talkin' on the cell phone on Discovery

Actually, I'll be talking about the cell phone - not on the cell phone - on a new Discovery Channel tv series this Wednesday, but I thought talkin' on had a better, ah, ring to it...

Here are the details:

This Wednesday, December 27, 1PM (Eastern Standard Time) on the Discovery Channel: The Inside Story of the Cell Phone, featuring me and a handful of who knows who much more knowledgeable experts.

Here's What I Know About It: I was taped for more than an hour last June (2006) at the Museum of Science in Flushing, Queens (New York City). It was an excellent interview - but you never know what will survive to the show and what will end up on the proverbial cutting room floor. The folks who produced this and interviewed me, though, seemed savvy.

The hour-long show is part of a new Discovery series, The Inside Story of ...

What I Especially Like About This Showing: It immediately follows The Inside Story of the iPod - this is bound to draw a lot of viewers (I think Steve Jobs will be interviewed on it)...

What I'm Not Too Thrilled About: 1 pm? Who in their right mind is watching television then? Well, I will, and hopefully you (or set your TiVo or VCR) ... and I'm sure the show will be rebroadcast (I'll tell you when I know).

All in All: I'm pleased the show will be on. As I wrote in my 2004 book, Cellphone: The Story of the World's Most Mobile Medium, and How It Has Transformed Everything, I think the cell phone is the most revolutionary medium we have going today. It's not only a vehicle of conversation - spoken and written - but it's giving us everything the web has to offer (tv, movies, radio, podcasts, blogs, websites, etc) and lets us take that with us, wherever we may happen to go. (Are any if you reading this on a device that fits in your hand? Let me know.) With every new month, there is less and less difference between cell phones, ipods, and little computers. I wrote a long time ago that, someday, anyone would be able to get any information that was ever created, from anywhere in the world, anytime ... and that day is almost here, courtesy of the cell phone.

I'd say I'd wave hello to you on the show, but that would require a time machine ... I hope you like it, in any case, if you get a chance to see it.
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Added in January, 2007 - and here's a 4-minute clip of my appearance on the show ...





Relevant links:

• ABC-TV Nightline interview with me (9/12/06) about cell phones: video clip
• CBS-TV Early Show interview with me (4/1/05) about cell phones and kids: transcript
• my book: Cellphone: The Story of the World's Most Mobile Medium