorola, said to have invented the handheld cellphone
Even that's imperfect because you're chaining an essential subordinate clause on the end of a nonessential subordinate clause.
Is it me or does his tie look dirty?
>Mobile phones these days are quickly becoming Jack-of-all-trades, masters-of-none.
>Think about it: A decent (but not great) camera, Acceptable (but not outstanding) web browser, Basic (but not very useful) GPS, Not bad (but not good) MP3 Player. Etc. etc.
I don't buy it. Those cameras and GPS programs will only improve (as we've seen with Android's Google Maps navigation, which has many features that standalone GPS devices don't). And I believe the iPhone is already a better music player than any standalone MP3 player. It can do all the usual things a music player can do, but it can also identifiy music playing around me, allow me to purchase music whereever I am, play streaming radio stations from around the world, etc. And my iPhone is loaded with apps that allow me to do things quicker than I could any other way. If I want the weather forecast, or information on what movies are playing in town, I never reach for a newspaper or laptop, because I can get that information in seconds on my iPhone. So Mr. Cooper is simply wrong when he says "Whenever you create a universal device that does all things for all people, it does not do any things well."
And I believe he's wrong when he says "Our future I think is a number of specialist devices that focus on one thing that will improve our lives. On a day by day basis my cel phone has replaced my address book, watch, check register, calendar, maps, notepad, calculator, radio/music player, netbook, portable game machine, and more, while at the same time allowing me to do many new things easily and quickly. And smartphones aren't just getting more powerful- they're getting easier to use. I'm not saying they're on the verge of becoming universal, but they certainly do many things well.
Agree. I have respect for this guy for what he's done, but calling the easiest-to-use smartphone (the iPhone) "too complicated" just makes no sense. The whole purpose of smartphones is to have diverse functionality. If one wants a simpler device, they can get a dumbphone or a niche device like Twitter Peek or Jitterbug.
Honestly, I think in the future, we'll be carrying around one or two devices that do everything. The main reason that we still have other dedicated devices is because those devices keep improving. The iPhone is 3MP, and probably takes better pictures than my first digital camera, but my new camera is 8MP. The browser on my iPhone is much more advanced than when I was cruising around the net on Netscape 4, but I still use my computer for the Internet because it can handle Flash. Lots of GPS navigation devices are better than using the maps on the iPhone, but I find places easier and get there faster than when I was using paper maps. When mobile devices' extra features are only marginally worse than their standalone counterparts (i.e. when my iPhone gets flash) I think we'll see a drop in the use of those standalone devices (i.e. non-professional-caliber cameras will no longer exist).
Old people....
Even the ones that personally changed the world can't grasp the concept that it continues to change despite them.
How to be smart in the 1970's: Go to graduate school, learn all you can about electronics and computers. Work for a company like Motorola and create something that has a profound effect on our everyday lives.
How to be smart in the 2000's: Buy the latest trendy gadget or computer, and pretend that you are smart enough to have invented it, even though you don't really have the slightest idea how any of this stuff really works.
Too true, how would we comment on Engadget if it wasn't for Al Gore?
What is this "cell phone" you speak of? I can make phone calls without wires?
I kind of agree with him.
If we'd kept them simple, and a bit bigger, we wouldn't see record numbers of people having fatal auto accidents because they're fracking around with their cell phone in the car. We wouldn't have droves of teenagers gabbing about nothing in particular while walking around in public. We wouldn't have a gajillion bad cell phone advertisements on the television at all hours of the day.
If we'd stuck with the cell phone as a niche product, I think the world might actually be a bit nicer.
It is a good thing he didn't invent the wheel or he would be pushing 18 inch polished stone to Ferrari!
You're my boy, Blue!
+++
fuck I knew someone would have said it first
The cell phone as we think of it was updated from earlier two way radio devices by his team. He didn't really invent the cell phone. They just miniaturized the tech and bought out patents filed by others for full duplex radio communication.
A cell phone is nothing more than an advanced two way radio. They were in effect using cell phones in WWII. Of course these were backpack radios and not something you could hold in one hand. By Vietnam there were large handheld two way radios. These used two different radio frequencies, one to send and one to receive.
The patent for what would become the modern cell phone was filed in the 1960s. The patent this guy is on is an extended filing modifying parts of the original patent.
You're my boy blue!
Guess I'll need to buy a man purse, a fanny pack, and cargo pants before prices go up.
Everything is complicated at that age.
"...our sterling Mr. Cooper..."?
Please tell me you watch Mad Men and did that on purpose?
I agree with Cooper. Cell phones have entirely too much crap on them, and most of what people 'value' in a phone is actually valueless. Playing games? Listening to Music? Browsing the internet? These are techie 'feel good' moments that are pushing the user's buttons more than anything else. They don't add to the joy of life and tend to distance people from those around them in any given situation.
People should not wonder why social America has disintegrated and they don't know their neighbors names anymore. If you're too busy fiddling with your phone instead of chatting casually with the person next to you in line, or on a bus or train or whatever, you're destroying the smallest of threads that bind us together and make us more collectively secure and friendly.
No number of cell phone photos on flicker or youtube videos of meaningless drivel can make up for that loss.
My original reply went God knows where so I'll try it again...
Apple MP3 players (all of them) are firmly middle of the road in terms of sound quality. Your iPhone is not better than a standalone, multiple features do not equal quality. I think that's his point, all of the additional features distract from the core functionality. Everyone talks about apps but what about the call quality? It is,at it's core, a phone and an average one at that.
"On a day by day basis my cel phone has replaced my address book, watch, check register, calendar, maps, notepad, calculator, "
And all on one non-swappable battery. Stay near a power source. One day in the not too distant future every iPhone, Droid and Blackberry in the world today will be in a landfill and my Seiko watch will still be keeping accurate time. It was a onetime, relatively inexpensive, purchase that will outlast me and any smartphone I will ever own. There's something to be said for quality and simplicity.