- The concept of jaXmobilem, a unique CSR project, was supported by over 5,000 people visiting the Mobile Etiquette Day event
- A record-breaking cartoon, made by 1,487 co-authors, was finished on 3 April at 3 p.m., setting a Czech record
- 562 respondents voiced their ideas about mobile etiquette
Prague, 3 April 2007 - The celebration of Mobile Etiquette Day at Prague's Náměstí Republiky culminated at three p.m. today with the setting of a record in collective cartoon drawing. Altogether, 1,487 people participated in the drawing of a cartoon whose basic layout was prepared by the cartoonist Štěpán Mareš. The final work consists of twenty panels, each measuring 1 x 1 m. The topic was set right at the beginning - proper behavior when using a mobile phone. The main figures in the cartoon were Mr. X and his family who are known to people from the www.jaXmobilem.cz website and, of course, their mobile phones.
"Štěpán Mareš created a very funny story with a strong message. I believe that everyone will appreciate the result," says Martina Kemrová, Head of Corporate Communication at T-Mobile.
The achieved record, sponsored by T-Mobile, whose validity was verified by a representative of the 'Dobrý den' agency of Pelhřimov, will be registered in the Czech Records Bank and will also enter the Czech Book of Records. The work will be exhibited in the Museum of Records and Rarities in Pelhřimov. The cartoon was drawn with 531 permanent markers on a special waterproof material. An area of 200,000 cm2 was covered in drawings. The youngest visitor to the event was one-month-old Kačenka Hornová, born this March; Josef Hrdý, aged 80, was the oldest person attending the show. The smallest and also the lightest participants in the record attempt were the twins Rozálie and Albert Dvořákovi (71 cm, 7.5 kg) while the heaviest cartoon drawer was one of the first visitors to the celebratory event, Tomáš Oplt (149 kg). The tallest person was Rudolf Sattler at 212 cm.
During the celebration, visitors could view the jaXmobilem exhibition and participate in a number of contests related to the project. Also, 562 people responded to a survey held by TMobile, the aim of which was to find out how people perceive the proper use of mobile phones. "We are happy that the first annual celebration of Mobile Etiquette Day was so successful. Our aim was for the largest possible number of people to learn about our project. Of course we do not want to go back to the etiquette rules of previous decades that recommended not to hurry in public spaces. We only wanted to point out that our use of mobile phones is often indiscreet, inconsiderate and sometimes even dangerous with regard to the people around us," says Martina Kemrová.
Those who did not manage to take part in Mobile Etiquette Day needn't worry. The jaXmobilem project is continuing as usual on the www.jaXmobilem.cz website. It includes, for example, an on-line enquiry from which respondents can learn how well they fare in the mobile etiquette arena, or a newly introduced special contest which involves people writing witty phrases in empty speech balloons in one of the cartoons by Štěpán Mareš. The newly added content at the jaXmobilem.cz website is being viewed very closely: there have been 166 contributions posted on the website only since last Saturday, when the contest was launched.
About the Mobile Etiquette Day
The Mobile Etiquette Day is part of the successful jaXmobilem project in which TMobile has been involved, in co-operation with the cartoonist Štěpán Mareš, since 2006 when a website under the same name was launched. The informal "holiday" called Mobile Etiquette Day commemorates the date when the first voice connection using a portable cellular phone, the direct predecessor of today's mobile handsets, was established in New York in 1973. T-Mobile's comprehensive program of corporate social responsibility also includes, for example, the T-Mobile Fund, which is intended to support local initiatives in the regions where T-Mobile has its offices. Furthermore, T-Mobile organizes an annual charity auction and a volunteer program for its employees, supports waste recycling on its premises and is the first mobile operator in the market to have enabled customers to hand in their old handsets at retail shops for the purpose of ecological disposal.