When did

[TheCalvinator24]

Cell phones become generally commercially viable? I don't remember many people having them until about '95.

[littlebeast13]

My family was always behind in the times, and I think my parents finally got one in 1997, so you're probably about right.

There are cell phone ads in my old Cardinals scorecards from the first half of the 90's....

lb13

[BackInTex]

Cell phones become generally commercially viable? I don't remember many people having them until about '95.

'95 is about when you started seeing them as something in the mainstream.

My wife got her first for Valentines day 1998. I didn't get one until after we moved to Houston, Spring of 2000.

I'm not sure what I'd do without one now.

[mrkelley23]

Not to be too Clintonesque, but you have to define "cell phone" a little better, not to mention commercially viable.

My dad, as a traveling salesman, had a "mobile phone," complete with industrial toolbox-sized power pack, in the 70s. But it was more of a short wave radio than anything.

It also helps if we define whether we are talking about the US, or the global market, since most foreign countries, especially Japan, are many years ahead of the US in developing and marketing these devices.

Just answering the question as asked, I'd say mid-1990s for the US, and about 5 years earlier for Japan.

[mellytu74]

Cal --

During the baseball strike of 1994-95, our committee held a hearing on the strike.

One of the player reps - Bob Tewksbury, maybe - got a call on his mobile phone and pulled it out of his jacket pocket.

It was the first one I'd ever seen that wasn't one of those big, clunky car phones.

[Bob Juch]

1983 - that's when the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X was introduced.

The FCC was holding random drawings for cell phone radio frequency licenses. Win one and you were guaranteed several hundred thousands of dollars. My friends and I in Raleigh, NC submitted entries.

[TheCalvinator24]

1983? I'm talking about when the average person started getting them. When they stopped costing more than $1000, and were smaller than a WWII issue walkie-talkie

[Bob Juch]

1983? I'm talking about when the average person started getting them. When they stopped costing more than $1000, and were smaller than a WWII issue walkie-talkie

The Motorola units were a lot smaller than a WWII Handie Talkie (a Walkie-Talkie was backback sized).

[Bob Juch]

1983? I'm talking about when the average person started getting them. When they stopped costing more than $1000, and were smaller than a WWII issue walkie-talkie

The Motorola units were a lot smaller than a WWII Handie Talkie (a Walkie-Talkie was backback sized).

They cost $749.

[littlebeast13]

Cell phones are evil....

lb13

[PlacentiaSoccerMom]

Cell phones are evil....

lb13

They are less evil than squirrels.

[PlacentiaSoccerMom]

Speaking of squirrels, I was looking for a picture of an evil squirrel to put on my last post.

I found this picture of squirrels and they don't look very evil. One of the squirrels is massaging the other squirrel's back.

Spoiler

[SportsFan68]

I got mine in Y2K. The main reason was to be able to call for help if I broke something important 10 miles from the nearest road on my Rocky Mountain Sheep hunt, but it was also important for Regis to be able to reach me on Round 2 days.

[AnnieCamaro]

Speaking of squirrels, I was looking for a picture of an evil squirrel to put on my last post.

I found this picture of squirrels and they don't look very evil. One of the squirrels is massaging the other squirrel's back.

Spoiler

Miss Placentia, I don't mean to be argumentative, but those squirrels are not giving back rubs. I see squirrels doing that a lot, and it makes me so mad! They are right out in public, where my little sister can see them, too. I yell at them: "Get a nest!"

[kayrharris]

I recall several people on the bored getting cell phones just so they could wait for THE callback on the phone game. That had to have been 2000.
I know the permanently mounted ones in vehicles were several years prior to that.

[silvercamaro]

I recall several people on the bored getting cell phones just so they could wait for THE callback on the phone game. That had to have been 2000.

I was one of those people.

I remain grateful that BiT got his cell phone when he did, too, because it was his call from the parking lot of his child's nursery school that secured an audition slot for me in one of the earliest road trips. Thanks again, BiT!

[earendel]

I recall several people on the bored getting cell phones just so they could wait for THE callback on the phone game. That had to have been 2000.
I know the permanently mounted ones in vehicles were several years prior to that.

I was one of those, at least partially. The primary reason we got them was to be able to contact each other (after a farcical turn of events), but it also made it possible for me to get a callback without having to wait by a land line.

[BackInTex]

I recall several people on the bored getting cell phones just so they could wait for THE callback on the phone game. That had to have been 2000.

I was one of those people.

I remain grateful that BiT got his cell phone when he did, too, because it was his call from the parking lot of his child's nursery school that secured an audition slot for me in one of the earliest road trips. Thanks again, BiT!

You're still welcome. Those were good times.

[littlebeast13]

I recall several people on the bored getting cell phones just so they could wait for THE callback on the phone game. That had to have been 2000.
I know the permanently mounted ones in vehicles were several years prior to that.

I was one of those, at least partially. The primary reason we got them was to be able to contact each other (after a farcical turn of events), but it also made it possible for me to get a callback without having to wait by a land line.

At least you didn't enter The Dead Zone®.....

lb13

[earendel]

I recall several people on the bored getting cell phones just so they could wait for THE callback on the phone game. That had to have been 2000.
I know the permanently mounted ones in vehicles were several years prior to that.

I was one of those, at least partially. The primary reason we got them was to be able to contact each other (after a farcical turn of events), but it also made it possible for me to get a callback without having to wait by a land line.

At least you didn't enter The Dead Zone®.....

lb13

I think about that very often - there's still very poor reception (at least for my carrier's signal) in the Fellowship Hall of our church, which is where I was when the call came. Had I not been near the rear of the room I might have ended up like TR.

[ulysses5019]

My memory is hazy, but wasn't there controversy about tr's encounter with the dead zone?

[littlebeast13]

My memory is hazy, but wasn't there controversy about tr's encounter with the dead zone?

To the best of my knowledge, TR was never involved in any controversy on this Bored...

lb13

[Catfish]

Cell phones become generally commercially viable? I don't remember many people having them until about '95.

In the summer of 1993---when I was pregnant, had moved to the country, but still had a 70-mile commute to Chicago---I had what I guess would be considered a cell phone, although it was about the size of a conventional phone receiver. It was a Motorola and had Verizon service. We got the phone lest I become stranded on the country roads. As it turned out, it would have been useful only had I become stranded on the toll road or expressways closer to Chicago. Anything south of the Kankakee River was a dead zone (and remained that way till fairly recently), so had I been stranded on the country roads, I would have had a good, long, pregnant walk or a good, long wait until someone came along to help.

[tanstaafl2]

Cell phones become generally commercially viable? I don't remember many people having them until about '95.

In the summer of 1993---when I was pregnant, had moved to the country, but still had a 70-mile commute to Chicago---I had what I guess would be considered a cell phone, although it was about the size of a conventional phone receiver. It was a Motorola and had Verizon service. We got the phone lest I become stranded on the country roads. As it turned out, it would have been useful only had I become stranded on the toll road or expressways closer to Chicago. Anything south of the Kankakee River was a dead zone (and remained that way till fairly recently), so had I been stranded on the country roads, I would have had a good, long, pregnant walk or a good, long wait until someone came along to help.

I think I got my first cell phone in about 1993 as well. That was about when they started to seem affordable to me although I remember them being around from at least the late 80's. It was a "bag" phone rather than a more typical cell phone although those were available as well. Those cell phones were about the size of a large brick and weighed about as much! The bag phones were cheaper which is why I got that. It allowed me to go out and about when on call without having to search for a pay phone when I got paged on my beeper (remember beepers?!?!). They may have been more common at an early date in the medical community or other professions that were frequently "on call" for the convenience factor.

It looked something like this:



The Motorola "brick" cell phones that I remember at that time looked something like this:

[Catfish]

The Motorola "brick" cell phones that I remember at that time looked something like this:

Yes! What I had was very similar to this.