Yuka Ito, age 17
It's seven a.m. A movie theme song starts playing on the cell phone of Yuka Ito (17). Switching off the music, which she downloaded from the Internet to use as a wake-up alarm, Yuka checks her e-mail: three messages received after she went to bed. Heading for school, she calls a friend on her way to the train station in lieu of writing a reply. As for the other two messages, she writes back on the train.

Yuka even exchanges e-mails with her friends between classes. They decide to go shopping after school, and Yuka surfs the Net to check out information on the sales taking place around town. At the store, she just can't make up her mind between three skirts, so she has a friend take photos of her in the fitting room using the tiny camera on her phone and e-mails them to another friend. The friend, who has an excellent eye for fashion, sends back her comments in next to no time.

Yuka finishes off her day with a long bath. Of course, she passes the time by chatting with her friends via e-mail. After the bath, she makes an entry on an online diary site through her phone, then finally goes to sleep.


Koji Takahashi, age 29
Koji Takahashi (29), a home builder employee, recently switched from a PDA to his cell phone to keep track of his schedule. The phone reminds him of important appointments and meetings by sounding an alarm 10, 15, or however many minutes he desires in advance. His cell phone has also replaced his portable music player; he now records music from minidiscs onto a memory card attached to his phone.

Moreover, Koji no longer needs to take specialists with him whenever he visits a client who has made an inquiry about home improvement. He can take photos and even videos with his cell phone, send them to the head office, and wait for instructions. He can also consult with various sections of the company wherever he might be, so giving an estimate for the project takes less time than it used to.

Koji communicates with his girlfriend every day, even during work hours. But he doesn't worry about what his boss might think because he can exchange quick, short e-mails with his girlfriend on his cell phone quite inconspicuously. The two of them can decide when and where to meet up without ever talking to each other on the phone.