Can you imagine the day when your pet can ring you on your mobile or when you can send smells to people? How about using your phone to pay for things rather than carrying money or cards around with you?

It might sound crazy but these are things that people are thinking about, and some are even happening in some parts of the world.

Mobile phones are changing, not just in size and shape, but also in terms of what they can do. In many countries we are getting more familiar with camera phones, and even video phones, and radio on mobiles. 3G phones are bringing much more in the way of entertainment, such as games, music, better Internet surfing and much more. Location-based services on mobiles can enable parents and children to know where each other are.

However, some thinking has been done even beyond this and here are some ideas that may happen in the future:

– to emphasize your message and your feelings add a smell to your text message. Imagine being sent a smell of your dinner by your mum to encourage you home. Though how would you like to be in a classroom where everyone is receiving different smells!

– mobiles could improve your relationship with your pet in a number of ways:

• You may never lose your dog again by having a GPS location system on your mobile and a tracking device on your dog.
• And if you are late home, and your dog needs feeding, dial a feeder device that will activate when you call it and release food for the dog to eat.
• And you could receive signals from your dog while you were out if he/she started acting strangely. If you were out of the house this could mean that something was wrong at home. Imagine if you could then access the camera at home via the Internet via your phone, so you could check what was happening and then call the police if you had to!

– real time translation of a voice call, meaning you can talk to anyone around the world and be understood even if you don’t speak the same language.