Things I Like: Smartphones

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Photo by Nakita Cheung on Unsplash

Smartphones are awesome. I was reading this article earlier on The Verge about how an iPhone has essentially replaced so many of the writer's other gadgets. I totally agree. I'd go even one further and say that my smartphone has essentially replaced my wallet.

Living in London, my smartphone is my digital assistant. It's essential and central to a lot of the things that I do daily.

My current phone is a Samsung Galaxy S7 edge. The phone itself deserves a whole post on its own, and I'll most likely post it on my other blog.

So what do I do with my smartphone? On a normal working day:
  1. Alarm - Several alarms actually. And I can customise how I "snooze" my way out of bed.
  2. Newspaper - I skim through the Breaking News just to be sure that the world didn't end while I was sleeping, or that someone discovered a cure for cancer, or we decided to stop using money and follow Star Trek's lead and focus on being awesome instead.
  3. City Travel Guide - Before I go on the bus, I check what time the next one is arriving. My app of choice for this is CityMapper.
  4. City Travel Pass - I use NFC and Android Pay via TfL. Tap on the bus. Tap on the London Underground. 
  5. Messaging - While on the commute, I catch up with my messages on the various networks and platforms.
  6. Gaming - Mobile Gaming is a thing. I'm not exactly the biggest fan as I absolutely abhor "In-app Purchases". The two games that I currently play are Battlevoid: Harbinger, and Deck Heroes.
  7. Photography - The best camera you have is the one that you have with you. It sounds cliché but how my life is at the moment, I can easily take several hundred photos before I use my DSLR.
  8. Music Player - I'm a huge metalhead. A lot of music that I listen to nowadays are on Bandcamp pages and not found anywhere else yet.
Whilst I really like having a smartphone to be able to do all those things on a daily basis, I am also aware of how it symbolises a "ball and chain" to technology. I'm so dependent on it that going back to not having one is a bit of a worrying thought for me.

Still, I make it a point to stop using my smartphone anytime after 9:00pm, especially on a work day. That's when I then use my tablet. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯