The smartphone managed to put a briefcase of instruments into our pockets. Cameras, calculators, calendars, and clocks were suddenly accessible everywhere, without the burden of carrying their weight around.
Concerns over an overdependence on tech have followed the smartphone around since the first iPhone. It does everything for us. It’s constantly trying to get our attention - and, according to research, usage at bedtime puts us at “great risk” of sleep disruption.
There was only one solution, to get rid of it.
“A Lifeline”
The rise of the ‘dumb’ or ‘feature’ phone, the smartphone’s lower IQ cousin, still seems inevitable. These rudimentary devices got a boost with the re-launch of the Nokia 3310 in 2017, which introduced a colour screen to the specs of the 2000 model.
Marketing company SEMrush claims that searches for dumbphones climbed by 89% in the three years between 2018 and 2021. Various sources mentioned by the BBC also note that demand for the basic devices is soaring.
A billion dumbphones were sold worldwide in 2020. Smartphone sales fell 12.5%. Most of those sales occurred in developing nations but as many as 10% of UK phone users now own a less capable phone.
Hipster fads aside, it’s not easy to see how dumb phones can get along today. One writer for Business Insider managed just a single week with the Light Phone 2 - “I found myself missing [...] a lifeline to the wider world". The way life has evolved since the dawn of the smartphone means that everybody needs an internet connection.
Light Phone 2
The Light Phone 2, which is about a third of the size of an iPhone 14 Pro Max, can be furnished with a few extra features, like maps, a calendar, and a notes ‘app’ but it’s still a device out of time. Nearly twenty years out of time.
A lack of entertainment possibilities is the biggest omission of the dumbphone. The Light Phone 2 has a radio and podcast app but doesn't support videos, images, and games, even those featured on the Nokia 3310, namely, Space Impact, Bantumi, Pairs II, and Snake.
Games that run through mobile web browsers are incompatible, too, as dumbphones don’t have internet browsers. This includes slot machines and modern ‘crash’ games like Aviator, a simple guessing game playable at Lottoland Ireland.
Then again, a dumbphone is not designed to be used at all, unlike the smartphone, which has the lust for attention of a bored labrador. This brings us back to the idea of dumbphones as a fad. It’s not easy to find an article about these devices that doesn’t use the phrase “digital detox”.
The problem is that it’s easy to rig a smartphone to be quiet. Even built-in apps can be disabled on Android. It might not have the same ring as going almost nude, technologically speaking, but it’s less expensive than a £299 ‘brick’, the Light Phone 2.
If a dumbphone absolutely has to go on the wishlist, the Nokia 3310 is just £50.
