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Plain Cell Phones Fading Away?
An anonymous reader writes "According to this Reuters article plain old vanilla cell phones are fading away in the US. Instead, the author claims, (after quoting some 'expert' from this company) that phones with fancy features (cameras, games, etc.) are starting to dominate. I beg to differ - one of the few things stopping me from purchasing a phone is the fact that I do not want to pay for hundreds of features that I will never use. All I want is an address book and a way to make calls."
Most cell phones have had at least small-scale games on board for years. Nothing advanced, but simple enough things that can keep you occupied during a really boring airport wait. Now, as the processing power increases and the color screens are more common, it's not surprising that the games are getting a little more attention. The new trend is the color screens and cameras, games were already on board.
as long as there is a market, there will be plain jane phones.
Sent from your iPad.
Happy Trails,
Erick
http://www.busyweather.com/
I would say that with Bluetooth, cell phones should get less stuff on them. I had a friend said that with Bluetooth a cell phone can just be relegated to a communication conduit. Ideally the cell phone can be made smaller and just stay in the pocket. Or even put in a palm pilot that does not have an ear piece or mouth piece. And have it come with a Bluetooth head set.
If you work for the Department of Defense on a military installation, you are not allowed to bring a camera phone onto the facility. A friend of mine did, and they fired him on the spot.
Here in Boston the most common phone I see is the cheap motorola phones that you get for $40 with a Verizon contract. Before that it was the cheap ?samsung phone that you got with the Sprint contract.
maybe that's just those of us who aren't into the bling factor.
There's really no other way for the cell phone companies to compete on price, they've pretty much hit the floor on pricing. Therefore, the price points are remaining the same, and the higher end model phones are simply moving to the lower price points.
Getting camera phones into consumer's hands, whether they really want them or not, is also the best hope the cell providers have to sell their data services. The cellular data structure is pretty much already in place at all of the wireless companies, but there aren't very many people using it. Camera phones are great ways to create a 1-megabyte file which then to get out of the phone requires use of the cell data network... notice that provider-subsidized cell phones never have a USB output through which the picture can travel?
My wife and I both got cell phones about a year ago. Hers was the fancy, bonus-cash-off color screen fold-open phone, mine was the standard, free-with-plan Motorola 120e. At the time, I thought I was being nice by letting her have the color phone. While she still likes it, I'm quite glad I let her have it, as the 120e is the perfect 'plain vanilla' phone for me. It's got a basic feature list--datebook, phonebook, and such--has a simple, monochrome screen, a powerful backlight (it comes in quite handy in blackouts,) and a nice design. It's absolutely bulletproof--it has gouges on the casing from where I've dropped, crushed, and scraped it, but it still works perfectly. It can last for days without needing a charge, and the call quality is just fine.
By contrast, the hinge on my wife's phone wiggles and feels somewhat flimsy, it's lucky to go for 36 hours without running out of juice, all the neat 'features' just end up costing money if you want to use them, and frankly, it doesn't get any better reception or sound quality than my phone does. Yeah, she can play Tetris on it, but honestly, I don't feel like I'm missing out on much.
For a good little "I just want to talk on it" phone, I'd recommend the 120e...
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Even though there are people that want just a regular cellphone, i would think that nowadays it would actually not be worth the price for any manufacturer to make them.
When i went to the sprint PCS store a month ago, i did not see a single phone that was B&W. All of them had all the shiny new features, withthe cheapest one being $40. I dont think i will have a problem shelling out 40$ on a phone that does have some of those 'cool' games.
Ok, the new ideas in phone are great, there great if you are a average user who like taking random pictures and having a nice large color screen and who uses a palm. But untill they cameras are 4 mp and the os is linux and there is about 10 gigs of storage on them I will be fine with my normal call only phone.
Well I would say that Nextel, though they are starting to reach out to that pop culture market...is keeping that "phone that works" trend. Those things are tough...they do't have the damn extra bells and whistles that you don't need, and wherever they have coverage, service is great. I plan on sticking with them for awhile.
MY SECRET DIARIES
Holy moly, the day that a cell phone manufacturer comes out with the ability to export/import your address book as an XML document is the day I get a new cell phone. I'm with the author of the blurb. I need a phone to call people, and to store the contact info for those I call. That's it. And it'd sure 'nuff be nice to be able to import/export that info into/out of my system.
I could give a rat turd about cameras and ring tones.
I dislike color screens because they drain the battery too fast and 99.99% of the time I use my cell phone for -duh- calling people, not for sending pictures.
Now if it could only play 8 track cartridges :)
Our company has banned cellphones and PDAs with cameras inside the workplace for secutiry reasons. They have also banned wireless network devices. Whenever someone orders a new laptop the admin has to disable the wireless network card before turning it over to the user.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
If I remember correctly, it was released in 1997. It cost me an arm and a leg (my first cell phone ever) but it's still working. Somehow it reminds me of my HP 48SX calculator.
My only gripe with it is that when it's cold (-10 C) outside, the display doesn't refresh properly. Other than that, it's in a perfect working condition.
The owls are not what they seem
People will actually buy more cell phones next year. With 1 billion GSM users there will be more than half a billion phones sold next year.
Part of that is new users, but yes, people are buying replacements like no one had expected.
It's simple really, I want to be able to plug into my phone and think the words, and they person calling me can hear them. Thats all I want, no camera, no games, I'd rather think talk than think how many times do I push 4 to get the letter captial 'I'.
I wouldn't bother anyone by needing to speak loudly in public. That is the most important thing of all. A cell phone that allows me to communicate, while extending the courtesy of silence to those around me. THAT is the killer feature I am waiting for.
AngrPeopleRule
"Science is about ego as much as it is about discovery and truth " - I said it, so sue me.
The vast majority of people in the US, especially /. readers, have very little connection to agriculture. Invent a new phone, don't, it really doesn't effect 3rd worlders. So rather than do nothing but try to make more food/apply economics to solve the starvation problem, a problem which ideally takes less than 5% of the U.S. population to solve, we deploy the remaining 95% to 'frivolous' projects, such as new technology, etc. WTF else are we supposed to do?
Karma: Excellent^(-t/Tau), Tau=Wittiness/Trollishness
Nah, there are just no alternatives anymore. Go out and look for just a cell phone, they all have PDA features, color LCD screens, IM and eMail and stuff.
It's more like a forced up-selling, you really dont have the choice.
My company just handed out a round of new phones not too long ago that are so bloated with features they're borderline useless as a phone. They run PalmOS, and I've had it crash with a fatal exception just by trying to answer it when it was ringing.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
When you're making a fully-functional cellphone with today's technology, it doesn't cost very much at all to add this extra functionality. I just upgraded to a digital phone from AT&T, went with their very cheapest model...and it still has all sorts of computer games and things on it.
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
Personally I just wish the web browser in my phone would load up my hotmail and I'd be happy. I guess I need to set up my own site that shows e-mail in wml or whatever it is my phone can read.
"You can now flame me, I am full of love,"
I am afraid I can't do that Dave
Help fight continental drift.
phones with fancy features (cameras, games, etc.) are starting to dominate.
Well great then! I think this is fantastic. Think about all of the places that cameras aren't allowed, for example movie theaters. Now think about how many jackasses who leave their phone on and have it ring during the movie.
This will have the benefit of making phones more and more difficult to bring into public places, since cameras aren't allowed in those places. In my opinion, all the better. I hate cell phones, I dislike even having one (I only do because of work), and I'm all for any "features" that cause a backlash against them.
Cell phones are now already banned from strip clubs, certain concert venues are pushing against them, etc. This is a great thing in my opinion.
As long as people like my grandmother continue to use a cell phone while she lives in Lforida for 6 months out of a year to call home, there is a rather large market for plain cell phones. I think it would be a huge misstep for the big makers to stop creating these.
Think about it: less time to research if all you have to do is add addresses and limited functionality web browsing. All your designers can move on to more important stuff that grabs money from the movers and shakers and you can continue selling cheap phones to Grandma and Grandpa and keep that part of your market.
Cell phones are getting ridculously complex, but there will not be a loss of plain phones anytime soon, just a flood of more complex phones.
what?
I think the main problem is a phone with nothing but the ability to make calls and compile an address book is that it just doesn't have a markbet big enough to warrant interest; why undoubedtly useful for some people who don't need colour screens and assorted games, those people are often in the minority. I want my phone to be more than just a basic tool for calling people, as do most other people my age (16), and as we're a big market, it's how phones are developed and sold.
I guess the blame can be pinned on us young 'uns again =)
I beg to differ with you begging to differ.
Maybe in the US, but here in the UK it is almost impossible to buy a plain black and white basic phone.
Phone functionality works in 6 month cycles. What is high tier this year will be middle tier middle of next year and low tier at the end of the year.
6 months ago colour screens and polyphonic was middle tier, now even the most basic phone these days has them both. Next year the most basic phone will have a camera (and the high tier will also have cameras but be capable of pushing 2 megapixels)
Ever tried getting a phone that doesn't have SMS? You can't and in two years it'll be the same with the other bits of functionality you despise.
So yes, they are dominating. Just because you are holding back doesn't mean they aren't. But when yours bites the dust you'll realise that you'll have to move with the times.
Which may or may not be a good thing depending on your point of view.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
My cellphone up and died last month, and I went to replace it. I asked at a few other carriers how long it would take to get my number moved to their service, and when they were telling me anywhere from 15 minutes to 3 weeks, I went back to SprintPCS.
Unfortunately, they no longer carry the plain, simple phone style that I prefer. [I was using an LG 4NE1, and before that, a Touchpoint, and before that, one of the early Sony models].
They tried pushing a picture phone one me, and I didn't want it. I got stuck with a Samsung that I'm really unhappy with. It may look all slick with its color screen, and flip action, but it just doesn't deliver in terms of simple functionality that I used to have.
I only bought this particular model because it closed, so the buttons were protected, so I wouldn't call people accidentially when it presses against my keys. Unfortunately, I can't easily open it one handed, and with the screen on the inside, I have to open it to see who's calling.
I should've just dealt with not having a phone for a week or so, and have bought a replacement 4NE1 off of eBay.
Hell, even the ring tones are particularly annoying -- most likely, so you'll use the cool feature of downloading new, snazzy ringtones they can charge $2 each for. And of course, the $15/month service to be able to download the ringtones. But they don't even have The Liberty Bell March, so I can't get back my old one.
It all comes down to the basics of an product design -- the more features you put into something, the more likely it's going to break. I want a phone that makes phone calls, and has a way to store phone numbers. That's all I care about.
[And I'd like a service provider that doesn't make me wait 3 hrs, then tell me there's nothing they can do about the fact there's constant static on my new phone. Mind you, it took them all of 30 sec to tell me that, after they wasted 3 hrs to flash it to new firmware, which was NOT what I brought it in for]
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Shameless plug alert!
... :) Every time I hear that in reference to a toy/gadget I look twice; it could be the next big thing.
I like to be able to tell my cellphone by voice to call my wife and have it react without having to touch the phone.
Also my fabulous 1year old Sony Ericsson t68i lets me use it as a remote for my home computer and laptop for watching movies and flipping PowerPoint presentations at work. AND the Bluetooth GPRS connection when the phone is in my wardrobe in some jacket pocket works like a charm. I'm free to walk around a hotel room with my laptop and work in any *ahem* position I like.
Features - real features - like that are really useful. On my old basic Motorola V I didn't know how to use the address book. It was so damn ugly I winced just looking at the menu.
Phones will do more handy things in the future, and don't you for a second make the mistake of so many before you:
"A [insert invention name here]?! It's neat, but who will ever really use it?"
not always tho...
... with Bluetooth a cell phone can ... be made smaller and just stay in the pocket... not have an ear piece or mouth piece. And have it come with a Bluetooth head set.
Great. Then when the obnoxious guy next to you in the restaurant, airplane, or [wherever you can't escape] starts talking loudly on his cell phone, at least you can hear BOTH sides of the conversation.
And even chime in. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
It seems that the usable selection of cellphones available is pretty much dictated by the companies who provide service to them. Anyone can buy an old-style phone off eBay, but to use it the service companies have to allow the phone to be programmed to their networks. When the business pressure of the users of any given phone style is outweighed by the cost and hassle of providing service to those phones (i.e. when current technology progresses to the point where old-style phones get too old and their technology is difficult to remain backwards-compliant with), the providers will, one by one, stop letting the phones be used. Of course, there may remain niche markets for old tech phones in areas where larger numbers of their users live (and maybe willing to pay a premium for the service?).
1. That camera has, most likely, a CMOS sensor (much, much slower than CCD, you can only take reasonable pictures in daylight)
2. Its cheap lens system makes you believe that you're in a different reality (i.e. all squares look round because of the radial distortion)
Integration of features is not bad, as long as you don't sacrifice quality.
The Raven
In some ways I agree with the author of this post. I mean, yes, it would be nice to have a camera on my phone (except that in all honesty, why would I use that camera when my digital camera is better), or instant messaging (except that keypad typing is really annoying, and thumb-boards are as well, and I'm not a JOT fan), and a web browser (if only I could really see what I was looking at), and fancy ringtones (my self-esteem is so low that I need some fancy song to play when my phone rings so everyone thinks I'm cool), and GPS (ok, so I actually like this feature), and a radio or mp3 player (except I can buy a better mp3 player or radio, a lot better)...
Ok, so maybe these features sound nice to begin with, but in all honesty, when your camera isn't that high quality (and yes, some are going to argue that they get GREAT pictures from their phone, thank you, I work in a publications department, lets compare your phones digital camera to our 10,000$+ digicams), your screen isn't big enough to really do that much, and the phone uses a keypad for text entry, is it really worth all that extra money?
In my opinion, not really...
I'd like one or two 'special features' but in all honesty, all I really want is a phone, an address book (and maybe a planner, if my phone can sync to my computer), really great battery life, and a good signal wherever I go. beyond that, there isn't much I want. I see how it's great that all these devices can come together (eliminate pocket bulge today!) but you end up with one somewhat mediocre device in the end.
I've been considering getting a combo pda/phone for a while, but the cost is just to high compared to the quality, and then when I see that most of them have internal (think ipod) batteries, and I know how fast I go through cellphone batteries, I can see myself being stranded somewhere without a charge when I might really need my cellphone, or worse, killing the battery from overuse over a few months (In the last 7 months I've logged 296 hours on my current cellphone)
[Something witty and intelligent should have appeared here.]
{Traicovn}
If you work for the Department of Defense on a military installation, you are not allowed to bring a camera phone onto the facility. A friend of mine did, and they fired him on the spot.
I thought the whole POINT of the cameras was to get people used to them so they could be used for spying, detective work, etc.
Like the stereotype of the japanese tourist with the camera. They were ALL OVER the US starting soon after WWII, taking pictures of everything.
Turns out it wasn't just that one of the first non-junk manufacturing industries they got going was mass-produced cameras. A lot of it was industrial espionage. They went back and cloned auto plants, cerial factories, etc. right down to the layout of the machines.
(That's why it's so much harder to get tours of manufacturing plants these days. Kelloggs, for instance, used to give plant tours all the time. Was a regular tourist attraction. But they stopped them entirely after the Japanese cloned the rice crispies machine.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
At one point in my life, I purposely went out to purchase the geekiest watch I could find. That thing transferred phone numbers from my computer just by holding it up to the computer screen, and it was like wearing a hocky puck. I came to hate the thing, and have taken to purchasing the plainest watch I can find. One with actual hands, and a mechanical date function.
One of the things that I never understood about email clients was why they insisted on trying to store all of the contact information about a person. Who sends things to a snail mail address from an email client? Attempting to keep these things synched with your regular contact manager (like a PDA) is silly because I never try to send email from my PDA, and I have three times as many email addresses as I have real world address and phone number sets.
Inappropriately added functionality usually just makes a device more difficult to use, or at least distracts from its primary function. I have a PDA for my addresses; I don't need them on my cell phone. I don't want to have to whip out an entire PDA every time I make a call. The games are cute, but they just drain the batteries more quickly. The only unusual feature that I actually use on my cell phone is the Direct Connect, which I consider to be a logical extension. Everything else is a waste of electronics, a waste of my time, and a waste of the energy it takes to lug the thing around.
Wake up - the future is arriving faster than you think.
Which often results in products that suck, of course, cause the work that makes for a really good product is usually subtle, or even invisible. Which means you can't sell it. So you concentrate on crap that actually makes your product less useful. You might call it the Copeland Effect.
It's not that there's no market for simple phones, it's that the microprocessor revolution has reached the point that there's so much excess capacity in the cheapest phones they can make they might as well throw in some doodads.
Find me one cellular company -- just ONE -- whose cheapest phone doesn't have some basic games onboard.
I beg to differ - one of the few things stopping me from purchasing a phone is the fact that I do not want to pay for hundreds of features that I will never use. All I want is an address book and a way to make calls.
...never assume that your preferences are the market's preferences. I simply want a plain phone too. And I think phones will lots of gadgets will dominate. That's not a contradiction. That is simply a realization that I'm probably not average. Why I buy AMD and think Intel will still dominate the mass market too.
Same with that incredibly cool geeky tech gadget - it might be a hit on slashdot, lots of support. And when you try selling it to Joe Average, it's a flop. Or the other way around. I know there are lots of products which I'd never buy, that are still huge hits. Maybe it's not for your market segment. Maybe it's not for you in specific. Neither of that may matter, though.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
"When the phones with the features are as cheap as the plain jane phones, then they will replace them." My cell phone, which has capabilities for Internet Access (if I chose to put it on my plan) and a handful of games, and a calculator, and probably some other stuff I don't even know how to use, came free with my cheapskate call plan. When you can get these extra unnecessary features without paying a dime for them, there's no reason not to get one if the part you want works.
Member of Orkut? Annoyed with spam?
I hate to see the demise of plain cell phones. I don't mind if others want to waste their money on these "services" (really, just methods to entice fools to part with their money), but as the phones get more complex, they are more likely to fail.
I'd hate to be in an emergency when I really need my phone, only to have it fail because of some bug in the software which is related to a game or the camera.
Proverbs 21:19
The word "phone" means sound, meaning speaking to someone. The way to think of cellphones now is to think of them as "all the electronic devices I need to carry with me all in one package." That is the future of them, and it's great. Sure, a lot of people still just want voice and a phone book, but that is a commodity market now. Manufacturers don't make money selling those. Manufacturers make money selling camera/PDA/Web/music/video/game phones. Hey, you can always buy the lowest-end phone and you won't be paying for extra features you don't want. However, you can't really buy a phone without messaging and wireless web these days. Just don't use those features and let the rest of us have fun sending phone pictures.
"I beg to differ - one of the few things stopping me from purchasing a phone is the fact that I do not want to pay for hundreds of features that I will never use. All I want is an address book and a way to make calls."
Most companies are giving you the phones with all the features when you signup. What is a bummer is that you have to switch carriers every so often to get a newer phone.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
To be honest, to me this smacks of Luddism; the additional features you bemoan clearly don't add to the cost of the phones, as the 'baseline' phone price hasn't increased in the past 3-5 years - in fact, it's decreased. I don't know of any phones on the market which do not have "an addressbook and a way to make calls", so the argument is basically pointless.
On the flip side of the argument, I've been using a Sony Ericsson P900 since it came out (and the P800 before that) - it's at the other end of the spectrum to the type of phone you describe, having a full-function PDA, Web browser and camera included - and it's been a total revelation. Having instant Web access wherever you are is astoundingly useful, and applications which make specific use of this feature are starting to appear - for example, I use a nifty little program which downloads the weather forecasts and exchange rates every day (or on demand), so that these data are always available to me. Until you try it, you won't think it's any great shakes, but once you have, you won't go back...
In short: the additional features aren't useless. If you don't want to use them, don't use them, but most people will get utility from them. And they're not adding to the cost of the phones; the increased sales of new models lead to economies of scale which bring down the cost of all phones. Win-win.
At some point this morphs into believing that "because we're offering it, it must be what the market wants". Basically people making the standard mistake of confusing cause-and-effect and also cause-vs-correlation.
Market "researchers" who make a living off this play off this fuzzy thinking all the time. Obviously if you tell people what they want to hear ("you're doing a great job trying to put an expresso maker in a cellphone"), they like you more and pay you money!
When I purchased a new phone about 6 months ago, one of the features I was looking for was a phone WITHOUT a camera. The problem was, that all of the high end(ie small) phones had cameras built in. I finally found one, but this is going to be a problem for many employers/employees. Where I interned last summer (a major defense contractor), cameras of any kind were not allowed on site. This means that if I had purchased a camera phone I would not have been able to take it to work with me. Many people were already starting to bring camera phones to work, and this was last summer. This is where the problem for the employer begins. Does the employer fire an employee that brings a camera phone to work? In the case of defense contractors this can get really ugly, because the company can get in big trouble if they find out that there are unauthorized camera going to and leaving the plant site every day. This puts the employee and the employer in a bind because it is very reasonable for an employee to want to bring a cell phone with him to work, but even if they leave it in their car while they are working, if it is a camera phone it is still illegal.
Who decided cellphones should have tiny buttons, in staggered rows? Hint to you designers: look at a Western Electric POTS 2500 (touchtone) set.
1 2 3
4 5 6
7 8 9
* 0 #
There! Do it like that!
The latest Slashdot meme.
So I recently had the opportunity to get a new cell phone (Read: My old Motorola StarTac got busted.) I went out and did a little shopping. Not only did I find out that there was no compelling reason for me to upgrade, but that the new phones actually got a worse signal than my "old" StarTac. So I tell the counter person that I just want a new StarTac. Thankfully, they still make these, and I was able to get one. And the reason I think this article is BS...is that he told me that, STILL, the old clamshell StarTacs are their best-selling phones. I think I got mine over 6 years back. That says alot. I can't see myself getting a new cell phone until they combine a fully-functional PDA and a cell phone into one, and sell it at a cheap price. And that's only because I've been needing a PDA recently, but hate carrying more than one electronic gadget.
People don't realize, and it's not really documented, but *any* nokia phone with a IR/BlueT/serial connection will export the addresses in a XML format. check it out.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
The cell phone market is slowly evolving, just as the automobile market did.
In the beginning, cars were simple and unreliable. Then lots of extra fancy features got added, but the cars were still unreliable. Finally, the cars got reliable, and now you can get them with or without the fancy features.
Right now, the cell phone manufacturers are foolishly thinking that they can cell more phones by adding more features. And for a short while, their sales will go up. But the sales will drop again as people learn that the phones still aren't reliable or easy to use.
Slowly, the manufacturers will learn that reliability is important for both simple phones and snazzy ones. If a phone isn't durable, is difficult to use, doesn't get good reception, or has bad sound quality, nothing else matters.
Market forces do work in a true capitalistic economy... they just take a long time to balance out.
Moderator hint: a comment is neither "Flamebait" nor "Troll" if it is true.
When I got back from working in London, I was looking for a new carrier that had some of the features I had seen in while I was over there, namely SMS and WAP.
How stupid and pointless is SMS? I mean, really, all I need is a phone to make calls with. I don't need silly doo-dads like text messages! It's a phone! I just need to use it to call people!
Yet, text messages have completely penetrated American culture (as they had in London). Conversations have overhead. "Hi, how are you, how's the weather, how are the kids [INSERT REASON FOR CALL HERE] Well I should be going, have a great day, yeah we really should go skiing some time, okay, I'll call you next week, have a great week, blah blah blah". Text messages, on the other hand, are concise. "I got tickets to the superbowl, yay me". And if the recipient is away from her phone? Fine, she'll get it whenever.
And, thus, almost everyone who bought their phone "just to have a phone to make calls on" and conceded to having text message capability has really enjoyed the text capability. A couple months ago, my father got his very first mobile phone and was sending me text messages within a week.
WAP hasn't taken off as strongly in the United States, probably because it costs an extra couple of bucks (and, thus, unlike text messages can be averted). However, those who did break down and pay the extra couple of bucks think it's the best thing since sliced bread. If, for some God-awful reason, I have to be away from televisions on Sunday, I can get the football scores immediately. Just 45 or so minutes ago, I checked the weekend weather and ski reports at lunch.
So why are we so averse to technology (or techno-creep)? I constantly hear even technophiles saying "I don't need my phone to do that". Get with it: YOU DO NEED YOUR PHONE TO DO THAT, YOU JUST DON'T KNOW IT YET!
Most of the "new mobile phone technology" has been alive and kicking in Europe, the UK, Asia, and Africa for years before coming to the antiquated United States. It has all been tested in those climates. It is all successful technology before it reaches the United States.
Which brings us to the latest debacle. Camera phones. Camera phones have seen wild success in the UK. As they caught on, the Brits found new uses for them and just continued until millions and millions of images were flying through the clouds over London.
Personally, I'm just waiting for my contract to expire so I can get the best and brightest camera phone out there. I already know I can use it to take pictures of the goofy things I see every day and send them to my friends. It also allows me to have a cheap digicam on my person at all times. Sure, it's only 640x480, but all I usually want is a "look, it's me on top of Mt. Everest! Hi mom!" for the ole' website. I'm not shooting weddings.
Whoever said necesity is the mother of invention is dead wrong. Invention is the mother of creativity.
:wq
... computers you could talk to.
But what do we get?
Telephones you type on.
Insanity is the last line of defence for the master diplomat. But you have to lay the groundwork early.
This is a very important concept. It addresses our natural proclivity to project our response, or desires or thoughts onto others. Its okay that you don't want all those silly features but it seems most others do. Address book, camera, sms, and alot of ring tones to choose from are for me. I would never bother with the games.
Yes, of course. The Rice Crispies machine. A simple set of photos of the outside allows them to clone it. Here's a roll of film I took of my car. Make a fuel injected 4-cyclinder DOHC engine now, please.
Oh, you can't? Hmmm. Funny.
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Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
- It is usually with you and having it don't make you geek. :) - will fly! :)
- It's smaller and easier to fit in pocket.
- Usually GPRS is available and easier to use than other wireless methods available for PDAs
- Having Java, at least compatible with Turing machine
- Or having WAP+GPRS and webmin shell connection -
same thing (but unsecure
- Address book is safe, it's in flash, possibly also copied into SIM card and can be immediately transmitted to your online address book. Having had a lot of troubles with the power-dependent RAM in PDAs, I can say that it's really a good feature.
The US Government, including the US Military buys tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of cell phones (and various other consumer-grade communications devices) for its personnel & civil servants every year. And due to security restrictions, and rules regarding communications devices within restricted work spaces (or even restricted compunds), phones with cameras, voice recorders, 'walkie-talkies', and any other features which can be utilized to physically - or even virtually - transport data/information (including SBU [Sensitive But Unclassified] and FOUO [For Official Use Only]) are strictly and unequivocally verboten . Some spaces forbid even carrying your phone into it, even if it is turned off - and irrespective of what features it has! Therefore, there will always be a market for "one-trick pony" cell phones. I highly doubt that the manufacturers would shoot themselves in their collective foot and obviate probably one of their biggest customers world wide. And it's a fairly safe assumption that other world governments/militaries have similar restrictions for their personnel's use of phones as well. So, unless they come up with a way for the government(s) to permanently 'lock out' those features that could be construed as "security risks", I can't see the simple 'entry level' cell phone/communicator going away any time soon.
Regards
- Que profuturus est maeror causa sententia Caelestis
I've got a T610, and I'm very happy with it..why? Because it was free to me. In fact, I got $100 cash back from "buying" it. It's a cell phone where i can make calls flawlessly AND has those "snazzy" features that i didn't pay for but can still use. Of course, you can argue that the cost of the phones is built into the ultra expensive plans in the US(compared to a $6/mo 500 anytime unltd. night/weekend I had in Taiwan), but I am a lowly consumer with no control over those factors, so I might as well be satisfied with what I have.
h-t-t-p-colon-slash-slash-slash-dot-dot-org
I was at a game development conference a while back aimed at small/portable game platforms. One of the talks I attended went into the expected growth of the phone gaming market, and what types of games are the most popular (and why).
One of the important facts that came out is that most people who buy a phone that can download and play games will eventually do it, even if they didn't know or care about the ability to do so when they bought the phone.
It was also mentioned that the major carriers are aware of this, and plan to start only selling phones that support downloadable games and ringtones. They all those additional $1 and $2 purchases.
I also found it interesting that one of the best selling (and most consistant) games is hangman. It was strongly pointed out at the conference that most of the phone game market does NOT consist of traditional gamers, and their interests to do lay in the same things.
PS:
I recently bought a new phone with bluetooth. I didn't want the camera, but couldn't get the rest of the stuff I wanted without it.
Since then I've used it quite a bit, and not for the reasons you expect. For example, it's a really great way to entertain a 5 year old at a restaurant.
plus-good, double-plus-good