Recent Mobile Phone Advancements

Today, virtually everyone owns at least one mobile phone. Some own even more, with a different phone for work and for family. As the needs people have for phones have increased and more and more are being purchased, mobile sellers have looked to increase their market share by developing new technologies. Some of these technologies include capacitive touch screen abilities, which can detect how the screen or screens on the phone are being pushed, and FTIR multi touch, which can easily read differing levels of pressure over a large space. These technological advancements get many people excited with what the future holds for this latest technology, and could change the way we communicate in the future.

It’s been surprising to see over these last years that mobile phones have had many changes in style and fashion, just as clothes have. While a bit over a decade ago any mobile phone was seen as a sign of status, the large “brick” look that the first phones had quickly went out of fashion, and cheaper and smaller phones began to be developed. Today, color screens are basically a must, and screens that take up the whole screen are now used by those who try to stay with the latest trends.

What actual real world benefits does this latest trend provide? Since there is no keypad to these new phones, touch screen technology is being employed. This doesn’t just involve a user pushing the images that appear onscreen. The user can actually appear to be contacting the programs they use physically. Pages can be flipped through, websites can be scanned down and programs can be opened in finger movements that replicate real word activities.

Not only are these technological developments attractive to the customer, they’re required to get people to continue purchasing mobile phones even when the one they have works perfectly alright. This is called “perceived obsolescence” and generally means the same thing as fashion. Many young children and fashion-conscious adults feel a pang of embarrassment when exposing that the phone they own is a model over a couple of years old, and does not have all the latest gadgets of something like the iPhone. The creators of the latest technology of course encourage these feelings of embarrassment, as this means the number of people looking for a new phone will increase in size.

Perceived obsolescence has an unintended constructive result. Third world countries depend on what the Western world throws away, in order to get these items at a reduced price. This means they are able to have perfectly good clothes that went out of style in the West a couple of years ago. If you ever go to Africa, you’ll also see the phones of a couple of years ago being sold, as the Western customers have gone on to the next technological advancement and are uninterested in buying the old phones. This means that in Ethiopia, where people make in a month what a Western person makes in a day, these disadvantaged people are able to own quite functional phones, with mp3 playing abilities and camera capabilities.

The use of phones around the planet has drastically changed because of people’s self-consciousness over style. It’s preferable to purchase phones based on the technological options they provide, rather than worrying about the style of the phone you buy.

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