All ringing, all dancing

The Financial TImes writes about the evolution of cellphones and where the market is heading with the advent of 3G. Obviously, carriers are pushing new services and handsets that can support them, but consumers in Europe and the U.S. have been underwhelmed so far.

Ben Wood at r Gartner, said, "They are now such a central part of society, it’s become fashion as much as function - it’s now almost shameworthy to have a clunky brick. It’s almost got to the point that without a cool phone you’re nobody. But as yet none of the reasons beyond its basic function are making people buy phones. One possible exception to that was the colour screen, but cameras, music and these other things have not delivered."

Wood, who the article states is a gadget geek with a personal collection of handsets that runs into the hundreds, said, "We are now seeing the emergence of the ‘Swiss army knife’ phones that do everything. And the one out there doing the best job is Sony Ericsson’s Walkman-branded W800 music phone, with a two mega-pixel camera, a cool funky design and a good voice experience in one package."