RE: anyone else notice that our present cell phones look and work (flip to open and flip to close) very much like the communicators used by James Tiberius Kirk on the Original ST?

that was a very conscious design decision made by motorola!

they wanted to make a smaller cell phone, and the Star tak (get the name!) was specifically designed to look like the Star trek communicators.. life sometimes does immitate art, just as art immitates life!