Image: June Wan/ZDNet.
Smartphones are very useful in many ways. But if there’s one area they excel at, it’s ruining the good time you have with your friends or family.
We all have a friend like that: when you’re together, he puts his phone on the table face up. Personally, I always take it as a challenge. Because for me, this gesture transforms a relaxed discussion between friends into an exam monitored by a plate of glass and plastic that will flash if I become too boring. Difficult to compete with a device that has access to the infinite knowledge of the internet with little anecdotes about my generally banal life!
And for those who think not to be concerned, because they are content to discreetly check the notifications on their connected watch: know that it’s worse, you give the impression of checking the time you have left before you can find a excuse to leave.
But if technological evolution allowed smartphones to provide the answer to the problem they created?
The foldable to the rescue of your connection to reality
This week, Samsung introduced its two new foldable smartphones, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 and the Galaxy Z Flip 4. And what’s interesting is how the Korean brand presented them: emphasizing how a foldable phone can be less intrusive than a regular smartphone.
The way we use our smartphones has changed, claims Samsung. And foldable phones are helping to change our behavior, allowing us to better signal when we’re paying attention – or not.
“Many of us try to manage our phone use so that we can connect more to the world. Closing your Z Flip sends a message to those around you that you’re ready to fully engage in conversation,” Samsung’s Dillon Hesse said at this week’s Unpacked event. In other words: read your message, turn off your phone, then pay attention to the world around you.
A bulky external screen
Instinctively, I like the idea championed by Samsung, because the physical action of closing the device has an air of finality. And reopening the phone is a bit more important than just activating your smartphone screen.
Of course, it’s a good idea from Samsung. But a big problem persists: it is still possible to consult the notifications on the external screen, when the phone is folded. For Samsung, it is possible to do so “without interrupting the present moment”. Allow me to doubt it.
The addition of this little friction in the process of connecting with the digital world (when you should be paying attention to the real world) is, in my opinion, welcome. So for the sake of your social life, even if you don’t plan on buying a foldable phone for yourself, hope your friends do.
Source: ZDNet.com