Handcuff computer was rejected by the marketing department.
“Smartphone” is the wrong name
61–70 of 117 posts
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#62If I had to rename "Smartphone" I would call it "Personal Computer". My phone is way more "personal" than my desktop and laptop. But there's absolutely nothing wrong with "Smartphone". Two are the reasons: 1 - There's history there. Most of the words aren't precisely crafted by linguists when society needs them, we simply build on what already exists. The so called smartphone came from the cellphone that came from th…
I'm pretty sure that Wittgenstein, while agreeing with your point about meaning being defined by use, would still argue that there's a lot of unspoken confusion that comes from calling the smartphone a smartphone.
The first thing I did when opening this thread was Ctrl+F to see if anyone was suggesting it should be called a "personal computer", because that's what I've thought best described what the smartphone really has become.
Now, to suggest even trying to use that to refer to smartphones these days would be adding a much heavier does of confusion. But the insight seems fundamentally right to me.
Interesting article on the subject that brings up this point: http://ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2015/11/7/mobile-ecosyste...
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#63The average adult is required to be available by phone. Not by snapchat, not by skype, not even by text message. By. Phone. In tech-land and teen-land you can specify platforms to each of your relationships. But in the average American's day, doctors, daycare providers, clients, etc are all going to be contacting you by phone. Without being required to carry around the phone part, a pocket-sized tablet would have 10x…
It doesn't make the point invalid. There are laptops that connect to cell networks. I can make calls to landlines from my desktop. That doesn't change the name, because it does a lot more.
I can also use these devices without a SIM card and never make a phone call. The evolution of the device definitely led to the name, but it's clear that that's just another peripheral use, like taking photos, listening to music, or getting turn-by-turn driving directions. If any device had all those capabilties, we'd call it a computer of some kind.
You're not going to get the media to use the name "palmtop," but if the tech community adopted it I think we'd do and see things a little differently.
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#64Does anyone actually say "smartphone" except (vanishingly rarely) when necessary to describe the device in contradistinction to "dumbphones"? Is there a difference whether spoken or written?
If so, where are you? I'm curious because all I hear in the UK is "phone" or "mobile" - both of which we always used. But I'm acutely aware that I hear or read "cell" in American sources significantly less often than, I think, I used to.
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#65> Personally, I have more faith in a third alternative: a virtual instruction set. Like bytecode, though not managed like Java, and not meant to be interpreted or JIT compiled either. It could run on the bare metal, or be translated into something that is —like the Mill CPU. That way you can keep the illusion of having a single instruction set, while sacrificing virtually nothing. Moreover, future CPUs don't even need backward compatibility, as long as you can translate (and optimise!) the virtual assembly for them.
I don't think he really gets how CPUs work -- it's already that way, and has been for quite a while. The published instruction sets are the 'virtual' instructions, and translation of these instructions (be they ARM, x86, or PowerPC) is baked into each CPU's microcode. We actually have no visibility into the 'real' instructions that CPUs execute ('micro-ops'), because they're proprietary.
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#66the device is still a phone, because it needs a SIM card to operate. Without it it's pretty much useless. You cant even start the iphone without it, first thing it needs is a sim card.
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#67Does anyone actually say "smartphone" except (vanishingly rarely) when necessary to describe the device in contradistinction to "dumbphones"? Is there a difference whether spoken or written? If so, where are you? I'm curious because all I hear in the UK is "phone" or "mobile" - both of which we always used. But I'm acutely aware that I hear or read "cell" in American sources significantly less often than, I think, I…
Yeah, "cell" usage is going down and "phone" is going up. Personally, I like to be needlessly formal and call mine a "telephone", and some of my friends are catching that.
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#68Note Apple came to this market from a different direction than most other cellphone makers. Their first mobile computer was a revolutionary music player (innovative UI and music store). It evolved into a sophisticated media computer with color video, wireless and computer utilities in the last iTouch before the iPhone. (Apple still ships iTouches which are the iPhone device without the cellular phone in it, or a micr…
> Their first mobile computer was a revolutionary music player
The Newton was not a revolutionary music player, and no Apple music player before the iPhone was a "mobile computer" in a sense that would make this portrayal meaningful and accurate.
> It evolved into a sophisticated media computer with color video, wireless and computer utilities in the last iTouch before the iPhone.
iPod Touch (sometimes nicknamed "iTouch") was introduced after the iPhone, running a later version of iPhone OS (the OS which later became iOS) than the first iPhone. There was no "iTouch before the iPhone."
There was the old-style wheel-controlled iPod before the iPhone, and that was a revolutionary (at least in terms of commercial impact) music player, but it wasn't a "mobile computer" in the same sense as the iPod Touch, modern smartphones, or even earlier PDAs or the Apple Newton.
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#69Dude, just give it a minute and they'll be called "tricorders" as they should be.
Re: “Smartphone” is the wrong name
#70This article is from France. What's the French term? Has the Académie Française decided on one yet? (Unlike English, French has an official standards body.)