It’s Called A “Mobile” Phone

By Daniel Miessler on April 3rd, 2006: Tagged as Culture | Language

Yes, I think it’s time. As of today, don’t call it a cell phone anymore.

First off, “mobile phone” just sounds cooler than “cell phone“. When I hear “cell” phone I think brick. Brick as in “need a backpack to help you carry it”. Brick as in “can be used as a weapon”. Etc.

Hell, just look at the difference in the pictues pulled up via the two links above. One has supermodels on it (mobile), and the other has lame cartoons (cell).

supermodels > lame cartoons

Plus, the Europeans are already calling it a mobile phone, and everyone knows cool people want to be more like the Europeans.

Anyway, point made — it’s a mobile phone, not a cell phone (if you want to be cool).

View Comments

brad

or maybe...."handimobicell".
you, know, cover all of the bases. If not that, "mobile" OR "phone", but NOT BOTH.

dylan

What about "mobicell"?

Zhasper

here in .au, it's always been "mobile"
Not sure what you mean about europeans though - for instance, in Germany, they call it a "handi" (short for handtelefon - lets not start on what mental images that conjures up).

In .au though, everyone does know if you're giving them a mobile or landline number - all our mobiles are in the 04 area code, with the next two digits indicating (approximately) your carrier (I say approximately, as we've had MNP for years now, so although my prefix indicates I'm with Telstra, I've actually been with Vodafone for over a year)

Tim

Also, I'm with Dennis. If the French do it, I'm against it.

Tim

Bah. I'm going with the ideology behind one of Jason's recent blog posts. A quote:

"I don't necessarily think it'd be a great idea to expose all the 'guts' of these things, but I think the mechanics of how something is achieved can be aesthetically appealing."

I think the term "cell" somewhat exposes the mechanics behind how the device works.

Maybe I'm stretching a bit, but I still think the term "cell" is cooler (despite the fact that supermodels don't think so). I've always called it a cell phone, and it trips me up to no end that the voice recognition software on my phone uses "mobile" and not "cell".

Just my $0.02

Dennis

If the French do it, I'm against it.

Daniel

I was waiting for you to show up, Jason. :)

I agree that "phone" would be good enough for most, but I think if we're going to call this thing by a single name it should probably be "mobile". Again, that's what the Europeans do.

"Hit me up on my mobile.", they say. Or maybe I made that up.

Kapil Verma

Yes i agree with him..

Carl M

Wait .. so we're not calling it a car phone any more?

Jason Powell

Actually, I propose calling it a "phone." It's rare that anyone needs to know whether it's your home phone or mobile--I'm still considering dropping the pretense altogether along with my land-line.

Jason Powell

When I hear "cell," I think small, as in "single cell organism." When I hear mobile, I think of trailer homes with a slightly more ambiguous title. When I hear europeans say "mobile," it sounds like "mo' bile," like the stuff that comes from your liver.

When I see that Google says supermodels like mobile better, I can hear me saying it, too. :D

It’s Called A “Mobile” Phone

By Daniel Miessler on April 3rd, 2006: Tagged as Culture | Language

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