Smart Phones in the Sky

I have always been geeky proud of the fact that I am an early adopter of new technology. My very first digital camera was one that did not even have a display screen on the back, it was a big and cumbersome thing, and it ran on 4 AA batteries. The images were blurry, and I do not even believe that the resolution was 640x480 to be honest. BUT, it was a digital camera, and I did take it all over the world with me, torturing my friends as I explained how it worked. It died a tragic death when my sister dropped it into a bathtub. Even drying it out would not revive it.


The next camera that I had was a Sony Mavica. It used a floppy disk as the drive, and it was a miracle to me. I was able to pop in the disk,and it had a display on the back, as well as some (primitive) special effects, a lens case, and a zoom. I took thousands of photos with this camera, and finally passed it onto a niece when I got a newer camera because my PC did not have a disk drive. The last that I spoke to her about the camera, she had gotten an adapter for it, so that the camera would take a memory stick, and then she was able to download the photos directly to the computer again. I said "How long has it been since you used it?", and she told me that it had been about 2 weeks, that she keeps it around as a back up camera.  That made me feel really good, even though I thought that the camera would have been a long gone relic by now. 

This brings me to my topic. Smart Phones. My first cell phone was one of the Nokia's that everyone seemed to have in the 1990's. The major deal with those phones was that the faceplate was changeable, and, when you removed the faceplate, there was a little smiling face looking at you. I know it had a game on it, too. It was called snake I believe. Anyway, technology changes, and one of the last Nokia's that I owned had issues with constant low battery life. That did not delight me.

Around the time that my contract was due to expire, Blackberry released a color model of its' smart phone. Color. It seemed like such a big deal at the time. I called the people with Sprint/Nextel, and I quickly signed up for the phone. It arrived by mail about 10 days later. I wanted to like it so much, I really did. The phone was too wide for my smaller hand, causing cramps, and I would have to either cut calls short, switch to speaker phone, or resort to calling back from another phone. Additionally, the phone did not have a strong battery life, and I found the motions to access features to be counter intuitive. I was very glad that Sprint took the phone back. Apparently, a lot of women were having the same problems with the phones that I was.


Since that time, I have been through a lot of phones. I have had the Razr. (Hated it. Too damn delicate) to the Krzr (Loved the one for reception. I was able to use it downstairs/underground when I worked at Disney, and Disney is notorious for the areas downstairs suffering from poor reception. But I hated it for delicateness and poor battery life) There have been many phones in between then and now. A pal of mine offered to let me use their Apple iPhone when they first came out. They were going to be out of the country for 3 weeks, and wanted me to babysit the phone for calls. I jumped at the chance to use the phone I had only seen on tv and the internet. 


I tried it and I did not like it. I explained that I liked the phone that I was using at the time (Palm Centro) because it had better reception, better battery life, and the calls did not drop like they did on the Apple, as well as the fact that making a call on the iPhone was a pain in the butt. 


Which leads me to the next part of this.


 I am not a bad person because I do not like Apple. I am happily a non Apple product user. I use the Creative Zen in place of any Apple music delivery product. I do not want to jump through all of the hoops that I saw when Apple released its' iPod. 
Having to use their software to manage my music seemed like a bother, when I could simply drag and drop to my Zen. Additionally, the battery life on my Zen is nothing short of incredible, and I have been very happy with it. I feel no need to go past 30G of music (and other media). If I need more than that, I should probably take some things off and replace them  from my player. 


I like the phone that I am using right now. I have a Palm Pre. I like this phone a good deal. I know that iPhone can do 9 zillion things that my phone cannot do, but personally for me, the small size is nice for my smaller hand, I only have to charge it about once every 24 hours (unless I am involved in a gab fest with someone. Recently, I was on the phone with a gal pal for over 3 hours, and I still had battery left.) 


Which brings me to my final point. I AM an early adopter of technology, when the technology that I am using wears out, or becomes too difficult to maintain or use. I do not jump on the bandwagon of the latest and greatest gadget just to be able to say that I have it. Sure, there are loads of things that I would like to have, and that I want, and even some that I will tell you that I need, but, being on a budget limits purchases to what I really really need. 


So here is my point. In Dallas, a man who wanted the new iPhone paid 500.00 to a kid in line who had waited all night. He stated that it was worth the money to not have to wait, and to be guaranteed a new iPhone. Seriously. I do not even know where to go with this. Obviously, he has disposable income. That is awesome. But to throw $500.00 simply for a place in line is beyond crazy. 


Coincidentally, on the same day of the new iPhone release, I had to go to Best Buy to get my Palm Pre looked at. What a horrible situation that was, but, I was happy because I was able to get my needs met, my phone serviced, and I am a happy customer. This is not the same for all of the people that were there, waiting in line for the iPhone. People were angry, shouting, yelling, and saying terrible things. What is that going to do? Each store has limited stock. That is how it is. Do you think that acting like an ass is going to get you a phone when they are sold out? No. Because they are sold out. 


Ads are being run on the internet now, creating a false embarrassment, addressing people who have "old phones". Is your phone old? The ad asks. Do you have an old cell phone? Are you embarrassed? That is absolutely ridiculous. We are in a horrible economy right now. People are jobless, and here are ads that are touting the merits of having a new phone. Give me a break. If it works, meets your needs, and is functioning the way that you need it to, then you are fine. Save your money. You don't need a new phone.