Your Love of Your Old Smartphone Is a Problem for Apple and Samsung (wsj.com) 120
The smartphone industry has a culprit to blame for slumping sales: Its old devices remain too popular. From a report: Flashy phones of yesteryear, particularly Apple's iPhones and Samsung's Galaxy S handsets, are getting refurbished, and U.S. consumers are snapping them up. Many shoppers are balking at price tags for new phones pushing $1,000, and improvements on latest launches in many cases haven't impressed [Editor's note: the link may be paywalled; alternative source]. As more people hold on to devices longer, new smartphone shipments plunged to historic lows at the end of 2017. "Smartphones now resemble the car industry very closely," said Sean Cleland, director of mobile at B-Stock Solutions, the world's largest platform for trade-in and overstock phones, based in Redwood City, Calif. "I still want to drive a Mercedes, but I'll wait a couple of years to buy the older model. Same mentality." Another trend borrowed from the car industry that has helped consumers get around sticker shock: leasing. Instead of buying new phones, Sprint and T-Mobile allow subscribers to effectively lease them, allowing them to trade up for the latest device. That option, though, hasn't yet gone mainstream.
[...] Second-hand phones long found their way to Africa, India and other developing markets. But now, U.S. buyers represent 93% of the purchases made at second-hand phone online auctions run by B-Stock, compared with an about-even split between the U.S. and the rest of the world in 2013. Samsung and Apple together sell more than one out of every three phones globally and capture about 95% of the industry's profits. U.S. consumers, spurred by two-year carrier contracts and phone subsidies, were upgrading every 23 months as recently as 2014, according to BayStreet Research, which tracks device sales. Now, people are holding onto their phones for an extra eight months. By next year, the time gap is estimated to widen to 33 months, BayStreet says.
[...] Second-hand phones long found their way to Africa, India and other developing markets. But now, U.S. buyers represent 93% of the purchases made at second-hand phone online auctions run by B-Stock, compared with an about-even split between the U.S. and the rest of the world in 2013. Samsung and Apple together sell more than one out of every three phones globally and capture about 95% of the industry's profits. U.S. consumers, spurred by two-year carrier contracts and phone subsidies, were upgrading every 23 months as recently as 2014, according to BayStreet Research, which tracks device sales. Now, people are holding onto their phones for an extra eight months. By next year, the time gap is estimated to widen to 33 months, BayStreet says.
Too expensive (Score:4, Insightful)
If I think $1300CAD is too expensive for a MacBook Air, you can imagine what I think about iPhone prices.
put back what we want (Score:5, Insightful)
Want to sell your new model for $1,000? For me it's simple. Put back the audio jack, make it a bit thicker and stronger. Add the capability to routinely swap micro-SD cards and I'll gladly pay $1,200. I feel like the new smart phones are still trying to market sexy styling ahead of swiss army knife capability...much like cars.
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If you underpay the people that work to make it happen, maybe it does cost $250
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Lol, do you think Apple and Samsung pay more!! Get real.
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" For me it's simple. Put back the audio jack, make it a bit thicker and stronger."
There are rugged sleeves with an audio jack and even an additional battery.
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In theory, yes. In practice, it's a bunch of Kickstarter projects, and if you happen to be there at the right time, you can order one. Otherwise, you're screwed. None of the major case manufacturers have gotten in on the act, unless I missed something, which is a shame, because that might actually be enough to make me consider upgrading my 6s before its last gasp.
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The situation with PCs is largely irrelevant. You don't carry your printer around with you in your pocket. You do carry your cell phone and earbuds in your pocket. And that's why dongles for mobile devices (including laptops) are bad—particularly when they are required for things that you typically do when away from home, like connecting you
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I'd be happy with two microSD card slots (one internal mainly for storage, one easily accessed externally for backups), and the phone have an unlockable bootloader, or come with a ROM with root ready to go like in LineageOS.
However, even then, would I pay four digits for a phone? $200 gets me a LG Stylo 3 Plus, which has a fingerprint scanner, SD card slot, and decent overall performance. $600 gets me a HTC flagship phone (which can be unlocked via HTCDev, then S-Off done via Sunshine) that has top tier c
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I can see the audio jack thing, but can you tell me what you need or do with a micro-sd card on a phone?
I've never had one, and never noticed I needed something like that, so, I'm curious what your use case is for that.
Re:put back what we want (Score:5, Informative)
You use a micro SD card to not be constrained by 8GB of internal storage which mysteriously has 6GB used with nothing loaded on there.
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Actually, I use a Micro SD card to avoid using MTP (Android's Media Transfer Protocol) because MTP is far slower, and doesn't behave like a normal file system. It doesn't work with rsync and moving files from one directory to another seems to actually require copying them instead of just moving as in a traditional FS.
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Hmm, i just checked, my phone has 128GB storage....guess that's why I never found I ran out of room.
Mine is pretty much pictures....what else do you store on your phone?
Apple made a super easy way - AirDrop (Score:2)
For an iPhone at least, it could give you an easy way to transfer files between the phone and a computer
That already exists, it's called AirDrop, it's all local and does not uses iCloud. Much nicer to use than a microSD card, which you would have to dig up a reader for on the computer.
It also does not require a network connection, as it can work either over WiFi or Bluetooth.
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My phone has 32 GB storage internally, in theory. In practice i'm currently using 19.5 GB of the 21.7 GB available. I'm also currently using 80 GB of the 119 GB available on the SD card.
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I'm on a metered data connection, and I like listening to music, so I use a cheap 32gb card to store all of my mp3s.
I also have pictures, etc on the card. But mostly for music.
Re: put back what we want (Score:2)
This "storage" of which you speak... pray tell; what is it good for??
Are you for real?!
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Actually, yes.
I have like 128GB on my phone, and I've not come close to filling that up, even with pictures and some music.
I mean, its a phone, what else do you store on it that takes up THAT much room?
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My use-case is getting around the annoying iTunes ecosystem. I want to use simple file-system level organization and commands. For a bunch of reasons, I like full tower desktop computers and the command line as the very first icon on the desktop. I travel a lot and keep a full tower desktops in several cities. iTunes seems to think I only need to be tethered to one computer AND THREATENS to ERASE ALL my data because it's synching with a computer other than my "home" computer, which is typically in a com
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Want to sell your new model for $1,000? For me it's simple. Put back the audio jack, make it a bit thicker and stronger. Add the capability to routinely swap micro-SD cards and I'll gladly pay $1,200. I feel like the new smart phones are still trying to market sexy styling ahead of swiss army knife capability...much like cars.
Since you haven't noticed, your opinion as a consumer as to what you want no longer matters.
Manufacturers don't give a fuck what you want. You'll get what makes them the most profit, and like it.
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Correction. I won't get what makes them the most profit, and they'll just stand around slack-jawed wondering why sales are soft.
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Manufacturers don't give a fuck what you want. You'll get what makes them the most profit, and like it.
TFA seem to imply that people don't like it, and that it goes in the way of profits.
Potential Reason (Score:2)
The marketing makes one feel attached (emotionally) to their Phone Choice. The people now are "invested" in that particular phone. They spend money customizing it with a case, and stickers, and become even more emotionally attached. It is a very "personal" device.
Now you (Apple, Samsung) want to take it away from me? What are you thinking???!!!!
Makes no sense (Score:3, Funny)
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I would gladly upgrade from my iPhone 6 to an iPhone X if the damn thing didn't cost $1,000. Maybe they'll have a reasonably priced model available next year.
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How about if they make the old ones slower? (Score:5, Funny)
Naw... too far fetched.
Features (Score:2)
Leasing (Score:2)
Sprint and T-Mobile allow subscribers to effectively lease them, allowing them to trade up for the latest device. That option, though, hasn't yet gone mainstream.
How is this new?
Swappa (Score:2, Informative)
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FYI If you are storing a device with a battery charge it to %50 and leave it in cool place. Unfortunately even under ideal conditions the battery will continue to degrade
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It is not necessarily a love of the old smartphone (Score:3)
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So my last new wonderful, top of the line, latest and greatest phone I bought died just before my two year contract was up, so I bought an older model phone (different brand) on Amazon that was supposed to work with my provider. It was supposed to be a temporary replacement until I could buy a new, latest and greatest phone.... but long story short, it's smaller, slower, and everything I actually need in a phone, so I just decided to just keep it.
Haha (Score:3)
It's funny because the car industry now looks like the old smartphone industry!
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Why would I upgrade? (Score:2)
My phone is primarily for calls, texting, taking photos/videos and putting on social media and a limited number of emails (mostly in the cases of business emergencies). I'm not a big app guy.
My iPhone 5 (no letter extension) works perfectly for this and I am still getting decent battery life - except for the case where it gets dropped in a blender, why would I consider anything else?
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Well, I use an iPhone 4 ... and if it gets stolen or lost, I buy another iPhone 4(s or what ever it is) ...
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"My phone is primarily for calls, texting, taking photos/videos and putting on social media and a limited number of emails (mostly in the cases of business emergencies). I'm not a big app guy."
Ditto here and I don't even do calls. It's good enough and now I even can get a new battery for around 20 bucks.
obsolescence (Score:2, Interesting)
My Nexus 6 is only 2 years old and Google decided it won't get security updates in Oct of 2017. Their suggestion was to pay $900+ for a new pixel phone, so I gave them the middle finger and breathed new life into my N6 by installing LineageOS. I'm glad I did, it has been working great. Google's attempt to forcefully deprecate my phone ahead of its time just hardened my resolve to fight tooth and nail to keep it alive as long as possible.
$200 limit (Score:2, Insightful)
$200 is my limit for a smartphone.
I want:
-replaceable battery
-headphone jack
-usb and bluetooth, WiFi and 4G
-Camera
-GPS
It just has to be "good enough". The camera in the smartphone is crap, the speakers are crap, the software is crap, even on the so-called high end models.
I don't need NFC, I don't need to Pay Apple, or Pay Samsung, or Pay Google to pay for things.
I need to make and receive calls.
I need to take "good enough" photos, I have an SLR for everything else, or even an old point-and-shoot
I would like
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My workplace doesn't have an open guest Wi-Fi access point because they are paranoid about security, and they also have a strict "no devices from home on our network" policy as well. In that case, having a smartphone with a good data plan comes in handy.
I think they're on to something. (Score:4, Insightful)
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The S5 was the best phone, and I too have it. If they sold a Galaxy S5 with a newer OS, 32GB, and a slightly faster CPU then I might buy that. But the newer phones actually lost features. The higher-res screens are really worse, not better. The resolution is pointless and it consumes more battery. I won't buy a new phone if it is *worse* than the prior model. If you lookup reviews for each new phone, the review is basically asking "Is this phone better than the prior one?"
Part of the problem is that t
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Actually the Note 4 is better then the S5. I have yet to find something to upgrade to as I like my replaceable battery headphone jack, and SD Card slot.
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Can you still get security updates for the S5? It seems that Samsung cuts you off after three years after the product was originally released, which kinda sucks for those people who buy it on clearance after the new model comes out.
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WAAAAAH! WAAAAAH! (Score:2)
Free market wins again (Score:4, Insightful)
Who has the bigger problem? (Score:1)
I Don't Love My Phone (Score:1)
Pardon me while I... (Score:2)
... fail to shed any tears for these companies.
What did you expect people would do when they shell out upwards of $700 for a smartphone? Toss it after a year--maybe two--just so you can keep your shareholders and some financial industry analysts happy?
The days of needing a $600+ phone are over (Score:2)
An alternate view on phone lifetime (Score:2)
http://www.asymco.com/2018/02/... [asymco.com]
Dideu argues the average life of a cellphone in large part represents the satisfaction of the user with that device. And in particular, the long life of each Apple device represents the substantial satisfaction of the great majority of users of those devices. So if Apple makes money from the use of any iPhone in their Services and app sales, Apple doesn't see this as the problem that a handset maker such as Samsung sees it.
He quotes Deming:
Dr. Edward Deming once said that
Newer = more anti-consumer (Score:2)
Newer phones are getting increasingly over-priced while removing features and making anti-consumer design changes. Meanwhile, manufacturers are trying more and more underhanded tactics to try and encourage/force users to upgrade sooner than they want/need to.
So yes, fuck you right back, Apple and Samsung.
Good enough, cheap enough (Score:2)
Not long ago, you HAD to buy a high-end phone to get a decent user experience. But now, any midrange at $200-$300 has what it takes to run very well and do everything 99% of the users need.
Why my iPhone is over four years old (Score:2)
My iPhone 4 was a great advance over my original iPhone. My 5S was a big improvement over my 4. My 5S still works nicely, with the latest iOS, and there isn't really that much in the new iPhones that entices me. (In the meantime, they made everything but the SE too big to fit in my shirt pockets.)
We reached a point where four-year-old computers were good enough for almost everyone, and PC sales flattened or dipped. We're doing the same thing with smartphones.
newer is often not better (Score:1)
Idiots (Score:2)
If they already know that, plus the invasion of cheaper chinese brands, why the fuck would they launch an entire new wave of phones that are too expensive for most people to buy?
Fuck you Apple and Samsung, you brought this on yourselves.
Awww, who moved their cheese? (Score:2)
I know the headline is tongue-in-cheek, but if smartphone makers actually blame customers it is very much Who Moved My Cheese? [wikipedia.org]
They're going to have to focus on delivering improvements at reasonable cost, rather than the best technology at no-matter-the-price.
To use the car analogy, Apple and Samsung have been lucky enough to have a Ford-sized market with Mercedes-sized prices until now. Now that customers have realised that smartphone technology is mature enough that the improvements are small and increment
Quite simple: Stop replacing good with unused (Score:2)
What does the new phone do differently? (Score:2)
Silver Lining (Score:2)
A nasty problem for Apple and Samsung. A wonderful problem for my bank account. I am fine with this trade-off.
One BIG factor was not mentioned (Score:2)
All this analysis seems to have missed one very big factor. US carriers used to subsidize the phones to the point where the phones used to be free or near-free every 2 years or so. Today those subsidies are gone, or at least are not keeping up with the prices of phones going up. My family used to upgrade with Verizon to new phones every 2 years. Today that will run us ~$500/phone, so we don't do it (even with buy one get one free, a two $1000 phones cost $500 each). A family of 5 would have to spend an aver
old phones (Score:1)
What we've gained with new phones & higher pri (Score:2)
These apply to the majority of phones out there...
Multi-day day usage with single charge - Removed
Hardware keyboards - Removed
User replaceable batteries - Removed
Hardware buttons - Removed
Phones that are actually think enought to hold - Removed
Phones that can be used in one hand - Removed
3.5 Audio Plug - Removed
Here are the features that are on the chopping block:
Expandable Memory Card Slot - Removal Pending....
Samsung.. if you want me to upgrade then... (Score:1)
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They're trying to force us to upgrade to a better service, because we've been using this one too long. They're just trying to learn from Apple.
Re:How long till the next Slashdot outage? (Score:5, Insightful)
I have an iPhone 6 Plus, which will soon be 4 years old. It works fine. (I expect it will work better when I get the update that will stop throttling me.)
I recently cracked the screen, and I see that I can order the parts to do the screen and the battery at once for less than 1/5 the cost of a latest/greatest iPhone. I'll be doing that.
The phone companies' problems are now that they can't push new features that make the phones better in any really meaningful way. They're at the point laptops reached 10 years ago, where unless it actually breaks, you can use it in perpetuity.
They need to innovate if they want people to buy, but they just aren't doing so. And part of it is that we have everything we currently need. My 4 year old phone does everything I need it to do. I'd probably have a little fun with some new features, but I'm not doling out $1000 for negligible benefit. (Not to mention to downgrade to the headphone adapter but that's a different rent).
You want people to spend money? Give them something they want, instead of something they already have.
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I went one better. I sent the asylum a note letting them know Pelosi, Schumer, and Schiff were loose.
At the asylum they call those notes "applications".
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I went one better. I sent the asylum a note letting them know Pelosi, Schumer, and Schiff were loose.
And now you are again posting from your padded cell.
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My guess would be Slashdot uses memcached (like many websites), and they didn't have it properly locked down (like many websites). For the last few days, open memcached instances have become the amplification tool of choice for DDoS attacks, so some websites and hosting farms have been having trouble as they try to lock down their memcached instances.
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These would not have happened under CmdrTaco
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Maybe they're using an old phone as a webserver?