mobile
nounEtymology From Middle English, from Old French, from Latin mōbilis (“easy to be moved, moveable”), from moveō (“move”). The video-gaming sense was coined by Richard Bartle to describe NPCs or creatures capable of moving "under their own power" in the 1978 video game Multi-User Dungeon. Bartle retracted an earlier claim of his that it was from the kinetic sculpture sense of mobile (for the "unpredictable but limited" motion of the hanging ornaments).
A kinetic sculpture or decorative arrangement made of items hanging so that they can move independently from each other.
Communications, Electrical engineering, Engineering, Natural sciences, Physical sciences, Telecommunications, Telephony India, Ireland, UK, Abbreviation, Ellipsis Ellipsis of mobile phone.
- Mobiles squerking, mobiles chirping / Take the money and run2000, “Idioteque”, in Kid A, performed by Radiohead:
- Pinned against my neighbours, I could feel small hands, fleeting as lizards, fluttering lightly through my pockets in search of money, mobile, wallet.2009, Michela Wrong, It’s Our Turn to Eat: The Story of a Kenyan Whistle Blower:
Internet The internet accessed via mobile devices; the version of a product seen on mobile devices.
- There are many business opportunities in mobile.
- The bug affects mobile, but not desktop.
One who moves or can move (e.g. to travel).
- […] if the constrained "immobiles" are given the same transportation access as the unconstrained "mobiles". […] We concentrated on a mobile teenager population that had good public transportation or automobile access and a[…]1963, Highway Research Record:
- Table 6.5 does indeed show that non-changers were more contented […] For Table 6.7 shows that even when we take account of the initial differences between the mobiles and immobiles, the mobiles' ratings of job characteristics move strongly in a positive direction while all the immobiles' record negative shifts. So the pattern is clear and consistent: jobs get better for movers and worse for non-movers.1988 February 25, Nigel Nicholson, Michael West, Managerial Job Change: Men and Women in Transition, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 132:
1 more example
- One ex-airwoman recalls meal times for both 'mobiles' and 'immobiles', when they sat on backless benches at long bare tables. The 'immobiles' brought in their own food, crockery and cutlery. A free-standing iron range was used[…]2005 July 19, Ian M. Philpott, The Royal Air Force: The Trenchard Years, 1918–1929, Casemate Publishers, →ISBN:
An object capable of moving under its own power.
Video games Broadly, Dated A creature or NPC that can navigate and interact with the game world (now often shortened to mob).
- MUD has a type of character called a mobile. These are monsters controlled by the program such as the Dragon and the Vampire. To kill these a band of adventurers need to hunt down the creature hurling a combined strength to vanquish it.1984, Simon Rockman, “Rockman Files: MUD, MUD, Glorious MUD”, in Games Computing, volume April 1984, page 89:
- Even mundane mobiles are very advanced. They incorporate other expert systems that enable them to fight (often better than the players); […]1991, “Modems and Mazes: Life and Death Over the Phone”, in The Gamesman, volume December 1991, page 16:
- Derived terms
- blingmobile, mobile entity, mobile-first, mobileless, mobile object, moby
- Related terms
- mobility, mobilization, mobilize, move