Trend Says Smart Phones Are Losing Their Luster

I wrote a bit about this last week but after reading a phonearena.com article my intuitiveness has been proven informative and accurate. The smart phone industry as a whole has been on a decline, not as rapid as the pc, but what does this mean for the future of the actual manufacturers. I remember when the first smartphone had a built in camera on it in a lowly vga quality yet it was still amazing at the time to actually use your camera for a photo. Then Apple revolutionized the smart phone with iOS and showed that you could have a smart phone that worked and worked smoothly and fast too. Palm came out with their Web OS which showed multitasking at its best on a smart phone. Htc came out with the Evo which was the first Wimax/partial 4G device in the US on Androids platform. Screen resolution started to become higher with the start of the retina display on the iphone 4. Nokia released a 41mp camera phone running on Windows as well as their gloves on touch enabled screen. Lg is now coming out with a phone with the volume rocker on the back of the phone and lastly Apple is working on possibly having a fingerprint reader implemented in their next phone. Oh wait also we have flexible screens in the works too. Question is, what out there is actually exciting and makes users want to continue to purchase new phones when the market has become as saturated as the PC world. One month you buy a new phone and a month later there is another one that's out that trumps it in hardware specs. It's becoming too much too little and what I mean by that is that sure you can have one phone that has a killer processor and high res screen but lacks in the camera department, or maybe a great Operating system that's smooth and lacks bugs and has great speakers but has a sub par camera. Even if a manufacturer comes out with a true "Hero" device and has all the killer specs with the great camera, smooth performance, fingerprint reader, loud speakers, fastest LTE, you still won't have a truly unique and exclusive phone for more than a few months at best. Here's where innovation needs to come into play. Why don't we have a phone that does something new and useful and I mean actually useful. We want great call quality, great photos, great ease of use, bigger, faster, smarter, but what's next that will rock the mobile world to the core? How's an actual phone that can just do what it's supposed to do, Simplify life. It's almost ironic sounding because that's what they are supposed to do right? With Facebook, and Instagram, and Twitter, What'sapp, Vine, Slacker, Pandora, Pinterest, and so many more it's almost a joke to me to think that this is making life simpler. Multitasking in my opinion is to be able to do many things at once in a proficient and time saving manner with maximum productivity, not being constantly distracted and glued to your device every time you see an led notification or hear a "ghost ring". Why not have a phone that actually does true multitasking where you don't need to constantly have to open and close apps, switch between multimedia and social applications to constantly stay on top of everything. My theoretic solution to this is simple.. Keep it clean, streamlined, and in the future.. Look at this video and let me know what you think of Nokias concept phone. Is it ridiculous or genius? If you guys have any suggestions or ideas shoot them over to me. I am all about hearing what you think would be innovative and a jaw dropper for the mobile industry and as always thanks for reading!

iOS 7, Samsung, HTC, BlackBerry And More Of The Same Ole Stuff

It's been entirely too long since the last post by myself or the other moderators on here and today will end that with a information overload on all the things we technology lovers care about the most. With that said let's start with Nokia announcing their newest device the Lumia 1020 which is priced at $300 on contract, $650 off, exclusively for AT&T. The phone comes in a variety of colors if you like white, black, or yellow, that is and is limited to 32gb of internal storage and did I mention it's exclusive to only AT&T? On the upside their is a 64gb version which can be purchased through Microsoft directly. So is it a killer of all phones? Maybe in the camera department whereas the camera sensor is stacked with a six lens 41mp camera which is just mind boggling if you think back how cameras used to be less than 8mp and today the standard is that/ However this is a Windows Phone 8 device and is limited to one carrier, so there are obvious pros and cons here. If you are a photo fanatic and like limited apps but a great and overall functional and stable operating system on a phone then pull the trigger. Personally I am satisfied with the 13mp camera on my Galaxy S4 and enjoyed the camera on the iPhone 5 just as much as any other average user. 

Apple has released the beta versions of iOS 7 which seem to be very similar to another existing operating system, cough Android cough, and honestly really doesn't seem to be implementing much innovation other than the home screen moving with your movements which Android has been capable of for years now. All in all after a month with the beta version I decided to go with the Galaxy S4.

Other news we have been hearing a lot about Motorolas X phone which may or may not be a big hit. With Google backing it so much it should be worth a look but from what the leaked specs appear to be it seems a bit under powered and not really something you would think a savior phone should or could be. Speaking of savior phones it looks like Blackberry is having a hard time getting their own z10 out the door as sales numbers came in way below expectations and they apparently have been leaking photos and specs for their new "killer" device and to be frank they are still lacking in the power house department with dual core processors and lower resolution screens it's just the same ole same ole. 

Samsung has released a few new phones within the past few months, one of which is a Galaxy S4 variant called the Active which again is exclusive to AT&T and is waterproof and dust proof and has almost identical specs to the regular S4, minus the Lcd screen and a lower resolution camera. Also Samsung came out with their Galaxy S4 Zoom camera phone which packs a punch in the photo department but not much better than the standard Galaxy S4. Do you see a trend here?

So with that said there are a ton of new devices coming out but from what I have been reading and seeing there is nothing that's coming out that really screams "WOW" or has really any kind of major innovation. So does this mean that the Mobile Phone Generation is starting to finally come to a stand still or worse a decline? The only thing I have seen or have been reading about as of late which makes phones seem like they haven't lost their innovative features is LG's G2 which  moved the volume button on from the traditional side to the back of device which is cool but honestly how useful. Apple is also supposedly working on a finger print reader for their next big release but how many people actually want or need that? Maybe instead of working on phones with one great feature why not make them have all the great features. Possibly a mobile phone in which you can have complete customization. Meaning able to upgrade the ram, or the internal memory, screen, camera sensor, dare I say even processor? I mean why can't a manufacturer actually offer a fully customized device based on what the user wants? Would they really lose that much money from the carriers by offering something that can be as tailored and exclusive as a customized device with your name engraved on it or a specific color or material such as brushed aluminum for the back plate. Guess we shall see what happens with the Motorola X and cross our fingers.

Lastly how about this for an idea, how about someone come up with a device that is as useful as implementing a complete operations system that can fully integrate with your life in every aspect including your vehicle and can be used in a HUD system for your vehicle to offer hands free internet viewing without distracting the driver, or text on screen(windshield) for viewing the internet, making calls, texting, or whatever you want to do with your phone. That's more innovative than a finger print reader in a phone or a quad core processor that can't handle more than a few tasks at a time until it bogs down. Let's see if anyone out there in the near future can do something to give the mobile world that wow factor again. Until the next update, thanks for reading!