at least when it comes to consumer tech

like i can't even remember the last time i was excited for a new tech thing. maybe my second smart phone, i guess? that one was at least a big improvement from my first one. third was marginally better, and then the fourth, which i'm using now, i feel like i only got because of planned obsolescence (slow down/battery problems etc.)

it's such a stark contrast from growing up in the 90s/early 2000s

  • cozy [she/her]
    ·
    2 years ago

    it definitely feels like new smartphone features are being targeted at people who are not me.

    who uses stickers? or animoji/memoji? who even cares about AR? do we really need lidar in every phone? how could anyone prefer faceid to a fingerprint scanner?

    there are a few recent-ish innovations that I think are really good though:

    • 120Hz displays make scrolling so much smoother! unfortunately I'm a firefox fan, and firefox is objectively bad. for some reason firefox's main render view isn't on some necessary whitelist to run at 120Hz, so every single time I install an OTA update I need to fiddle with adb to manually override the global frame rate minimum or else Firefox will run at annoyingly-noticeable 60hz while opera and chrome are buttery smooth...
    • machine learning driven features. gmail's compose autocomplete is insane, sms auto-suggested responses can be nice when driving, AI assistants are very useful, and it's nice that my phone can learn things like what brightness I prefer in different environments, what time I wake up (for smarter charging), and which apps deserve more frequent background scheduling (to conserve battery).
    • macro lenses on phone cameras
    • IP67/68 as default
    • 5G (mid-band is fine)
    • CheGueBeara [he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      who uses stickers?

      There was a Russian bear series that had a bunch of hammers and sickles on it. Strong recommend.