From Water Bottles to Hand-held Video Games

Alvin Yu

If I ask you what is the characteristic of Hong Kong, you may say that Hong Kong is full of skyscrapers, people can be seen everywhere, and buildings can be seen even on high mountains. These are the impressions people from other countries have on Hong Kong. However, there is something that you may not know. Have you ever seen children using mobile phones in the street of Hong Kong? The mobile phone population in Hong Kong is overwhelming. According to a report, every one in six people in Hong Kong have a mobile phone. Even among Josephians mobile phones are not uncommon. Today, I shall be talking about some histories and recent developments of the popular mobile phones.

Have you seen the drama, "Genesis", on TVB? Did you notice that the people are using huge mobile phones? Those were the mobile phones in Hong Kong in the late 80s. Some of them even weighed over 600 grams. You may have brought something that looked like them to school when you were small, as drinking bottles! At that time, the phones were very expensive, ranging from about $10,000 to $20,000 each. The monthly service charge was also high, about $650 for 100 minutes. Few people could afford them, and so they were not too popular at the time. The number of mobile phone users did not increase greatly until the government issued the PCS (Personal Communication Services) licenses to increase competition in the mobile phone market in 1996. Since then, four new companies have entered the war in the mobile phone market, and the monthly fee began to drop from $6.5 per minute to as low as $0.88 per minute. In addition to that, in March 1999, the government launched the MNP, which allowed users to change their service providers without changing their mobile phone number. In order to compete for more customers, the service providers started offering "free handset scheme" to consumers, meaning that their handsets would be free of charge if they started a new account and prepaid the service charges for a certain period. As the costs were greatly reduced, many people could afford a phone, and the number of mobile phone users in Hong Kong exploded.

As time goes by, the phone designs are also improving. Unlike old mobile phones, which are heavy and bulky, phones now are much smaller and lighter. Take for example, the Motorola V-series, which is even lighter than a bottle of 'Takult'. Besides, phones now also have much additional features. Other than making and receiving calls, they also serve as an organiser, SIM Tool Kit, composer or hand-held video games. The organiser is used to take down appointments and let the phone remind you of them. As for the composer, it allows one to compose songs as ringing tones. The most interesting feature, however, is the game. The most popular game in Hong Kong as well as in our school is the 'Snake'. In the game, the player has to control the snake in the phone to eat the food, the snake will then grow longer and longer. With good hand-eye co-ordinating, it would be possible to score as high as two thousand points. The most useful feature is the SIM Tool Kit, which allows you to buy tickets and even stocks. All new phones are equipped with the SIM Tool Kit, among the most popular phones in Hong Kong nowadays: Panasonic GD90, Nokia 6150, Nokia 3210 and Motorola V-series, the 6150 and 3210 have got the game 'Snake'.

The service providers have also developed much. They now encourage students to use mobile phones by offering discounts, For example, you can buy a stored-value SIM card at a 40% discount with your student ID card at Orange. There will be no monthly charge and so it is very suitable for students having a low mobile phone usage.

We can see that the government policies, service and products have all contributed greatly to the expansion in telecommunications business in Hong Kong. We all hope that Hong Kong can carry on its development and maintain our leading role in telecommunications in the Asian region.