4 ms·

At some point isn't it natural for people to just hold on to the phones they already have ? I probably average a new phone ever 18 months or so, but I'm a tech

At some point isn't it natural for people to just hold on to the phones they already have ? I probably average a new phone ever 18 months or so, but I'm a tech enthusiast. No normal person needs a new phone that often. At a point you saturate your market.

rcoilliot 3y ago
I’m also a tech enthusiast but I change my iPhone every 4 or 5 years. And it may be the issue here, there’s not that much incentive to switch from an iPhone to the next one except if you are an Apple fan boy, thanks to the awesome upgrades support. Hope they won’t “fix” it.
- pojzon 3y ago
  If Apple didnt artifically „break” phones with software downgrades - that phone with replaced battery could work perfectly fine for 10+ years. To tackle climate issues we have to enforce an improvement to quality of produced goods. Remember those old German cars that were easy to maintain and could do 1 000 000 miles without major maintenances? Capitalism and consumption enforced on ppl (greed) destroys this world.
  - dehrmann 3y ago
    > perfectly fine for 10+ years Carriers will want you on the new wireless standard before then.
  - avgDev 3y ago
    Wait what? Cars reliability has greatly improved over the years, the tolerances got smaller as the manufacturing process got better. Literally any car today can make it over 100k miles. As a nerd I prefer to work on cars today, you plugin a scanner, run diagnostics and it literally tells you what is wrong with the car. The 1 million miles cars were not trouble free, they were kept running by people committed to replacing everything but the body of the car.
    - pojzon 3y ago
      Not true. Almost every produced Volvo 900 did get to 200k or so without much maintenance - only oil and breaks/lightbulbs. It was not uncommon for them to do 500k miles without major maintenance. Now do that with any direct gasoline injection cars enforced by stupid emission laws. Those car engines are designed to do max 150k and die and you can do nothing about it, no way to fix it. And talk to any cars enthusiast about wiring issues, one wire broken in the car computer ? Well you better buy a new car coz noone will ever ever find it :) Ive been fixing cars as a hobby for 20 years, the quality of cars went downhill super hard and new laws only make it worse by increasing pollution not decreasing it.
supernovae 3y ago
There is also a diminished value of mobile phones today vs yesteryear. * Twitter is dead for all intents and purposes * Lots of mobile apps are dead/dying and people aren't using them in the same way they used to out of privacy or concerns - such as checking in where you eat or tracking your exercise/fitness. (Nike really screwed the pooch here) and see twitter dead * New phones just push performance which isn't really needed when people merely surf the web or click a few apps while they take a crap I'd say a lot of the mobile apps are dead/dying because they gave up on the app store paradigm and went subscription. Take myfitnesspal for example - where its 80 bucks a year to subscribe to use USER GENERATED CONTENT and it isn't shareable because its not an app purchase, but rather a sub. So many apps did this now that the family share is useless.. and lets not forget phones are getting expensive in plans rather than more affordable.. remember the days of cable? that's what carriers like verizon are doing where its hard to avoid disney, hulu or game subs or other crap when you just want a cell phone plan
- codedokode 3y ago
  Telegram is growing though.
- lostemptations5 3y ago
  None of this is really true globally where the main sales falls are indicated. Particularly in Asia there is a huge growth in apps still from ride hailing to social media (TikTok is still allowed there, btw), and data plans are cheap and ubiqutous. Unlimited data can be had for just $30 a month in many countries. Even $10 in some. What is true-- outside of the US -- is an extraordinary galaxy of Android phones available for every price point from cheap $80 (and quite capable RedMis) to $2000 Samsungs. All with dual SIMs and 1 TB capable SD Card slots. Maybe people just don't want to pay for expensive and limited hardware (expansion wise), especially where their monthly salary maybe just $500 USD.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
kotaKat 3y ago
Longer device payment agreements combined with promotional credits designed to trap customers into a single phone also don’t help when yearly releases come out. Many people leaped up to the iPhone 14 and are now about 12-14 months in on a 36 month installment plan. Combined with the deep promotional credits offered that made the phones “nearly free” or “free” for many, we’re now stuck in a rock and a hard place. I plan on buying out my phone after a few more billing cycles since Verizon is crediting close to $22/mo of the phone and I’m only in it for $5.
- 999900000999 3y ago
  I haven't financed a phone for years. I buy my phones cash and pay about 30$ for unlimited data on Mint.
  - tazu 3y ago
    I finance pretty much everything because it's easy to make 5%+ on cash and fixed payments gradually "decrease" with high inflation.
    - 999900000999 3y ago
      Verizon is like 100$ a month. After year 1, your doing better buying the phone out of pocket. 1200 a year for Verizon vs 360$ for Mint. 1k for an iPhone, assume the phone is included with the plan. 2400$ for two years on Verizon vs 1k + 720 for two years of Mint.
      - nytesky 3y ago
        We had Google fi for $25/line for 6 lines. But VZW works out to $31/line for 6 lines; and we got 6 “free” iPhone 14. So it definitely seems like the better deal over the 3 year contract period — $1300 extra for 6 new phones. But I air quote becaus there were some extra activation fees, we pay monthly for the phones but then get a credit to zero it out which I worry is tricking me somehow, and I’m pretty sure our monthly service with VZW is NOT fixed under contract, so maybe they can jack up my monthly bill over the 3 years I’m paying off the phones?? I don’t know. So far, 6 months in, it’s been a good deal but I much prefer buying phone outright and opting for cheapest service — but I THINK this promotion will get me out ahead, as long as I switch back to a cheaper provider at the end and don’t get an escalating service fee before phones paid off.
Zambyte 3y ago
I'm also enthusiastic about technology. That's one of the main reasons I've been running the same phone for 6 years, and ideally it is my last smartphone.
karmakaze 3y ago
I wouldn't expect upgrade cycles to be synchronized in nearly all countries.

rcoilliot 3y ago

I’m also a tech enthusiast but I change my iPhone every 4 or 5 years. And it may be the issue here, there’s not that much incentive to switch from an iPhone to the next one except if you are an Apple fan boy, thanks to the awesome upgrades support. Hope they won’t “fix” it.

pojzon 3y ago
If Apple didnt artifically „break” phones with software downgrades - that phone with replaced battery could work perfectly fine for 10+ years. To tackle climate issues we have to enforce an improvement to quality of produced goods. Remember those old German cars that were easy to maintain and could do 1 000 000 miles without major maintenances? Capitalism and consumption enforced on ppl (greed) destroys this world.
- dehrmann 3y ago
  > perfectly fine for 10+ years Carriers will want you on the new wireless standard before then.
- avgDev 3y ago
  Wait what? Cars reliability has greatly improved over the years, the tolerances got smaller as the manufacturing process got better. Literally any car today can make it over 100k miles. As a nerd I prefer to work on cars today, you plugin a scanner, run diagnostics and it literally tells you what is wrong with the car. The 1 million miles cars were not trouble free, they were kept running by people committed to replacing everything but the body of the car.
  - pojzon 3y ago
    Not true. Almost every produced Volvo 900 did get to 200k or so without much maintenance - only oil and breaks/lightbulbs. It was not uncommon for them to do 500k miles without major maintenance. Now do that with any direct gasoline injection cars enforced by stupid emission laws. Those car engines are designed to do max 150k and die and you can do nothing about it, no way to fix it. And talk to any cars enthusiast about wiring issues, one wire broken in the car computer ? Well you better buy a new car coz noone will ever ever find it :) Ive been fixing cars as a hobby for 20 years, the quality of cars went downhill super hard and new laws only make it worse by increasing pollution not decreasing it.

supernovae 3y ago

There is also a diminished value of mobile phones today vs yesteryear. * Twitter is dead for all intents and purposes * Lots of mobile apps are dead/dying and people aren't using them in the same way they used to out of privacy or concerns - such as checking in where you eat or tracking your exercise/fitness. (Nike really screwed the pooch here) and see twitter dead * New phones just push performance which isn't really needed when people merely surf the web or click a few apps while they take a crap I'd say a lot of the mobile apps are dead/dying because they gave up on the app store paradigm and went subscription. Take myfitnesspal for example - where its 80 bucks a year to subscribe to use USER GENERATED CONTENT and it isn't shareable because its not an app purchase, but rather a sub. So many apps did this now that the family share is useless.. and lets not forget phones are getting expensive in plans rather than more affordable.. remember the days of cable? that's what carriers like verizon are doing where its hard to avoid disney, hulu or game subs or other crap when you just want a cell phone plan

codedokode 3y ago
Telegram is growing though.
lostemptations5 3y ago
None of this is really true globally where the main sales falls are indicated. Particularly in Asia there is a huge growth in apps still from ride hailing to social media (TikTok is still allowed there, btw), and data plans are cheap and ubiqutous. Unlimited data can be had for just $30 a month in many countries. Even $10 in some. What is true-- outside of the US -- is an extraordinary galaxy of Android phones available for every price point from cheap $80 (and quite capable RedMis) to $2000 Samsungs. All with dual SIMs and 1 TB capable SD Card slots. Maybe people just don't want to pay for expensive and limited hardware (expansion wise), especially where their monthly salary maybe just $500 USD.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

kotaKat 3y ago

Longer device payment agreements combined with promotional credits designed to trap customers into a single phone also don’t help when yearly releases come out. Many people leaped up to the iPhone 14 and are now about 12-14 months in on a 36 month installment plan. Combined with the deep promotional credits offered that made the phones “nearly free” or “free” for many, we’re now stuck in a rock and a hard place. I plan on buying out my phone after a few more billing cycles since Verizon is crediting close to $22/mo of the phone and I’m only in it for $5.

999900000999 3y ago
I haven't financed a phone for years. I buy my phones cash and pay about 30$ for unlimited data on Mint.
- tazu 3y ago
  I finance pretty much everything because it's easy to make 5%+ on cash and fixed payments gradually "decrease" with high inflation.
  - 999900000999 3y ago
    Verizon is like 100$ a month. After year 1, your doing better buying the phone out of pocket. 1200 a year for Verizon vs 360$ for Mint. 1k for an iPhone, assume the phone is included with the plan. 2400$ for two years on Verizon vs 1k + 720 for two years of Mint.
    - nytesky 3y ago
      We had Google fi for $25/line for 6 lines. But VZW works out to $31/line for 6 lines; and we got 6 “free” iPhone 14. So it definitely seems like the better deal over the 3 year contract period — $1300 extra for 6 new phones. But I air quote becaus there were some extra activation fees, we pay monthly for the phones but then get a credit to zero it out which I worry is tricking me somehow, and I’m pretty sure our monthly service with VZW is NOT fixed under contract, so maybe they can jack up my monthly bill over the 3 years I’m paying off the phones?? I don’t know. So far, 6 months in, it’s been a good deal but I much prefer buying phone outright and opting for cheapest service — but I THINK this promotion will get me out ahead, as long as I switch back to a cheaper provider at the end and don’t get an escalating service fee before phones paid off.

Zambyte 3y ago

I'm also enthusiastic about technology. That's one of the main reasons I've been running the same phone for 6 years, and ideally it is my last smartphone.

karmakaze 3y ago

I wouldn't expect upgrade cycles to be synchronized in nearly all countries.