Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
The mobile technology industry is fascinating. And scary. Phones, tablets, phablets and wearables are just some of the recent inventions that have transformed our lives. Imagine your life without your phone, or your iPad. You can’t.
However, with all this innovation kicking into hyperdrive, our consumer society is obsessed with having the latest version of everything. The new iPhone 6 and 6 Plus were released recently, and aside from the minor changes in screen size: it is nothing revolutionary. And, before the Apple cult members throw eggs at me, the same can also be applied to Android devices – the S5 was barely a new model. And yet, all of these barely distinguishable versions outsell their predecessors. Why?
Because of us. We, the consumers, have shown mobile companies that we will buy every new model. We will create the hype. We’ll throw out our perfectly usable version for the newer, shinier one.
I’m just as guilty as the rest of us; I recently got a new phone even though my old one wasn’t broken; it just didn’t have the updated features that I wanted. Waste is the pitfall of innovation. Out with the old, and in with the new.
