Cellphone Kingdom 

cctv.com 03-15-2005 18:58

Hello and welcome to rediscovering China. I'm Daniella Kuhn. For the newly arrived visitors to Beijing, one thing may surprise them most, when they walk into a typical crowded street like this one, the omni-present cell phones.

The plethora of these devices may be surprising coming from a developing country like China, but most Chinese have quite accustomed to it's rapid spread and the unexpected development of it's related technology. In today's program, we're going deep into the cell phone kingdom.

In the past few years, China has leapt into what can only be called the cellphone age. According to the Ministry of China’s Information Industry of China, cell phone usage accounts for almost a half of all revenues in China's telecoms industry. It has seemingly raised a cellphone class overnight.

The history of telephone development serves as a mirror of contemporary China. Forty years ago, phones were widely regarded as luxuries. Three decades ago they were still something which bore little relation to ordinary people.

Due to China’s huge population there is an even greater need for the cellphone.

At the end of 90s, China’s overall network construction came to an end. The transmission speed of China’s core network is at 40 to 100G.. For example, in Beijing, from the 3rd Ring Road to the 4th Ring Road, several loop networks have been set up, and the base station coverage of this area is up to 98%. Since the historic harbinger of telecom transformation appeared in the 1990s. The only thing that has been left out is the terminal products - cellphones.

Cellphone has become so prominent and obvious that there was even a movie made titled “cellphone”, which vividly described the difference between the old times and present day.

It is estimated that two decades ago 200 Chinese people had to share one land phone, making contact with each other pretty difficult.

As of June 2004, China Mobile and China Unicom —in terms of subscribers are the world’s largest and third-largest mobile operators. They have a combined total of about 300 million users.

There are around 500 different phone models available on the market at any given time. And it’s very simple to get connected. Once you complete the paperwork, you stand there for about 30 seconds as your service is turned on —your phone becomes instantly usable.

The cell phone users in China ranked the No.1 in the world, turning it into the biggest cell phone market in the world. Today is weekend and I am standing outside an electronic shop where as you can see, where people are going to buy their favorite cellphones.

With so many cell phones to choose from, how can one possibly make a decision?

There is such fierce competition for the attention of this new consumer that companies are providing a dizzying array of options. The consumer is now dictating what they want.

the Chinese manufacturer has adapted the cellphone design and functions to meet the specific demands of the Chinese people.

Before the cellphone reaches the market, they have one last stop.

This is where cell phone come to be judged. China’s telecommunication technology lab was established over 20 years ago as a non-profit legal body to establish standards and to test mobile phones here in China. Over 350 hundred phones pass through the door every year.

Everyday the cellpohnes are put to the test, punched, flipped, twisted, squeezed, smacked, and dropped.

Cell phones have not only closed the distance between the Chinese people but changed their life-style. Young or old, rich or poor, they all consider the cellphone now, to be a necessary part of their daily life.

da ge da certainly doesn’t apply here anymore.

The world was certainly gotten bigger than the little red book. You may not find it surprising that most Chinese people, especially young people, are so interested in SMS. With the mobile network’s wide reach, value-added service providers are following closely behind.

Short messaging (SMS) is the most used of all services. In 2003 alone, Chinese users sent approximately 220 billion of them. However, not all of these messages originated from mobile phones, of course, which is where the Internet comes in. More than 8,000 providers are offering a myriad of services

China’s Internet scene is indeed fascinating — you can easily access to a Websites by typing Chinese names rather than Web addresses in the browser; entering a world in which the Internet, mobile phone, and real world are intricately connected into one tightly-knit universe. The Chinese language portals are now providing mobile phone services through the Web, making it easy for users to compose long messages or even essays and broadcasting them to friends. In fact, China now even has SMS-in TV programs. A great number of Chinese Web sites provide special services to download pictures, music and even movie clips from their website.

Ann hu is an acclaimed film director, with her upcoming movie that will hit the theater this Valentine’s day, but now, everybody can enjoy the promo and soundtrack of the movie on their cell phone through the website sina.com.

China now even has SMS-in TV programs.

And from movie to games, everything is available in this little device.

But now, since China’s mobile operators have developed more and more ways to for subscribers to download games. More and more students and technicians are interested in developing the technology for cellphone games. The rapid adoption of next generation mobile phone technologies, which enables the delivery of richer, more interactive content than was previously available and continued unlimited sources of cutting-edge entertainment in China.

The cell phone in my hand is no longer a simple tool to send or receive calls. As China's mobile technology network approaches the third generation, we will see a wider bandwidth, faster access to the internet and integration of more features, such as bill pay, watching movies and reading books. 3rd generation cell phones are waiting in anticipation for all the new services that the internet has to offer.

The 3rd generation network is perhaps the hottest topic right now in the Information industry, offering a consistent set of services to laptop and phone users, no matter where are located in the world.

The emergence of third-generation (3G) mobile technologies in the global mobile telecommunications market will have a strong impact on China. Several Chinese government agencies are directly engaged in formulating the blueprint for China's 3G strategies and plans. China's ultimate goal is to accelerate the development of home-grown equipment and proprietary standards, and shorten the time it takes for 3G systems to reach the Chinese market.

In the future, along with the improvement of the network, cellphone’s access to it will be as fast as the internet. Once 3rd generation comes, the cell phone will not just be a device for speaking to people, but rather a complete visual communication and entertainment center for playing games, downloading news, music, and cartoons, participating in fan clubs and engaging in a whole host of other activities. Whether used for buying lottery tickets or voting for your favorite member on the all-important Chinese New Year party, mobile phones and the internet will be forever intertwined.

Two years ago, China became the world's largest cellphone-user group. This tiny and ever-improving apparatus keeps the old country updated with the new one. Ten years ago, no one could've imagined the speed at which Chinese culture would embrace this mini personal assistant. Yes, the future is always hard to predict, but China has learnt that the best way to predict future is to invent it. Thanks for watching rediscovering China, I am Daniella Kuhn.

Editor:Hu  Source:CCTV.com