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Coming soon: the roll-your-own cellphone?

Cellphones have become something of a fashion item and status symbol.

Many folks seem to change their phone every 12-18 months, simply to make sure they're keeping up with the joneses and have all the latest features at their fingertips.

While this is a great thing for the mobile manufacturers and network operators, it can be a significant expense to those trapped in a seemingly endless cycle of purchase, discard, purchase, discard.

And what's more, there isn't really a lot to choose from when it comes to buying a new mobile.

If you want local warranty and support, along with a guarantee that your phone will have access to all of the services offered by your chosen network provider, you're pretty much stuck with choosing from their (often limited) range of offerings.

But that could be about to change

I'm picking that the arrival of Google's new open mobile operating system will create a whole new business in modular mobile phone systems that are extremely hackable.

This will spawn the birth of a raft of operators who will specialise in pimping your mobile or creating exclusive "one-off" handsets with exactly the list of functions and features *you* demand.

What's more, thanks to things such as 3D printers, the chances are that you can have a mobile that can be created in any shape or form you can imagine.

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Folks like Nokia, Motorola, Samsung, et al, will be hard pressed to compete at anything other than the very bottom of the market.

Just look at the PC marketplace for an indication of what this might do to phone sales.

It was the low-cost and flexibility of the clone-makers who rolled out generic IBMPC-compatible boxes at a great rate from small garages and shops that really made computing what it is today.

This may well be the future of the mobile phone too.

While mainstream handset makers appear reluctant to roll out affordable dual-mode phones that will allow VOIP via WiFi as well as GSM/CDMA calls through a cellular network -- the new wave of "phone-builders" will knock you one up for a song.

Of course it's always been possible to roll your own mobile phone from readily available components and modules -- but the key ingredient (the OS) has always been missing.

With the arrival of Android, small phone-builders may suddenly find it far easier to put these bits together in a reliable, flexible and affordable manner.

If this trend does start to pick up speed you can bet your bottom dollar that yet another industry will surface. Companies will start designing, building and shipping functional phone building-blocks with consistent well documented open interfaces.

A "cellular bus" that allows for the interconnection of things such as cameras, GPS, MP3, Bluetooth, etc may well spring up and mean that customising or building a mobile becomes very much a "plug and play" operation.

And think of the environmental benefits such a system could bring...

Instead of tossing that toxic handset every 12-18 months just to stay fashionable, mobile users will instead be able to have most of their modules transferred to a new case or perhaps have the "function de jour" added to their existing phone.

The amount of waste generated could fall significantly -- and that's good for everyone.

So, if you were able to pick and choose features for your next mobile, what would you include, what would you leave out and what would you wish for?

Do you think my idea has merit?

Will those folks currently building PCs from boards, drives, peripheral cards, etc also shift into building/upgrading modular "open" phones?

Will writing software for Android become a very big industry, as mobile users all seek to have the *best* range of features and functions?

Have your say on this...

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