Mobile phones

[Drago]

As you all know, I don't do smart phones. I think they're horrible things, as addictive as crack cocaine and almost as expensive. I hate the fact that walk outside on any given day and 1/3 to 1/4 of people will be walking around staring at a smart phone (and in London then complaining when it gets nicked out of their hand).

So I don't have one, and I'm quite happy thank you very much..

But a thought occurs.

Mobile phones are now music players, sat navs, GPS devices (although not terribly good yet), as well as phones. As a consequence sales of dedicated MP3 playrs, sat navs, etc, are plummeting.

So my questions are thus - will there come a day when these things will become impossible to buy as stand alone items, or else so hideously expensive that only the dedicated hobbyist or someone needing it for work would buy one? At that point I guess I would have to give in and buy one if I wanted those things - how far in the future do you think that would be?

 

[Mo1959]

Suspect it will be a few years yet but I'm sure it will happen.

Although I have an iphone I am not one who requires to have it stuck in my hand 24/7. It only becomes addictive if you let it. I usually forget to actually take it with me. Lol.

They have become quite good as sat navs now. I used an app called Co-pilot the other day to do a route I didn't know and it worked perfectly. More and more cars are coming with sat nav built in now so even that will become redundant...........just the way things are going just now.

It also annoys me seeing people so fixated with them and I'm sure they are becoming a dangerous distraction.

 

[summerdays]

No idea, but I used mine with a battery pack yesterday as it's getting older! Throughout the day it was used for a number of different reasons, including messages, lots of photos, weather forecast (general), cloud cover amounts, star gazing identification, OS map on a walk, google maps for direction, searching for today's plans, playing games on an app, recording my activity with a tracker, updating Facebook, etc!

I have to admit I love my phone and I'm one of the addicted! I did carry a camera as well on the walk but it was a lot heavier and was running out of battery itself. I used to buy paper maps but they can become slightly out of date (as can the online map) and Mr Summerdays complains about the entire shelf they occupy to store.

I think that there will be a need to some devices that are specialist but that they will become more rare and therefore as you say the price will go up.

I think the phone will be a jack of all trades but a master of only a few of them!

 

[Shut Up Legs]

I think that for phones to replace these other devices, their battery life would have to improve a lot. Perhaps one day this will occur, but from what I've seen, too many phone manufacturers keep adding features to phones (and other electronic devices) without compensating for the fact that these features just drain batteries faster.

 

[Beebo]

It is wrong to call them a phone.
They are powerful personal computers with a phone app installed as standard.

 

[PaulSB]

To answer @Drago I would argue we are already there. My, old iPhone 5, gives me email, web surfing, film on demand, TV live or on demand, music, Sat Nav, activity monitoring, GPS, Strava, camera, photo storage, spreadsheets, calculator, the Guardian, books, alarm clock, weather, diary, banking, OS maps, railway and bus timetables.........there is more but I've lost the will to list it!!!!

I know I only scratch the surface with this stuff when I watch my kids.

Now I chose to have a Garmin and a Vivoactive HR because I feel these provide their functions better. I also have a Microsoft Surface Pro 4 because it gives me some functions more pleasurably.

Saying the above the only two things which would drive me to buy a new phone would be a larger screen, of secondary importance, and better battery life. Even battery life I see as an inconvenience rather than essential - I charge regularly through the day and carry a quality battery pack for when this isn't practical.

 

[Levo-Lon]

These smart phones are a technical marvel, sadly most of the humans that can't function without them are not, phone in face life.
We're already a non communicative society with these phones, it's ruining communication and personality.
There's lots of good points but we are losing lots of social interaction on the face to face front.
Where its going i dont know, I'll Google it

 

[Oxo]

These smart phones are a technical marvel, sadly most of the humans that can't function without them are not, phone in face life.
We're already a non communicative society with these phones, it's ruining communication and personality.
There's lots of good points but we are losing lots of social interaction on the face to face front.
Where its going i dont know, I'll Google it

Just ask Siri.

 

[Jason]

A modern smartphone is already a Jack of all devices, it may not be a master of any,but comes darn close to a few.
I used to think the picture quality would take years to catch up,but for the casual snapper they are brilliant. Sat Nav is as good as dedicated devices with apps such as co-pilot and Waze. Email on the move is a god send,allowing me to contact customers located abroad within seconds to arrange access for me into their London HQ's. Maps show how to get there. Tube map shows which line I need to catch. Waze indicates best route to drive.
Recently installed Skype for business and can participate in voice over IP meetings,as thought I were sitting at my laptop.
It really has become indispensable to my professional life.

Having said all that, my wife constantly moans at me for NOT taking my tiny iphone SE with me on weekends and days off. She doesn't appreciate the freedom I feel of being "unplugged" from the World for a few hours.
The kids still ask us,how we survived life without a mobile phone until we were into our 20's

 

[Lonestar]

Yup I'm with Drago.I hate mobile phones and only carry mine when going to work.

I see loads of people distracted by the blasted things all the time.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

They are a tool and about as addictive as, well, Allen keys.

 

[swansonj]

As you all know, I don't do smart phones. I think they're horrible things, as addictive as crack cocaine and almost as expensive. I hate the fact that walk outside on any given day and 1/3 to 1/4 of people will be walking around staring at a smart phone (and in London then complaining when it gets nicked out of their hand).

So I don't have one, and I'm quite happy thank you very much..

But a thought occurs.

Mobile phones are now music players, sat navs, GPS devices (although not terribly good yet), as well as phones. As a consequence sales of dedicated MP3 playrs, sat navs, etc, are plummeting.

So my questions are thus - will there come a day when these things will become impossible to buy as stand alone items, or else so hideously expensive that only the dedicated hobbyist or someone needing it for work would buy one? At that point I guess I would have to give in and buy one if I wanted those things - how far in the future do you think that would be?

If a smart phone is like crack cocaine, what, for heaven's sake, are we to liken Cyclechat itself to?

 

[Dan B]

It is wrong to call them a phone.
They are powerful personal computers with a phone app installed as standard.

Not really. They're consumers of computing power in "the cloud" operated by and in the interests of multinational companies competing for our attention

Which is not to say they're not useful in a multitude of ways, just that we need to be aware of the bargain we've struck

 

[Hugh Manatee]

Work has given me the creation that is the crApple iphone. I have written it with a small p just to annoy them. My problem is I think, my previous phone was the same one I had used for probably 12 years plus; a Nokia something or other. You could make calls all day (important for site based tech support) and the battery would last all the next day too without a charge. I was very happy that no one could email me!
The crApple does so much (for other people anyway), a camera, a computer, a health monitor, a GPS, a wallet, a game station and a myriad of other things I haven't looked at; it has forgotten its a phone.

The battery went from 60% to nothing in a couple of hours. I wouldn't mind but I wasn't even using the thing. My personal problem is I suppose that I don't see it as anything other that a phone. On the plus side, I switch my PC on in the evenings less as I can sort emails on it.

Can I have my Nokia back?

 

[Lonestar]

They are a tool and about as addictive as, well, Allen keys.

Maybe to you,yes but to other people,no.I've NEVER had a problem with someone being distracted with an Allen key.