M&T: How Cell Phones Work

Communication is the key to the world, cell phones have redirected the way we communicate daily with one another. We are allured by the types of cell phones manufacturers put out. Some cell phones provide key features that others don’t. What most of it’s consumers don’t know is that the cell phone is just another type of radio. Though of course, it is merely complex, but it is still a radio. Cellphones have definitely improved within the past 30 years, not only in models, but in signal, weight, and design of the phone. It is amazing how technology redefined cell phones.

In the 1950’s cell phones were used in cars, though these mobile radio phones were as common as cruise control. It was practicallly like driving around with the phone in one’s ear. In select urban areas, there were large, central antennas that were specifically allocated for these radio-phones. Each car that had a radio-phone required a big antenna that could transmit at least 40 or 50 miles.

“About 25 people could be talking on their radio phones at the time, only 25 people didn’t have cars in big areas such as NY, there were more. The solution to this problem was to divide each city up into small divisions, or “cells”. The technology behind cells have changed dramatically over the years, just as cell phones have, but now most standard cells are about 10 square miles large. They are usually in the shape of a hexagon.  Now cell phones are made to be low-power transmitters, which is much lower wattage than in past decades. This means that the same frequency can be used in the same city, at the same time, but in different cells. The cell phone transmitting towers don’t spill their transmissions that far out of their own cells. They may spill slightly into the most adjacent cells, but not into cells more than one cell away. Usually each separate carrier, (Verizon, AT&T, Cingular, etc) have their own control office in each major urban area called the Mobile Telephone Switching Office (MTSO). This is where they control their respective towers. This office also connects all of the cell-phone calls to the land-line phones”.

Dr. Martin Cooper, is known as the inventor of cellphones, his idea was for people to be able to carry their phones with them anywhere. Though the first cellphone came in weighing in at 2.5 lbs and measured 9x5x1.75 inches. It’s features were pretty basic, you talk, you dial, and you listen. That was then, now cell phone models weigh in at 200-800 grams, and it is convenient because now cell phones can fit in your pocket, in a secure spot. Signal isn’t that much of a problem anymore because frankly there is signal wherever you go. Cell phones have become a way of life, and it doesn’t stop there, it is actually intriguing that now there is practically applications for whatever you can think of. 

The cell phone Dr. Cooper used ran off of 1G (First Generation), and in the 1990’s 2G (Second Generation) was introduced fast phone to network signaling. Modern day phones now run off of 3G network which can also be referred to as 3rd generation; and which was revealed in 2001. 3G practically is the fastest up to date service which includes wide-area wireless voice telephone, video calls, and wireless data, all in a mobile environment. Compared to 1G and 2G services, 3G allows simultaneous use of speech and data services and higher data rates. Thus, 3G networks enable network operators to offer users a wider range of more advanced services while achieving greater network capacity. It allows and supports a ton of applications. These applications under 3G include mobile tv, video conferencing, location based services; for ex. weather updates, GPS, traffic view. The technology will increase, and it will be even easier to utilize a phone. As the years go by 4G will play into effect in a few years to come.

Now a days cell phones are touch screen, and some instill replicas of computer keyboards. This is the turn around towards communication. Text Messaging also known as SMS which is short for Small Message Service. The advantage of text messaging made possible new forms of interaction which were not possible before. A person may now carry out a conversation without directly being on the phone all the time. Personally texting is much better than a phone call in my opinion, sometimes the person doesn’t feel like talking on the phone and you may forget what you had planned to tell them. Texting is on the go, its simple, and easy. Texting has provided a venue for participatory culture, allowing viewers to vote in online and TV polls, as well as receive information on the move. It only gets better, radio stations have a number you can text too, shows, the advertisement is incredible. It has also had an effect on language, which phones now a days come with practically every letter known to mankind.

Cell  phones have become a on the go computer, it has media player, notepads, an address book, email, internet. It’s a personal organizer. It has a deep effect on music, a simple jingle on a 2g phone turned into a 15-25 sec clip of an actual song by popular artists. Ringtones have become extremely popular with urban youth. Instead of hearing the actual ringing sound when you call someone you can listen to music, if set correctly. Cell phones are self explanatory, it’s a toy for some, and a way of life for others. Imagine a world without a cell phone, it’s surreal. The competition is bizarre, manufactures make phones that will be useful for anything you can think of; Absolutely anything!

Cellphones will be around for a long time, they will become more advance and us as the consumers will become more and more infatuated & intrigued with them as the years go on. I honestly cannot imagine life without cellphones, not now, nor in the future. What I do see happening is technology becoming so advanced that a cellphone will be able to do so much cool stuff such as perhaps project an image of the person u are talking or things like that; I can’t really tell what a cellphone’s capabilities will actually be a couple years from now but I can’t wait to see how advance it will become. What the future hold’s technology wise there is no telling, only thing that we could predict is that it would be even greater than what we are using today and that includes other items not just technology.

WORKS CITED

How a Cellphone Works; http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/fall04/keith/Works.htm

How a Cellphone Works; http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/cell-phone.htm

Mobile Phone; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phones

complete essay will be posted by tomorrow afternoon!

hey guys sorry i haven’t posted up my full assignments for my technology, I just have a couple things going on that’s making that even harder for me to do; so I’m going to have all of my essay which are 3 more that i have to do up by tomorrow afternoon.

Content & Examination Essay-Cell Phone’s

Melissa Veloz

Professor: Pirone

Content & Examination Essay

When there’s a new technology that becomes available to the public there’s always some type of issues that arise. Whether it be with the law, generation conflicts, and/or even addiction to the technology; with that being said I think that my technology that I chose definitely has all these issues. Cell Phone’s are something that were once good for emergencies and have become some ordinary technologies that are a must to keep up with the generation as well as social networking.

One of the main issues that I personally have with the Cell Phone is that it is slowly but surely driving us more and more away from personal interaction with others and it as if we’re not texting we’re doing something else on our cell phone, they have so many features from social networking apps, to email synchronization and even more that it’s as almost as if we’re too dependent on this one handheld item. I find this to be a problem not only because we’re constantly on our cell phone’s but because it has come to the point where we don’t realize the true significance of the cell phone and it’s main purpose without thinking about what if one day cell phone’s were no longer capable of working, we all would not know how to react and some including myself might even strongly believe that their life is over with out this hand held device.

With how addicting cell phone use has become, it really has been even more dangerous to be addicted to while driving. New Jersey along with Washington, NY, Oregon, D.C, CT, Virgin Islands & California has been the only few states which has created a law that bans the use of hand held cell phone use while driving; other states such as Utah & Illinois have exceptions for which the use of hand held devices is allowed. There has also been some states which have even made laws to ban texting while driving which to me makes a lot more sense and I really think all states should really have this as a law as well (although I must admit, I catch myself doing it from time to time). Texting while driving is very dangerous and could even cause deaths as well as those who are talking on hand held cell phones because their concentration on the road becomes more than impaired; so for me as well as many others this is a big problem that cell phone’s do not create themselves but are created by there users.

 

Technological Examination Essay

As a person who is a frequent cell phone user or as many may call a cell phone addict, I have to say the cell phone along with the computer & internet is one of the greatest technologies ever made to this date; there has been a lot of other technologies that helped lead us to the solid use of the cell phone such as beepers and even 2way’s devices but once the cell phone became as advanced as it is today, there really has not been a need of the use of those items since the cell phone’s capabilities took over and allows us to do what those devices were meant for as well as so much more.

Other technologies that have been around for sometime such as the computer and internet have also had a huge impact in how we function in today’s world but I would have to say I think the cell phone has definitely took place as the number one used technology since we can carry it around and after years of transforming itself it has become a lighter device with numerous amount of uses which both computers and the internet provides as well. There has also been many computer programs such as oovoo (web cam chat program), yahoo/msn/google instant messaging which has allowed people to talk in real time but I honestly cannot see these free programs taking the cell phone’s device; unless of course something happens in which we are no longer able to use cell phones.

Although, Cell phones provide us with the convenience of being able to talk almost where ever and when ever we want (depending on the amount of service bars your company provides of course!) I do remember as a younger teen hearing things on the news about health hazards to the brain that could be cause from extreme cell phone use, which for me was scary to hear as a younger teen/pre-teen, but now I rarely watch the news so I have not heard much about the effects of cell phone usage still being risky or not. I also read somewhere while doing research that there is still many more studies that need to be done to see how the use of cell phone’s can effect us and even children but  just knowing that there may be a risk due to exposure of the cell phone’s radio frequency effecting us is something that should concern everyone (including myself) and definitely be more talked about since it is one of the most used technology devices used to this date.

Some of the tradeoffs for this device I would have to say are trading personal (face to face) interaction, possible health hazards, and paying to use the device many times is very costly which can hurt our pockets during hard economic crisis such as the one which has been occurring since, I believe mid- 2008. Although, some of these trade-offs may not seem as extreme for the exchange of the use of these devices which many people have become so attached to if you really sit down and think about it you may whined up changing your opinion. As for the limitations of cellphone usage I have already mentioned the use of the device while driving, but another limitation which can annoy both students who own the device as well as teacher’s who are teaching a class, is the use of cell phones during class; many middle schools and high schools have banned cell phone’s from being used at all during school hours.

What I really enjoy about this technology and I’m sure many others do as well is that is has evolved into something that we can turn to in times of boredom, emergancy, work, etc.. I consider my cell phone to be my personal assistant; I recieve all my emails directly to my phone, I have a planner which is very helpful for both work and school assignments, you can also search on the internet, stay in touch with friends via txt, messaging app, or even a phone call, and there are even games on it to pass time on when you have nothing else to do.

 

Works Cited

State Cell phone driving laws, GHSA; http://www.ghsa.org/html/stateinfo/laws/cellphone_laws.html

Car Accidents Caused by Cell phone use, Nolo 2009; http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/article-30055.html

Brain Damage From Cell Phones; http://www.rfsafe.com/articles/brain_damage.htm

Cell Phone Radiation Levels; http://www.rfsafe.com/sars.htm

M&T: History of the cellphone

Cellphones have definitely become one of the biggest forms of technology to have emerged and become more advanced as the years continued to pass by. I myself, could not see my self without my cellphone as well as no cellphones in general; I find myself freaking out if I was to leave my cellphone at home because it’s my personal assistant, entertainment gadget, contact device and even more importantly could be used in case of emergencies. A lot of my group members as well as close friends/family members also feel the same way I do when it comes to cellphones in general, so this leads me to believe many other people out there feel the same way. This leads me to question what if cellphones were never invented? what would happen if for some reason we can no longer be able to use them? and last but not least how was life before the cellphone was an actually product that could be sold and used by consumers (for those that remember)?

Being that the history of any product, company, brand or anything in general is best viewed by a timeline I decided to use the one that I found on a website that provided this information in just that format. 

The Cell Phone Timelinee 

 In “1843, Micheal Faraday a chemist began to do research on the possibility that space can conduct electricity. His research starts the wheels turning for many other 19th century scientists. At the time, many of them were referred to as “crackpots”.” This was way before my time and most of the research I’ve done did not mention a lot of the information that will be listed in timeline order for the history of a cellphone, with that being said in “1865 A Virginia Dentist/Scientist, Dr. Mahlon Loomis, had developed a method of communicating through the earth’s atmosphere by using an electrical conductor. He did this by flying two kites, that were rigged with copper screens and wires, which were connected to the ground on two separate mountains about 18 miles apart. He later received a grant from the U.S. Congress for $50,000.” This for me was pretty interesting, I never really thought about the use of kites in this way; growing up I never learned about kites being used for a method of communicating, instead as a young child (already in school) I learned that kites were just for fun. Although in “1866 The first trans-Atlantic telegraph is built” and really does not have much impact on the history of cellphone’s, I still decided to add this in because it was a major advancement in communication, especially for that generation since the only way to communicate before was in person or via mail (which could take weeks to receive and send out) which I could not possibly ever imagine doing especially in this day in age. Fast forwarding about a good fifty-five years to “1921 The Police Department in Detroit, Mich. begins installing mobile radios, operating around 2 MHz, in their squad cars. They encounter many problems such as overcrowding on the channels and terrible interference”. 12 years later, “1934-1940’s The U.S. Congress creates the Federal Communications Commission. They decide who gets to use certain radio frequencies. Although, most channels are reserved for emergency use and for the government. the mobile radios are able to operate at 30 to 40 MHz and become much more common between police departments, and the wealthy. Several private companies and organizations begin using these same radios for personal gain. In 1945 The first mobile-radio-telephone service is established in St. Louis, Miss. The system is comprised of six channels that add up to 150 MHz”. This “walkie-talkie” device was approved by the FCC, but there were lots of issues that this device had. Now here is where At&t comes into play, and which is one of the many reasons why I chose to write a bio on them along with Motorola, and Dr. Martin Cooper instead of writing about another actual person who impacted my chosen technology in a huge way”. 1947 AT&T comes out with the first radio-car-phones that can be used only on the highway between New York and Boston; they are known as push-to-talk phones. The system operatated at frequencies of about 35 to 44 MHz, but once again there is a massive amount of interference in the system”, just like the “walkie-talkies” had. Although, AT&T declares this project a failure it is still important to recognize the effort in trying to create car-phones which in a sense were “mobile phones” just as long as it was being used inside the car. A few years later after this mishap, “The FCC authorized the widespread use of many separate radio channels to other carriers. They were known as Radio Common Carriers (RCC) and are said to be the first link between mobile phones and the telephone. The RCC’s are the first step toward the cellular phone industry, which is were designed more for profit than for the general public”. Long after At&t’s “failure” to properly communicate using in car phones a new system was created in 1964 which allowed better communication as well as telephone-like capabilities. This was huge success for the RCC because they were finally beginning to be taken seriously by the FCC as competitor’s to phone companies with land-line systems. In “1970 Cell phone lobbyists finally win with the FCC and get a window of 75 MHz in the 800 MHz region, which allocated specifically for cell phones. The FCC realizes the potential of the industry and can’t ignore it any longer.” In “1971-1973 AT&T is the first company to propose a modern-day mobile-phone system to the FCC. It involves dividing cities into “cells”. Two years after At&t proposing this system to the FCC, Dr. Martin Cooper invented the first “Cellphone” while working for Motorola. This benefited Motorola because they became known as the first to invent the cellphone. Dr. Martin Cooper was so frantic to announce “the Motorola Dyna-Tac.”, that he headed to New York City and shows it to the public by calling his long time rival. In “1975, AT&T adapts its own cellular plan for the city of Chicago, but the FCC is still uneasy about putting the plan into action. They have concerns about its success”. From this point on things only began to look more optomistic for the cellular business as time went on. In “1977 Finally cell phone testing is permitted by the FCC in Chicago. The Bell Telephone Company gets the license; they are in a partnership with AT&T which is a general effort to battle the stubborn FCC. Eleven years later “The FCC makes firm rules about the growing cell phone industry in dealing with manufactures. It finally rules that Western Electric can manufacture products for both cellular and terminal use. After the FCC makes it’s decision on Cellular businesses/companies Seven years in 1988, One of the most important years in cell phone evolution. The Cellular Technology Industry Association is created and helps to make the industry into an empire. One of its biggest contributions is when it helped create TDMA phone technology, the most evolved cell phone yet. It becomes available to the public in 1991.

My personal first time learning about cellphones was around the 1990’s when my mother’s car had broken down on a highway and we were stuck there from about 6:30ish- 11pm. I remember my father was worried sick about us since we were not able to reach him to let him know what was going on, the next day my dad came home with this cool device called the cellphone and he mentioned that my mother needs it for emergencies even though my mother was very much hesitant to the use and cost of this device who at the time was a Motorola cellphone with services from At&t. For me, at that age, that was the first cellphone it was very bulky yet smaller than the previous ones that were made before the 1990’s which I found while doing research and while also doing the archeological dig. From that point on I was very intrigued by cellphones as well as how they evolved in size, style, color and service providers over the years. Today there’s well over five different cellphone carriers which offer (depending on the company/carrier) National & Regional coverage, Pre-paid services and other specialty plans. In addition to that, they provide so many different varieties in cellphones to meet just about anyone’s specific needs. The different cellphone types start from basic cellphone, camera phones, music/mp3 phone, video phone, smart phone, & pda phones; now day’s a lot of basic phones have some of the features that are listed above but mostly all smart phone’s have just about every type of feature on this list if not more.

I honestly believe the cellphone was one of the technology innovations that was received more than well by its consumers; it is here to stay but if for one day it were to be gone there would be cayos, it would be as though no one would know how to do things how they were done before the cellphone became this great use of technology which can be used in many ways and for many different reasons/needs. Although, many new cellphones that are created to perfect and advance the cellular technology even further, there are many times which the cellphone can perform slower, and tend to freeze more than usual because of all the added features to the cellphone. Of course like with any new technology there may be some glitches and a few things that may annoy consumers but I don’t think it would ever get to the point that one will consumers will let the cellphone trend fade away completely.

Works Cited

The cell phone timeline; http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/fall04/keith/history1.htm

History of the Cellphone; http://cellphones.org/cell-phone-history.html

Cellphone Service providers; http://www.phonedog.com/cell-phone-research/companies/default.aspx

Cell phone types, http://www.wirelessguide.org/types/index.php

 

Biography Essay-Martin Cooper (Cell Phone Inventor)/Motorola & AT&T

DR. MARTIN COOPER BIO:

Dr. Martin Cooper was born on Dec. 26, 1928, in chicago Illinois; without this day perhaps we would not one of the greatest forms of technology known to man which is also widely known as the cellphone. But before Dr. Martin Cooper  was even close to inventing anything he studying at the Illinois institute of engineering during the 1950’s, where he received both his master’s & Bachelor’s degree in electronic engineering. Something that I found to be very interesting while doing research on Dr. Cooper was that he in fact was in the military; he served four years in the navy working on the destroyers and the submarines and later he began to work for Motorola. He first began as a telecommunications employee, working on portable products including hand radios made for the Chicago Police Department in 1967, and later he began working on Motorola’s Cellular Research project and developed the 3lb.prototype from his base in Washington. It was later that Dr. Martin Cooper decided to head for NY to promote his technology with At & t, where he decided to test his cellular device by calling his rival Dr. Joe Engel, the Research Director at AT&T Bell’s Lab on April 13, 1973. This for me was so long ago and I remember as a younger child/teen not even hearing about cell phones up until I want to say the sixth-seventh grade; it was amazing to me back then when my mother first got one but i’m even more amazed each day with how great and extensive the use of a cellphone has become. For this Dr. Cooper should have known that he would become very well recognized/appreciated and with this new found technology though very bulky at the time came a new path towards how to better a cellphone to make it lighter, and as advance as it has become today!

http://www.helium.com/items/1235159-martin-cooper-mobile-phone-inventions-whartonmotorola-attwireless-technology-innovatators
http://www.martincooper.uk.com/html/biog.html

MOTOROLA BIO:

Motorola was created when two young men (Paul Galvan & Edward Stewart) found the first storage battery sometime in the early 1920’s, from there they became known for making car radio receivers (entertainment use) for those who drove cars sometime in the 1930’s, this helped Motorola extend their radio receivers products by creating the police cruiser radio receiver in 1936. Although this company had spread in product variety from radio car receivers to tv’s, car telephones; none of those products made the biggest impact like the first cellular system which was then followed by the creation of the cellphone (by Dr. Martin Cooper) throughout the early 1970’s. It seems as though a lot has changed from the first cellphone product they put out, cellphone’s have become over the years less bulky and built with much more capabilities than before. One of the people who had an extreme impact on the first cellphone was Dr. Martin Cooper, it was because he had worked with Motorola that Motorola had the advantage of becoming famous for the first cellphone and the majority of the ones which were sold to consumers much later on. I’m very appreciative of the cellphone and i’m sure many others are especially now that they are built with so many different capabilities such as email sync, where you can receive all your emails straight to your handheld device, there’s also text messaging which allows us to txt something really quick instead of having to call someone and talk to them just to get a message across, there are also numerous amounts of applications and social networking apps that help us stay connected with friends & family; for me my cellphone is not only my up most favorite gadget but sort of my own personal assistant and i’m happy that Motorola & Dr. Cooper have helped create such a device.

http://www.motorola.com/staticfiles/Business/Corporate/US-EN/history/timeline.html

http://www.motorola.com/staticfiles/Business/Corporate/US-EN/history/about-heritage-services.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola

AT&T BIO:

At&t was founded back in 1875, by Alexander Graham Bell, who created the first telephone. Later on At&t became the parent company of Bell System (an american monopoly). A couple years later it spilt up into eight different companies by agreement of both AT&T and the U.S. Department of Justice. In 1996 was when At&t became involved in telecommunications services. In today’s world At&t is one of the biggest networking systems which have now concentrated on  delivering IP-based solutions to enterprise and government consumers; At&t also provides consumers as well as business an option to voice over IP services. At&t now offers all forms of use for their products be it wireless and/or landlines and are even now promoting services for tv & internet as well as a part of the new at&t. At&t has many different competition but their main competitor for their wireless services is verizon wireless. At&t made a huge impact with the first cellphone  services along with Motorola & Dr. Martin Cooper; it’s amazing how many different cell phone companies are out there today but it’s even more amazing to realize how the use of cell phones & it’s services all began. 

http://www.corp.att.com/history/

http://www.corp.att.com/history/history1.html

http://www.corp.att.com/history/television/

http://www.corp.att.com/history/milestones.html

M & T: Techlab-Computers

My world is definitely better with computers I honestly cannot imagine living without them, computers, internet and cellphones are what I consider to be the best inventions of mankind. Honestly with computers you cut your workload by half if not more, with all the different softwares available there are endless possibilities of what it is you can actually do on computers. All I can imagine as i’m typing away is life without computers will def. be hard for companies, students, and even for those who use computers during their leisure time. We would have to actually write everything out and do everything by hand which would be very hard; we would also have no internet so all our research would be conducted through books and articles which would cost us more time wasted.

M&E Session 10: Media products and physical products

I’m going to use the example which you’ve provided about the difference between running a tire manufacturing company vs. running a film production company. I honestly think that the structures are the same each company has a ceo, cfo…manager etc so I would say that the business structures are the same but the technology as well as the Creativity that a film company is allowed to use is much more different. For the business side of thing for both companies you would need to create a business plan and obtain a business license as well as hire people, search for funding, and begin to network in order to make your company grow and become one that is well known as well as well liked. For a regular company most of them have the basic technologies like for instance computers, fax machines, copy machines and perhaps a little more than what I can come up with off of the top of my head; film companies on the other hand they would def. use more expensive technology such as video cameras, editing programs, computers, all types of different tech. gadgets so they would really need a bigger budget than a physical products company.