I will be switching back to flip phones

[ihateyourUI]

The benefits of using a smart phone just aren't there. It's a vastly inferior phone built around SMS and email, and no where near as good at the job of being a phone.

Problems include, horrible battery life compared to flip phones. No intelligent way to remind users of missed calls, txt or voicemail. That is really the most ridiculous part. They are selling us phones that are so smart they can't be bothered to remind us of missed calls, then they fill the notification screens up with spam. I actually switched to a few months ago ago and happened to be looking through my old flip phones. The freakin things still powered up after being shut off for MONTHS. They last for 2-3 days easily. They ring louder, they fit in your hand much better. It's easier to make and receiver calls and they have solid notification systems to ensure you get your calls. A little blinking LED or relying on me to come check my phone every 30 minutes is really just horrible. The smartphone is wasting hours of my life per year, not making things easier. At best it's mostly a multimedia toy/music phone with a tiny screen and a horrible keyboard. Phones should fit in my hand, they should be usable with ONE hand, they should always have audio reminders that do not go away or rely on me constantly check in on my phone like it's a child that needs babysitting. I don't think Android as a platform is really up to being a phone when all is said and done. It's way too much overhead just to run a phone. The phone aspect should be separated from the advanced OS features which drain the battery and drive hardware needs up.

I feel smartphones are mostly a scam to justify higher costs, wasteful data usage and to keep me checking my phone constantly in hopes I'll generate more revenue for Verizon, Google and Apple.

Apple at least made some effort to bring call notifications to the platform, but at the end of the day I can just carry around a 15 dollar hotspot and a 50 dollar tablet and do use that on the rare occasionally that a really need to check email or surf.

I'll be happy to switch back AND save money while getting a much more rugged, longer lasting phone instead of a low end handheld computer than kind of works as a phone. I'm just glad I didn't spend hundreds of dollars per phone because unless you don't have a computer and internet, it's really a huge rip off for a device that makes for an inferior phone. The handful of voice commands just don't make up for all the [Removed] I don't need to surf the interent on a tiny screen. I hate inputting text on a phone and touchscreens really aren't that great. It's all eye candy and half baked ideas with the promise that app can fix all the OS's shortcomings.

It's a scam all the way around.

profanity removed as required by the Verizon Wireless Terms of Service​

Message edited by Verizon Moderator

[mama23dogs]

Just because it isn't for you, does not make it less valuable to others.

I run my business off my smartphone.   my customers come via internet, Facebook and email, as well as calls and Text.  Since my services are provided in my clients homes, I need my access on the go.

FYI, all phones allow you to choose notifications and the sounds and volumes.  I block all but essential notices, alarms etc. 

[ihateyourUI]

It's not simply not for me, it's a poor phone design. With proper design

the phone would have similar capabilities of a flip phone without the need

to constantly connect to everything and get a bunch of mostly useless push

updates. The OS could be made modular since it's based on Linux and there

is just no excuse to not have audio reminders, even the Apple smartphone

has some level of audio reminders without adding half baked apps, some of

which exploit your privacy. You're situation is rare, not mine. Most people

do not need Facebook to do business and email can most often wait until

you're at the office. That leaves calls, voicemail and text, which you can

do just fine with a flip phone. You could take the flip phone OS and simply

add in surfing and email and facebook (many have basic surfing and email)

and you'd have a much better platform, BUT it would not sell as many apps

or as much advertising or MINE as much personal data and that makes them

money, and that's all they are really interested in, not actually making

smart phones, but making profitable phones and platforms that trade off

well established phone design.

On Tue, Dec 27, 2016 at 7:33 PM, mama23dogs <forums@verizonwireless.com>

[Weth]

Actually, your situation is rare these days.  I would not want a flip phone again.  As the data shows, actual calling is flat, and other forms of communication are growth.  Even my parents and in laws in there 70s and 80s use the smartphone and don't want "just a phone" anymore. 

[ihateyourUI]

No my situation is not rare. Facebook is a fun toy to get a free easy to

manage and highly limited webpage, but few businesses operate through

facebook in any meaningful way. Most of them make a page and do nothing

with it, some of them manage the mosts, but almost none of them run their

business meaningfully through Facebook.

I've worked on IT on blackberries and iphones. It's not that I don't know

how to use them. It's that after years of evalutation I find them not

bringing benefits and instead wasting my time. First off, you nationwide

view doesn't apply to most businesses, which are regional. Sure more

communication happens, but not more sales. If you want to make sales and

setup appointments you primarily do that through voice.

Text reminders and emails are nice, but looking at other forms of

communication that did not exist and saying they are rising is not a

realistic view of things, of course they are rising, that doesn't mean they

are very meaningful. In my area Facebook and webpages do almost nothing for

sales. It's all calls. Most people get our family business from the

yellowbook still. People don't fill out most businesses google reviews and

they mostly ignore Facebook pages. It's all about answer your phone and

voicemails and I think you are underestimating the importance of voice

contact by looking at numbers like that in a time where communication

volume has drastically gone up. Facebook status updates don't could as

meaningful communication, for instance, neither do text reminders or email

spam.

[Weth]

Keep telling yourself that to justify what you want.  Just your statement that you would carry around a tablet and a hotspot and a flip, 3 things on you, is ludicrous and confirms the power of the smartphone.  A phablet does all 3 in one, and the reason it s the fastest growing segment.  Flip phone?, ya - dying segment.

[rcschnoor]

ihateyourUI wrote:

First off, you nationwide

view doesn't apply to most businesses, which are regional. Sure more

communication happens, but not more sales. If you want to make sales and

setup appointments you primarily do that through voice.

but looking at other forms of

communication that did not exist and saying they are rising is not a

realistic view of things, of course they are rising, that doesn't mean they

are very meaningful. In my area Facebook and webpages do almost nothing for

sales. It's all calls. Most people get our family business from the

yellowbook still.

It's all about answer your phone and

voicemails and I think you are underestimating the importance of voice

contact by looking at numbers like that in a time where communication

volume has drastically gone up.

You have some interesting points here. I agree that many communications are via phone. I disagree that webpages do almost nothing for sales. Speaking for myself, I don't remember the last time I used the yellow pages. I use Google and that searches thru webpages in order to get phone numbers and addresses for the businesses I frequent and patronize. I know many others who contact these businesses thru the same method.

Yes, for you smartphones may not be the method of communicating. For others they are a better method vs a flip phone. I can think of MANY businesses I would not have patronized if it were not for the search capabilities of my smartphone and these businesses having a web presence.

[mama23dogs]

I think you underestimate how many businesses work on the go.  Many businesses use smartphones to track employee location with their phones.  Many are working toward being paperless, as I try to be. 

Facebook is far more useful when not solely a social media.  It's a source of local news, local business and neighbors word of mouth.  We have a town group and I founded a garden group.  Most of us like to hire local small business first.   All of these small business people do work on the road like me and need an office on the go. 

Because of my type of business, I get a lot of word of mouth referrals.  I'm on the road much of the day. 

I need a real keyboard to send job quotes and keep in touch with clients.    I need to email documents and send photos.  I also am with new clients all the time, so turn by turn navigation, tied to my contacts and calendar is vital.  It also tracks my mileage.  Something may business track on paper and hope they don't lose. 

If all I did was talk and text, A flip would be ideal. I miss mt EnV Touch basic phone, but I need more.

[DigitalRules]

With the right phone, set up properly, voice calls are much better on a smartphone. (For me anyway, Loud speakerphone, excellent notifications, transcribed voicemails, great battery life. . . . ) Not sure which phone you have, but I don't have these problems.

To be honest, I didn't like the smartphone that much at first, but have grown to like it as I have learned how to make it work for my needs.

[ihateyourUI]

I tried transcribing through youmail and google voice and it didn't work

anywhere near good enough. The idea that you have to keep checking the

phone instead of it reminding you like a flip phone as well as the horrible

Verizon dialer just makes them not worth the time. I've certainly lost far

more hours attempting to tweak my smartphone than the smartphone has saved

me. I've worked on and owned blackberries, iphones, Moto Droid Bionic and

Moto Droid Mini and they all are inferior to flip phones. Visual Voicemail

is OK, but at the end of the day it's not any kind of big advantage over

the button based interface. You're still just using a UI to listen to

voicemail, being able to delete them faster is nice, but it doesn't warrant

massive battery draw and horrible notification systems.

They need to build these phones with the core functionality first but

instead they are piling on OS features and trying to sell hardware. To a

large degree this is just bad design and bad coding. They COULD make phones

far more power friendly and have audio alerts that don't drain the battery,

but they don't really care enough to put the effort into it. They want to

sell apps, advertising and hardware and making a phone that only did what

people need would wind up producing less profit because they would get that

phone and stick with it for more years and the simpler hardware demands

would mean lower hardware profits and longer phone lifecycle.

It's a scam!

On Wed, Dec 28, 2016 at 8:08 AM, DigitalRules <forums@verizonwireless.com>

[Nanjer1]

Agree!Have had every smartphone you can think of finally saw the light now I have a dumb phone and am smart 

[ihateyourUI]

Just pick up an old phone or cordless phone and feel how it fits in your

hand and how the buttons/UI are made to fit your hand and you have a solid,

time tested platform for calling. Flip phones are the closest highly

available portable solution that excels at being a phone.

There is no reason you can't add email to flip phones like you had text,

other than Verizon pretending mobile data has a similar value to gold.

There is no reason a flip phone can't have solid voice commands that

trigger from a button press and not use a bunch of power with always on

services.

Flip phones mostly don't break when you drop them and don't scratch much,

since they the phone is also a case when closed. They often survive extreme

conditions, like being out in the rain. They last forever, they fit your

face and hand better. The people who make flip phone operating system

actually take into considering one hand control based off a refreshingly

static interface (the phone keypad). Texting is not hard on a smartphone

unless you text all day long, in which case I question your

productivity/business approach. Flip phones cost a fraction of the money.

They have superior call quality and reception. Unless you provide me

awesome features I don't want to learn a new OS every 2 years just to use

my phone.

A flip phone and a 15 a month hotspot with a tablet is all I need until

Google, Verizon and others get their game together. I've put up with their

platform for years and I'm just tired of spending my personal time and

money to endlessly find work arounds for basic phone functions and things

the hardware obviously could do, but don't need to do in order to make

Google and Verizon money.,

The biggest features I would miss is call blocking, which really should be

done at the Verizon/Call Center level and not on the phone's hardware. The

calls should never even reach my phone. And the next big feature would be

the few simple voice commands that work well like setting a timer or

setting an appointment. Then the far less important entertainment and

convenient search ability, which generally are not productive uses of my

time. I'm better off researching things on a real desktop and scheduling my

life in more meaningful ways than trying to get things done on a limited

hand held computer phone. I also like the authentication apps for two

factor authentication, but that can be done through SMS or a dedicated

hardware 'key' like Yubi.

So, it's really nothing important. I don't want Facebook on my phone (if I

used social networking successfully for small business the people should be

calling me or I can respond when I have time at the office). I don't need

traffic updates that don't really work. I don't need weather and news

updates to distract me from real work. I don't need half baked geo location

features and inferior navigation to my dedicated GPS unit. I don't need IM

on my phone (already have SMS). I don't need to take HD video and pictures

with my phone when a 100 dollar dedicated camera can do a far better job

and with a way superior interface and not consolidating those features into

one unit doesn't increase my costs, it lowers them because GPS and camera

technology is much more static compared to smart phone software. The

hardware you can get on a smart phone can be pretty impressive for the

cost, but the software is so many years behind it really doesn't make it a

smart investment.

I'm an IT tech with over 10 years experience from DOS to Windows 10 to

Linux. I've worked on phones from running copper lines for old PBX systems

to modern VOIP and supporting hundreds users cell phone issues. I've

wasted days of my life this year alone researching all the short comings of

MY personal smart phone and the conclusion is, there is no acceptable work

around. Because of that, there is no reason to accept the crappy battery

life, low security, higher costs and overall disappointing performance of

today's smart phones. I have better things to do with my time than be a

phone/advertising platform guinea pig.

I would rather smart phones were smart and could replace my car GPS and

function as solid long lasting phones while also having the ability to go

online and do some basic research and document retrial, but my needs for

mobile computing are limited, while my need for mobile phone connectivity

have been decided for my by societies demands of a more connected world. I

don't EVER need to rapidly respond to a Facebook post, but I do need to get

all my calls and not generally dislike using my phone because the coders

and project directors don't really care about focusing on core

functionality and ensure they are providing a solid device for the money.

It's just never going to happen. The way these guys make money is selling

us new gadgets every few years and a consolidated device that actually

worked really well and lasted a long time would basically put multiple

industries out of a job. They aren't going to design phones that can last 5

years unless we make them design phones that can last 5 years. Batteries

are not honestly up to the task of this much consolidation. Modular phones

are not going to be a real solution for years down the road until batteries

are 3 times more energy dense.

[Nanjer1]

Thanks

On Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 4:11 PM ihateyourUI <forums@verizonwireless.com>