Toimisto matkalaukussa

kannettava tietokone vapauden ja liikkuvuuden symbolina

Authors

• Petri Saarikoski

Abstract

Office Suitcase: Laptop computer as a symbol of mobility and freedom

The article studies the history of the laptop computer, focusing especially on its image, visualisation and operating situations. The starting point for this study is that the concepts of mobility and freedom emergenced long before the developement of modern laptop. Especially mobility was publicized as a quality of many innovative machines, from "dumb terminals" to the first transportable heavy-weight computers. The article shows how the symbolic values of the laptop computer slowly started to change. At first, business-oriented masculine imagery was very strong, especially before 1990s, then slowly this imagery started to elaborate when laptops entered the consumer markets. Today the laptop is publicized as a fashionable multimedia center of the modern household. New technology can be seen as a part of individual lifestyles with the concepts of mobility and freedom.