Continuing to admit that the smartphone era is done. Samsung’s latest teaser video for next week’s Galaxy S9 Unpacked event hints at more camera trickery and social media silliness. It might as well shout “conning the consumer, reimagined!” It is pretty much the equivalent of Apple launching the next iPhone and talking obsessively only about the Calculator app.
People use both, but the gimmicks added to improve their utility are only used by a tiny fraction of users and enjoyed by perhaps a handful of obsessives. In the desperate race to get consumers to upgrade to the latest model. Flogging the S9 as a better camera is a futile gesture. But, Samsung has to play along because that’s what Apple, Sony, and the others are doing to suck the last few billion dollars from upgraders.
Instead of genuinely improving the user experience, rolling out a better triple-life battery, or going crazy with a flexible roll-out second screen that expands the main OLED, firms are still trying to wow the customer base with niche gimmicks. All of this to diminishing interest, and fans who are clinging on to their old model until something worthwhile comes along.
Bad press problem?
Even the press is starting to get fed up, The Verge writes “with a little mystery wiggle room leftover for whatever experimental feature the company (Samsung) tries to push (almost always unsuccessfully) onto consumers.” And with the price of these phones going up all the time who can blame anyone hanging on to a perfectly good Galaxy S7 or iPhone 6 model (perhaps with a quick battery swap).
Truth is its time for even the biggest of fans to stop playing “the game” and drive smartphone vendors to stop with the annual upgrade charade by turning off from these pointless marketing events and voting with their wallets. Wake us up when a company (any company) does something truly worthwhile with their smartphone, perhaps eliminating the use of rare earth metals or going the whole Black Mirror with smart contact lenses.
YouTube: The Camera. Reimagined.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-EcyYkv-mU
Photo credit: Samsung
Source: Samsung press release / Nick Statt (Verge)
