The feature phone. Still big in Japan. Still being sold in the millions. Still relevant, though? And does it even matter what a 30-something tech writer at a Western tech site thinks? Japan’s large elderly population – people who haven’t even heard of Angry Birds, Gmail or Uber – they’re the ones sticking to their flip phones. Hardy, easy to use and cheaper than an iPhone. (If you need a primer on the phenomenon of gara-kei, you should probably read up on that here, but in short, it’s how Japan’s mobile phone market sped ahead with early technologies, then faltered when smartphone competition arrived.) So let’s try using one. The best and newest feature phone available in Japan, no less. It’s pitched as bringing the best smartphone features to the flip form factor. Is it better than a plain, old smartphone? Good lord, no.
Most of the problems that the author had with his smartphone seem more like problems with the user than with the phone. The only real issue I can find is that it lacks an audio jack and music playback.
That just means he picked the wrong feature phone.
There are (or at least, were) several feature phones that supported MP3 playback and microSD cards for storage.
One of my favourite phones (after I got a BlueTooth headset to get away from their horrible proprietary connector) was the Sony Walkman w580i. Great little feature phone, supported J2ME, and had a separate DSP for music that allowed the main SoC to deep sleep while playing music with the screen off.
With feature phones, you really need to look at your use-cases and wants/needs, and get one that supports the features you want/need.
That, or he overlooked the dataport-to-headphones cable.
I like the sly dig at the end that implies that only people who don’t want change would use a feature phone. Yeah, because everyone who don’t need instant access to Instagram and Tinder are inherently against change….
And only three days of battery. I can find smartphones that does that (though it is hard). My last flip phone (that I still miss dearly at times), had 2-3 weeks of battery life.
Some people just need a knife, not a swiss army knife.
And some should not be entrusted with safety scissors…
I’m jealous of the physical buttons.
Supposedly another reason why flip-feature-phones continue to sell in Japan;
http://www.geek.com/mobile/japanese-adulterers-use-fujitsu-flip-pho…
Old article though. There’s probably some destructible number/messaging app somewhere in the App/Play store that provides the same functionality anyway.
Edited 2015-03-26 19:34 UTC
the author of the article has a nasty case of First World Problems.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwvlbJ0h35A
He’d freak out here in southwest New Hampshire where the only people who have smartphones are hipsters and twenty-somethings from out of state since most parents can’t afford to spoil their brats by even bothering to give them a phone, much less a “smart” one.
I still miss answering and hanging up with the flip of the phone. Instead, I have Google voice. It rings, I push the icon over towards answer. A voice asks if I want to answer it – if so, I need to bring up the keyboard and press 1. By then, the person has hung up and I want flip my phone into the cement.
I have an LG Glance (VX7100) with an extended battery. I can talk all day. And standby all month. It works with my bluetooth headset just like a fancier phone (I have a BLU Studio 7″ phablet with my backup prepaid SIM, but I almost never use it for voice or even text). The Glance’s Bluetooth also exchanges things like contacts. Oh, I’ve dropped it several times and the battery has popped out. But it boots in 5 seconds or less.
If I want to text, none of the onscreen keyboards on a phone work. I’d need QWERTY (before the BLU Studio, I used a BLU QWERTY). The keypad works for text-as-text.
It works as my phone and pocket watch. I don’t need a smart watch, smart ring, smart belt-buckle or smart shoelaces.
I have a Samsung tablet (with Groove IP so it is also a phone!). I can actually type onscreen (though keyboard via USB or BT is better). If I can’t find another Glance ($30 refurb!), I’m not sure what I’d do.
Laptops are great for what they do, So are tablets. Phones that try to be something more run into problem that they need to be big to have a huge screen (and they so far don’t have a butterfly screen), but need to fit into a pocket.
And I really don’t get the race toward razor thin. I don’t want a crepe that lasts for under a day, I want a brick that lasts for several. But this is complicated by the manufacturing. I can get an extended battery and battery cover for my glance and almost every feature phone easily. Even the most popular smartphones are hard (and no, I won’t want the charge case, I want to use the USB OTG which is one reason I want the big battery).
Watch if there is an iPad MO or iPhone MO (morbidly obese) that runs for days and then the Android community runs after.
That is the only criticism of my Samsung tablet. Battery life isn’t that good, but instead of simply releasing a different model with more battery (like they do with choice of memory), they try all kinds of strange power saving mode hacks.
Ok everybody! Move along as this apparently is a first world problem and thus we should be ignoring it.
Still carrying my ruggedized SonyEricsson. Can go a week on standby, and with Opera Mini i have easy access to the web if i need to check on something.
And if i need to get something “beefier” online it has bluetooth and HSPA.
Anyways, i read recently that Mozilla is going to bring FirefoxOS to flip and slider phones.
Edited 2015-03-27 02:38 UTC
Mozilla doesn’t make phones.
My phone is still a “dumb” one and I have no plans to change it in the foreseeable future. Granted, is a Nokia E series, which can do some (limited) Internet things, but as I don’t have a data plan, it practically can’t.
Still, I don’t live in the stone age, for the “smart” things I have a Nexus 7 too.
For me, is the perfect setup: the phone is easy to carry and the battery will last long enough.
E-series Nokias are Symbian smartphones…
Yet they don’t even have a half-decent web browser. Not much to do other than checking your email and such.
Yet they are definitely smartphones; don’t reclassify them on a whim. They might be not very good smartphones by todays standards (like weak default browser; because you can install better one), but that’s a different issue altogether.
Coles supermarkets are currently selling the prepaid ZTE Hop V811 smartphone in Australia for AUD39 (USD30).
http://www.ztemobiles.com.au/V811.htm
Why anyone would still buy a feature phone is beyond me.
Decent battery life (i.e. recharge every week instead of every day), for starters?
Edited 2015-03-30 09:16 UTC
You’re not a very bright person, obviously… I’ve had Samsung Galaxy S II, then HTC One X, and some modern BlackBerries, too. Now I bought CAT B100 feature phone few months ago and I’m extremely happy with it. Much more satisfied with it than I was with any of my smartphones. Though I can really dig QWERTY BlackBerries, too.
P.S., just so you do not wonder, I am a tech-savvy person, work in IT and even fixed friend’s phones/tablets (mostly Android) in the past.
Hope this will enlighten you on the subject, so it will no longer be “beyond you”.
Cellphones are for peasants that can not afford a man-servant.