Nokia wants to help family communication

If you're interested in how a mobile phone maker is thinking about how to improve family communication, listen to Rafael Ballagas at the Nokia Research Center in Palo Alto describe what his group - which does research for implementation 5-10 years out - is finding. They're looking at current family practices with an eye toward "promoting a stronger sense of family," Ballagas said. One thing they've found is that a lot of families still use standard voice calls, while children, particularly around 7 or 8, "have a lot of different difficulties communicating on cellphones," from cognitive (e.g. holding a phone up to their heads in a sustained way, pointing at things the listener can't see) to social (such as the give-and-take of voice conversations) to motivational (getting kids to stay engaged in audio-only conversations).