Mobile and mobility

Archie is amongst my favourite cartoon characters and the daily strip in Bombay Times is my staple. The beauty of this comic strip is that it has updated itself with time and therefore, continues to hold interest of readers.

We are all aware of communication revolution that started with mobile phones ( remember Nokia and Motorola?). While the new avatar of mobile phone, smart phone, is altogether in different league, the basic objective of the mobile phone of being contactable while being mobile is now an integral part of our lives.

Those who love and savour Archie comics know Veronica’s father’s dislike for Archie whom he treats as good for nothing fellow wasting his daughter’s time. In today’s strip, he’s seen lamenting to his butler about his disgust with mobile phones. He sees his daughter Veronica talking to Archie on phone and then his sight catches Archie standing outside their house about to enter. So he laments , “ You know I prefer old phones to these cells. It used to be when she was taking to Archie there was at least a reasonable chance that he was at his house! “

And we have all experienced in real life situation people lying about them being out of city or out of country or alternatively children lying to their parents being only 5 minutes from hone, when in reality they could be in altogether different location!

Of course, we now have apps that help one locate the actual coordinates of other person and catch his bluff.

But as is my experience, sometimes this light hearted banter in comics contains very deep rooted and pertinent message and the message from this take on mobile phone and new technology is to use the technology to build better character and become a better human being and not misuse it for nefarious objectives. If we use technology for betterment and upliftment, there will be no spams, vishing attacks, cyber crimes and tendency to avoid and lie.