Smartphones Are Boring. That’s Good!
When technologies get boring is when they become truly interesting. We’re just starting to see the cultural value of smartphones.
Maria felt the vibration of her phone in her pocket. The kind that meant there was actually a phone call coming in. As in, someone wanted to talk to her. Like a conversation. Maria ignored the call, not even bothering to take the phone out of her pocket. Calls were so annoying. Texts so much easier.
This scenario plays out around the world everyday, across many cultures. A survey recently shows that about a quarter of people aged 18–34 don’t answer their phones for a voice call. Many people think a phone call means a scam or bad news. Our relationship with phones, vi smartphones, is changing.
Most people think the first smartphone was the Blackberry, or perhaps the iPhone? The first smartphone was produced by IBM in 1994, called the Simon. It had a touch screen and several apps, including, best of all, the ability to send a fax!
It seems almost impossible to imagine our world without smartphones. There’s an estimated 6.7 billion smartphones in the world today with almost 70% market penetration globally. Consider that there’s about 8 billion people.
