Many years back, an American friend who was visiting London from New York remarked on the odd way in which people were walking around with blocks of plastic held to their ears. “Why don’t they just use normal phones?” she asked.
That was long ago, and it feels like a galaxy far, far away. My friend is rarely without her iPhone now, and the lead that the UK and Europe held over the US is history. These days, most of the innovations and advances in mobile communications come from Silicon Valley or from South Korea and China.
I can remember when the biggest struggle in mobile was between Vodafone and Nokia over which companies would control branding and content on data-enabled phones – operators or handset makers. The answer was neither.