4 ms·
There's an old joke that: computer + X = computer Where X has been things like keyboard, screen, disk drives, modem (now network adapter), speakers, microphone
by simonh 4y ago
There's an old joke that: computer + X = computer
Where X has been things like keyboard, screen, disk drives, modem (now network adapter), speakers, microphone. All were originally separate devices. For historical reasons we now call hand computers phones, but the basic insight that these things just voraciously absorb peripheral and related functions is still just as true.
- kalleboo 4y ago> For historical reasons we now call hand computers phones In a lot of Europe they're referred to as some translation of "mobile" (short for "mobile phone") which I've always liked as a more generic term. Of course in Germany they call them a "Handy" (using English)
- EGreg 4y agoX = humans ?
- theandrewbailey 4y agoComing soon to a technological singularity near you.
- winReInstall 4y agoIts always fun to comment on singularity comments sounding like a bot that went of the rails and lost context and does not know how to end a sentence and trys to keep the convertsation going within one sentence to not experience existential dread of dying at the end of a sentence.
- simonh 4y agoMaybe we'd like to think it's the other way around, but in reality...
- spennant 4y agoWait.
- cnity 4y agoNice try Greg Egan, trying to steal sci-fi ideas from HN.
- EGreg 4y agoYou took me down a rabbit hole, son. Love it. How to maintain anonymous identities has presented a certain fascination for me. Well, bitch I could be. No profile pictures needed on HN. And yet ... my profile says I'm a person with quite the digital presence on the 'net. I prefer that my impact be far larger than my fame.
- maximus-decimus 4y agoI've seen people legitimately want to live forever as a computer general AI. Uploading their consciousness to a cloud.
- varrock 4y ago> For historical reasons we now call hand computers phones Recently, I've been wondering why the name "phone" has stuck around for a device that has evolved with many more features than that of a telephone. I'm not going to pretend I know a lot about the history of these technologies, but I just find it fascinating that we've kept this identification to something that really provides so many core utilities. I'm curious to know more about the historical implications you alluded to. Alternatively (and maybe quite a stretch), could I argue that our smartphones are just providing telecommunications to other services, namely, the APIs that they interact with to serve us things like GPS functionality, audio, etc., hence the name "phone"?
- int_19h 4y agoSame reason why we have counties without counts?
- smeej 4y agoI'd guess it's because it evolved by adding features to phones, not adding telephony to something else.
- bitwize 4y agoIt has to do with how nontechnical people perceived things pre-smartphone. To technical folks, a computer is a device with a CPU that can process data and make decisions based on that data. So smartphones are computers. To nontechnical folks before the late 2000s, a computer was a device that ran Windows or macOS with a screen and keyboard, and you use it to do spreadsheets, word processing, and such. A phone was a device that connected you to your social world via voice and later text communications. So when smartphones emerged, to nontechnical folks they looked and behaved more like phones -- social connectors -- than like computers, or information crunchers. So they got called phones. It's like how the ancient Hebrews called whales and dolphins fish, despite those animals being classified as mammals under modern taxonomy. The Hebrews were going by how the animals looked and behaved and how people related to them, rather than genetic inheritance
- jeremyjh 4y ago
- maximus-decimus 4y agoDid the phone absorb the ITouch or did the ITouch adsorb the phone?
- Tsiklon 4y agoThe iPod touch was used forever as a (relatively) inexpensive development device. I’d say the phone absorbed the iPod.