zlacker

>>alphab+(OP)
It's starting to feel silly, having a yearly release cycle for smartphones. So much of this product page is focused on new software functions that may have some vague relationship with the slightly upgraded hardware, but that could mostly be released to existing phones. Every new iPhone, Pixel, or Samsung phone basically claims the camera is marginally better and hey, look at these software features that have very little to do with the hardware and should not fundamentally be a reason to upgrade to this phone.

There is so much time, effort, and physical waste that is generated by slightly redesigning phones every year purely for the sake of making sales (as opposed to meaningful improvement upon the existing design or introduction of a new hardware feature). Think not only of people upgrading for the sake of it, but all of the cases, screen protectors, and other assorted accessories cast in plastic for previous models that are garbage now.

It would be nice if we could just space these things out to 5 years or so now, because that's probably how long it takes for anything to change enough to justify a new model.

>>kimber+T71
It's funny because if they did not release a new phone every year, the old phones would be useful for longer. I recently had to replace my iPhone 7s plus because it was getting so slow I sometimes could not get the camera to open as it loaded the system down too much. This was despite the fact that the system said my battery was not degraded (it had been replaced with Apple Care a couple of times).

Of course when it was new the camera opened quickly. And then Apple made their OS more heavy weight every year until my phone slowed to a crawl.

And faster phones are nice, but I think it is worth considering how valuable that really is to us as users and a society, especially if the process involves making loads and loads of ewaste and consuming tons of new resources, and all the emissions their mining and transport involves, when we could simply keep our software slim and our old devices functional.

And the big companies will never do this. Do we need to force them to allow open software to run on these devices, so that clean builds can be patched and maintained when the company over bloats them or abandons them?

>>Taylor+qa1
I don't update my phone every year but I also don't really want the progress of software or tech in general determined by the laggards.

>>sanswo+Xd1
I think that a new phone release should just be warranted. The trigger should be "we made significant improvements that couldn't be applied in software to the old device" instead of "it's October"

>>kimber+Sh1
An improved camera can't be something applied in software, a faster chip can't be applied in software. So by your own standard every version is warranted.

>>sanswo+Tl1
My last three phone upgrades have been decidedly 'meh', and I only upgrade every 2-3 years. There have been some marginal improvements in battery life and performance, and some software niceties; but those get counteracted by bloat, regressions, and UX churn. Replacable battery and storage becoming less common is categorically worse for users.

A phone with upgradable parts and minimal bloat would be better than any recent phone I've had, but it would also be less profitable for Google so obviously they will avoid that as much as possible.

>>rurp+6B1
Honestly, one of my favorite phones was the Motorola (what's now) Power.

Middling specs. Huge battery.

I'm still on a Pixel 4a 5G now, because I haven't seen any reason to upgrade.

But I'm a "I want to be able to accidentally run over my phone with a car, shrug, and go get another one" type of person. (Despite the fact I've never actually cracked a screen...)

>>ethbr1+vO1
I hold no love for Apple but the phone I used the longest was my iPhone 3GS. I think 5 years or so but only because it was jailbroken. (Thanks saurik!) Otherwise it would have been half as useful (or secure since I got fixes to exploits faster than Apple made then).

The initial SailfishOS phone from Jolla was supported for 7+ years and was also a really nice experience.