Photo of hover board from Back to the Future
Bottom text:
SCIENTISTS
you have 3 years.

  • RGB3x3@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    Honestly, the smartphones feel like the last big innovation we’ve had. What’s really changed since smartphones have settled into what they are now? What new technology has had such an impact on the world?

    I don’t know, feels like the world has settled for a while and that we’re not doing anything cool anymore, especially as the internet falls into the corporate soulless garbage it’s becoming.

    Maybe the Artemis program will instill that sense of progress back into us.

    • JackbyDev@programming.dev
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      11 months ago

      I guess it depends on where the line is drawn. I think you’re right though. The “ubiquity of smartphones” (as I call it) happened around 2015 or so. It’s hard to pin down when it happened since it is intentionally a fuzzy definition. At some point smart phones became cheap enough that even kids were getting them. I didn’t get my first on until 2010 or 2011 when I was in college. Even then a lot of folks still had “dumb” phones.

      What’s wild is hearing what people use smart phones for. My wife does fan fiction. Some pretty prolific writers in their mid twenties (so the oldest of gen Z I guess you’d say) have said they exclusively write their fics on their smart phones. That’s insane to me.

      • lanolinoil@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        After the wright bros built that shitty airplane, we spent the next 60 years or so improving and making them safer, cheaper, etc. That’s what’s happening now with the internet and smartphones and things like that.

        It’s so early. In 2026, Ecommerce is expected to account for 1/5th of all sales. In 3 years, brick and mortar business will still have 75% share of sales versus online. We have a long way to go – I think it’s confusing because you’re always living on the ‘cusp’ of tech and our lives are so slow and short compared to reading about the last 150 years or whatever