Your Future Cell Phone

Your Future Phone

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The Future of Cell Phones

Apple's 3G iPhone is earning plenty of plaudits for its canny features. But even in its upgraded form, the iPhone is still a seamlessly designed package of pre-existing services--not never-before-seen innovations.

And that means there's still hope for competitors to produce something even more disruptive--a phone that integrates science fictional tools like projecting screens, video chatting or even alternative energy sources ...

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Your Future Phone

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Video Chat

We've dreamed of two-way video conferencing ever since AT&T debuted its Picturephone at the 1964 World's Fair (and probably long before). But video calling is a bandwidth hog--and that means real-time chatting remains a dream for U.S. cellphone users for now. The advent of WiMax, a speedy fourth-generation (4G) wireless technology, should change this in the next few years.

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Your Future Phone

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Phone As Magic Wand

In the future, your phone may also be the device that ties together your other gadgets. Think of it as a remote control that can transfer files and activate or shut off other devices with a shake or swing of your arm.

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Your Future Phone

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Touch-Free Motion Sensors

For your phone to be a "magic wand," it needs to be able to detect motion. A handful of current phones from the iPhone to Sony Ericsson and Nokia models already do this.

So do phones powered by "shake, rock and roll" technology from a California firm called GestureTek. In the future, motion sensing won't even require you to touch your phone. Simply make the motions in the air; your phone's camera will read your commands. The best part? No fingerprints to wipe off later.

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Your Future Phone

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Mobile Payments

Cellphone manufacturers like to say that your phone is the object aside from your wallet that you're least likely to leave home without. So why not combine the two?

In fact, carriers Mobilkom in Austria and NTT Docomo in Japan already allow users to make small purchases by swiping their cellphone across a sensor. The technology has yet to catch on in the U.S., but credit card companies including Visa and MasterCard are experimenting with similar phone-based payment systems.

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Your Future Phone

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Video Projectors

One constraint on the utility of phones has been their tiny screens. The solution of companies including 3M, Texas Instruments and Redmond, Wash.-based Microvision is to install projectors into handsets.

Equipped with what these companies call "pico projectors," cellphones can expand their displays to fill the nearest white wall or desktop. Microvision's plans to sell pico projectors in 2009, while 3M may install them in Samsung phones as soon as late 2008.

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