this post was submitted on 14 Sep 2023
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Eh. I mean, are there any great innovations left when it comes to smartphones? They kinda all just look and do the same nowadays.
They sure made USB3 look like a breakthrough innovation, though...
Functioning AI voice assist, foldable, better peripherals, better input systems, better data transfer between systems, more durable, better battery life, repairable, more sustainable, better UI, decentralised communication options, meshnet options, etc.
There's plenty to do about smartphones that needs innovating...
They are always making Siri better (check out the news for it), I super do not want a foldable phone, the Apple peripherals are quite good, the data transfer between Apple systems is one of the main appeals of Apple, never broke an Apple product unless I chuck it at a wall, battery life is quite good I have a 4 year old phone that still has 24 hour battery life, Apple is committed to making not just their products but the entire company carbon neutral by 2030, Apple UI is also one of the main appeals since it’s so nice.
Literally every major company on the planet is, doesn't mean they actually are working towards it.
They are tho
Wow I'm sure the website from apple full of promises is a good indicator of how good they're actually doing for the environment. I'm sure they're also planning to stop their model based on mass producing new hardly-repairable phones every year and pushing consumers to buy them rather than keeping their functioning ones, sometimes by cutting support and bricking their old phones.
Really debatable, since apps battery consumption increases balances it out. It really feels like we have to upgrade just to keep up.
REALLY debatable. There's some UI updates that I abhor. Several have reduced functionality.
Apple is always doing all of that other than the fokdable, which has been turned for a long time.
AirDrop and AirPlay are always getting better between Apple products. They literally just made the iPhone titanium for better durability. It has better battery life pretty much every year.
This one is more repairable than ever with the easily removable glass.
Those are all things Apple announces every year and everyone shits on them because it’s not innovative enough, like every year needs to be 2011 again when phones were making massive leaps year over year.
Like oh, this chip is only 20% faster than the last one with only 10% better battery life. Yawn.
Last I checked they're not very keen on repairability (Being able to remove glass and being able to fix everything are two different things) and sustaniability (and no making a phone more efficient/produce less ghg/etc does not mean caring about sustainability when your whole model is mass producing and selling new phones every year while encouraging customers to ditch their current functioning phones for the new one, sometimes by purposefully removing support for them or bricking them with updates)
iPhones are more repairable than their comparable flagships from other companies. https://www.ifixit.com/smartphone-repairability
iFixit gave the 14 and 14 plus a 7 for repairability and a 6 for the pros, compared to a 3 for the Galaxy S22 and S22 ultra. The Pixel 6 pro only got a 5 and the base pixel 6 got a 6.
The 15 pro introduced more repairability with changing the back glass mechanism to be easily swappable, which was the biggest issue with earlier pro models and why they only got a 6.
They support phones longer than anyone else, and have a massively more robust recycling program to recapture virtually everything from older models and use them in new ones.
Also, plot twist, every company has the same model of encouraging you to buy a new one every year. That’s not specific to Apple in the least. Other companies essentially force you to upgrade sooner by dropping support entirely after a couple of versions while Apple supports for 5-7+ years.
At no point have I defended other companies, other than FairPhone, on either of those points.
Honestly, this is such a weird take because, yes. Of course there are innovations left, you just cannot think of them yourself now because then they obviously would not be innovative but rather same old same old. Now the rate of new innovations probably did slow down a lot, I agree with that, so its harder to find something that is innovative in this space.
Of course, they're just being done on Android until Apple takes them on later and markets them as their innovations.
Foldables are already a thing and the next iPhone will likely be their version of it.
I've commented this elsewhere in this thread:
I dislike Apple, but I think it's mostly vendors and reviewers that highlight the connector (both protocol and form), Apple isn't doing it.
I think innovations in phones are going to go the other direction honestly. Bringing back shit like eink displays, batteries that last days, fuck it, am/fm... New consumer tech is outpacing the users needs. I see a touch of old standards making a comeback. Hell how old is USB-C?
Fuck it, but an antenna and TV tuner on there. Give Cathode Ray Dude something to enjoy.
What you're describing is not innovation.
Neither is what Apple is doing and I guess thats my point. How much higher tech to people reasonably need or want in their pocket? Is innovation for its own sake really innovation? They are just remarketing existing tech as features without a demand.
Oh, in that case I would have said something like "Companies are bringing back useful features and call it innovation."
I am holding out for rollables! There still so many things that can be done. Satellite coms and holographic displays are my dreams.
Speaking of sat comms, imagine a cell device with a whole suite of radio tools for amateur operators and professional ones. Im waiting for the FTC to open up some fun bands for us to play with as they depopulate while consumers etc switch to the newer ones.
i just don't see holographic displays being all that great to interact with. they might look pretty, but what's the advantage over what we have now?
Pov: you dont understand what innovation mean.
Innovation is kind of their job