give me a bell

I just read somewhere (in the analogue world of ink and paper) that mobile phones have been going for around 20 years. "This calls for a montage", I thought, "or at least a few photoshopped pictures".

I expect there's already people who don't remember phones with dials, and the idea of remembering actual phone numbers is long since gone. I don't get all misty eyed though because the cellular world offers a lot of advantages with quick text messaging, conferencing, photography and video and I actually miss the text chat facility I had on my last mobile phone, which seems impossible to emulate in the world of Windows on my current one.
Of course, when phones only had to make phone calls, they were a lot simpler, and there's a special law that says whenever its something urgent the phone will throw a tantrum and demand a reboot, which seems to take about a minute. And the last two phones I've had both have qwerty keyboards instead of numbers, so I've got used to typing in part of someone's name now when I want to call them.

So I don't really reminisce for the days of early mobile with short battery life and a burning sensation around the ear after a long call. I'm still slightly suspicious of bluetooth operating on the same frequency as microwave ovens, but I suppose someone has proved that a bluetooth headset can't cook baked beans.

And of course with all the hilarious and imaginative ring-tones around, the old style "bring-bring" bell has also made a solid come-back.
UPDATE: I checked. The first cellphone was used in 1973 by Martin Cooper/Motorola and the first ones sold were 1984. So Gordon Gecko in Wall Street(1987) was cutting edge.