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Mobile devices have been starting to hit the business world more and more in the past couple years. Before that, using personal devices for work may have been disallowed (e.g. keeping company files and information on them, not cellphone usage which has been around for a long time). Now, it seems businesses are starting to acknowledge that personal smartphones and tablets may have a place at work (maybe even to reduce the cost of company-supplied devices). So, that would be why, for people who do not work at more liberal companies, it seems more recent. And by the way, no, I can't use my own devices for doing work, even today. That may change; however, for regulated industries, the need to control company files would argue against it (absent any security measures to ensure those files don't end up in the wrong hands or change inappropriately when on personal devices). So, this does not surprise me.
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