Memobilia : the mobile phone and the emergence of wearable memories

This chapter focuses on evolving memory forms in relation to the digital media prosthetic of the mobile phone. It suggests that the mobile phone is no longer only a handy communication device but is significant in its contribution to an emergent form of digital memory, that I have named, ‘the memobile’. Mobile digital phone memories or memobilia are wearable, shareable multimedia data records of events or communications. They are captured on the move, easily digitally archived and rapidly and easily mobilised. They may be saved as a personal note, shared via the mobile-phone handset with a chosen few or circulated to the many by individuals or via websites. They can include an image of a pet shared via the mobile handset with a co-present friend; keeping an archive of texts from a boyfriend; recording ambient sounds in a pub to listen to later or capturing a mobile-phone video of a London fire and sending it to the BBC.