The return of 'dumbphones'

[Heel n Toe]

Seventeen-year-old Robin West is an anomaly among her peers - she doesn't have a smartphone.

Instead of scrolling through apps like TikTok and Instagram all day, she uses a so-called "dumbphone".

These are basic handsets, or feature phones, with very limited functionality compared to say an iPhone. You can typically only make and receive calls and SMS text messages. And, if you are lucky - listen to radio and take very basic photos, but definitely not connect to the internet or apps.

These devices are similar to some of the first handsets that people bought back in the late 1990s.



Ms West's decision to ditch her former smartphone two years ago was a spur of the moment thing. While looking for a replacement handset in a second-hand shop she was lured by the low price of a "brick phone".

Her current handset, from French firm MobiWire, cost her just £8. And because it has no smartphone functionality she doesn't have an expensive monthly data bill to worry about.

"I didn't notice until I bought a brick phone how much a smartphone was taking over my life," she says. "I had a lot of social media apps on it, and I didn't get as much work done as I was always on my phone."

The Londoner adds that she doesn't think she'll ever buy another smartphone. "I'm happy with my brick - I don't think it limits me. I'm definitely more proactive."

Dumbphones are continuing to enjoy a revival. Google searches for them jumped by 89% between 2018 and 2021, according to a report by software firm SEMrush.

And while sales figures are hard to come by, one report said that global purchases of dumbphones were due to hit one billion units last year, up from 400 million in 2019. This compares to worldwide sales of 1.4 billion smart phones last year, following a 12.5% decline in 2020.

More: https://www.bbc.com/news/business-60763168

[svandamme]

these days you can't do diddley without a smartphone or tablet
banking
secure access to important gobment websites
security dongles
parking app


I'de love a good brick, but it needs minimal features like a good camera
and that's where the current bricks typically fail, they come with cameras the likes you found 10 years ago on an early blackberry

[rusnak]

^ I don't do any of those things on a phone. That's what a laptop is for. I would be happy to ditch the smartphone. The only time I ever use it as something other than a phone and actually enjoy doing so is when I rent a car and use the Bluetooth to stream music. But even then, the iPod is better and has more songs and way way way more playlists.

I don't even like to send text messages. I think that's for children or childish adults.

I would pay big money for a Nokia 6162 that works.

[Radioactive]

Sadly, MFA (multi factor authentication) has taken over my life.
sms, okta, google authenticator, authenticate, microsoft authenticator

I am unable to NOT have a lock on my phone anymore.

[svandamme]

Originally Posted by rusnak

^ I don't do any of those things on a phone. That's what a laptop is for. I would be happy to ditch the smartphone. The only time I ever use it as something other than a phone and actually enjoy doing so is when I rent a car and use the Bluetooth to stream music. But even then, the iPod is better and has more songs and way way way more playlists.

I don't even like to send text messages. I think that's for children or childish adults.

I would pay big money for a Nokia 6162 that works.

that's the thing, MFA authentication cannot be done on the laptop where you need the authentication to happen.

It must happen via an alternative route.. Sure Could be email.. but that's the worst kind of MFA to have because it's typically already open and authenticated for convenience..

hence MFA via token app or SMS

MS office 365 does have MFA via call authentication, eg to authenticate they call your phone and you have to answer it, press #
But again it's not ideal, since most phones can be answered from the locked screen, again convenience

[rwest]

I have been avoiding a smart phone at work for a long as I could, but unfortunately they finally are taking my flip phone away and replacing it with an iPhone- it’s sitting on the IT counter waiting for me to trade.

Flip phone is so easy to shove in my back pocket and takes abuse without breaking. Texting is a nightmare, but I don’t like texting anyways- for problems at work, I always need more information than what someone texts me, so I need to call them anyways.

Don’t have a personal cell phone- can’t figure out a big need for it.

[rusnak]

Originally Posted by svandamme

that's the thing, MFA authentication cannot be done on the laptop where you need the authentication to happen.

It must happen via an alternative route.. Sure Could be email.. but that's the worst kind of MFA to have because it's typically already open and authenticated for convenience..

hence MFA via token app or SMS

MS office 365 does have MFA via call authentication, eg to authenticate they call your phone and you have to answer it, press #
But again it's not ideal, since most phones can be answered from the locked screen, again convenience

Beats me if these are any good, but I don't store sensitive data on the hard drive. I use these: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1462860-REG/apricorn_a25_3pl256_s821_1tb_256_bit_aes_xts.html/?ap=y&ap=y&smp=y&smp=y&lsft=BI%3A514&gclid=Cj0KCQjw0PWRBhDKARIsAPKHFGh44vIZkXfsZVTBW0xW G3cXrJMqEdA0v5YWRxOFfMoqmd73KHD5XIMaAoltEALw_wcB

[Jims5543]

For my Crypto acct I use Duo Mobile.

For many of my other accts I use SMS.

If someone were to intercept that and log in on a different computer, then I get an email and text message alerting me that a new sign in occurred.

EDIT

I did not come to post that.

I could not function today without a smart phone.

I have no real social media, I have a gab account and might post something once a month on there. I am more active on here. I really do not spend that much time on SM.

I need to have mobile data for my GPS to function correctly, so much so myself and my other crew both carry 2 cel phones on 2 different carriers to make sure we can always have connectivity.

Yesterday I rolled up on my first job, I break out my WIN10 tablet and realize I left my USB thumb drive with all my calculations in my computer at the office.

No worries!! I log into my cloud server on my phone and download the files I needed. I email them to myself. I loge into my email on my tablet and download all the files.

If this was 8 years ago, I would be driving back to the office to get the files.


I can run my business off my phone, there is no way I could go back to a brick.

[cabmandone]

It must be nice living in Europe where they don't penalize you for owning a dumb phone by charging roughly the same for the plan you use.

[Geronimo '74]

What is charged depends on the plan you use, not on the phone you have.
Makes sense, no?
Is it not the same in the Ustated Nites?

[hbueno]

The new Nokia 3310 dumbphone (pictured above) runs on AliOS, a Chinese Linux distribution. No thanks.

[KFC911]

Originally Posted by cabmando

It must be nice living in Europe where they don't penalize you for owning a dumb phone by charging roughly the same for the plan you use.

Though I held off on a smartphone for a long time, mine is my only computer now.... but no apps are on it. Consumer Cellular, with modest data plan, can go with just voice plan if one chooses.

After driving a QWERTY as an IT geek for decades.... doing taxes on a screen smaller than my hand is a hoot.

When I disappear from Pelican .... I prolly just lost my phone ...

[herr_oberst]

Some event tickets are smartphone only these days. No paper tickets.

[cabmandone]

Originally Posted by Geronimo '74

What is charged depends on the plan you use, not on the phone you have.
Makes sense, no?
Is it not the same in the Ustated Nites?

Verizon doesn't really offer a non data plan that I'm aware of. They used to offer unlimited talk and text but I don't know if that plan exists anymore. Where I pay $40 per line for unlimited talk, text and data, my brother pays $30 for talk and text with a small amount of data IIRC. Seem nuts to me.

I don't know what other providers offer but my brother being a truck driver, he needs to have good reliable service and here, that's pretty much Verizon.

[KFC911]

Consumer Cellular uses AT&T (or T-Mobile if one chooses) networks.

Both AT&T and Verizon are sucky here at my house (traffic loads I have determined over decades of each) so I use T-Mobile... great here at home . I didn't even have coverage south of the Outer Banks tho with TM.... even better !

[cabmandone]

^^^
AT&T's network isn't so great around here. I had to drop them two years ago because my wife and kids couldn't reach me when they had a car issue. They tried calling me but couldn't reach me so they called my friend who was sitting in the passenger side of my truck and the call went through. I was with AT&T he had Verizon.

I think with TMobile and Sprint merging, their service might be better but when it was Sprint alone it was the absolute WORST of the bunch.

[URY914]

We got some real dinosaurs here. You guys still use the hand crank on your 356's?

[KFC911]

Originally Posted by URY914

We got some real dinosaurs here. You guys still use the hand crank on your 356's?

I was carrying an AT&T bagphone when I lived in Jax in the mid-80s and data networks was my "golden goose" for decades....

signed....

T-Rex

[GH85Carrera]

I resisted a smart phone. I wanted a phone with a camera, and a saw no point in text messages. The camera was not much better than my old Kodak Brownie from grade school, but a little better than nothing. Then my dad gave me his old iPhone original to play with. It was no longer activated, but worked fine with Wi-Fi.

I swallowed the smart phone hook line and sinker. Soon I activated the iPhone and the old phone was given to the abused women's shelter as all phones will call 911, even if not activated.

My first time to really see the true handiness of a smart phone was when I went to a business that I had used for years, and they had a sign on the door, that they had moved. The address was on Grand Blvd. That street was the first street to encircle the city, back in the 1930s. An address can be about anywhere on that circle. I punched it into my iPhone and it took me there, turn by turn. My first ever test message was to my dad. I still have that text string to him even though he has been dead for many years. I have every text I have ever sent, and I only delete spam texts.

A few years back at Porsche Parade, we were on a bus returning from going to see Churchill Downs. My wife and I were discussing where we wanted to eat that night. I was looking at different restaurants close to the hotel and the couple sitting across from us perked up. The husband was in the no cell phone camp, and his wife had a dumbphone only. She started asking how I was looking up restaurants. I showed her the map, and it of course showed the area restaurants. I then show her the radar and the thunderstorm was going to miss our area. I then called the restaurant from the listing and made reservations for four, as we had invited them to dinner with us. We made new friends, and had a nice meal. She said as soon as they get home she is getting a smartphone.

I have an app called AirDisk Pro. It makes a "hard drive" on my phone for me to store any document from my computer on it. It has a password on top of the password to use my phone. It is a comforting way to back up important data and know I will have the phone with me at all times, so if the house burns down, or whatever, I will have that data. Not on the imaginary cloud, that is very hackable and has been hacked. It is on my phone and in my possession.

[GH85Carrera]

There are just so many things that make a smart phone just indispensable for me. Not long ago I was working on a project, and I needed a small Allen wrench. I dug through my collection, and found one that fit. I wanted to figure out what size it was. That is some sort of little tiny text there. Even with my bifocals and good lighting I could not make it out.

Whip of the cell phone, snap, oh it is a .050 inch. Dang small. I then knew what it took to remove the part, and I filed that in the noes I made on the repair. All stored on my phone.

I have numerous notes on my phone. Like how to program the Liftmaster version of Homelink to the rear view mirror in my car. Lots of non intuitive steps, and I only have to do it once every few years.