I knew many UL's before cell phones, Spot and PLB's.

In the UK much of our highland regions don't have mobile phone coverage. There are very few Spot's being used here and PLB's are only licensed to be used by sailors and pilots.

Communication Technology is not an argument for the increase in UL hikers. Material Technology has, as new lighter materials that provide advanced performance over older materials becomes increasingly available.

Modern synthetic materials work, this can be seen in mountain rescue statistics world wide that shown rescues of hypothermia cases are slowly dropping year on year.