Making Sense of Our Wireless World

The mobile phone has become a kind of superextension of ourselves–faster, brainier, more reliable and always on. As we say in this issue, there are now more smart phones than toilets in many parts of the world, and the average smart phone today has more computing power than Apollo 11 did when it journeyed to the moon. In our special report, we explore all the ways mobility is changing the world around us, from education to politics, from medicine to romance.

Every photograph in the package was originally shot on a mobile-phone camera, from the photojournalistic images to the portraits and still lifes. More and more professional photographers are using their mobile devices as tools. And of course it’s not just pros. Our striking cover image was created using selections from more than 30,000 photographs submitted to us by readers from more than 120 countries through Instagram, the popular cell-phone photo-sharing service.

In addition to exploring how wireless devices are changing the world, we wanted to find out how they are changing you as well. To do that, we launched a worldwide poll in cooperation with Qualcomm to survey attitudes on mobile technology.

The issue was beautifully edited by assistant managing editor Thomas E. Weber, who used not only all manner of mobile devices but also some older technologies, pencil and paper.

And finally, to coincide with this report, we are relaunching our Time Mobile app with a cleaner, faster design to give users access to Time.com’s top stories, photo-essays and videos. The mobile app also includes a scanner that lets you access bonus content in this issue. To find out how, just look to the right.

Richard Stengel, MANAGING EDITOR