Techie Ramblings

Category: Nostalgia

  • HMD 105 – Incremental upgrades

    From time to time I feel myself getting overwhelmed with technology. I’m very mindful and aware of my behavioral trait to be sucked into things to the point of obsession. Mobile games, social media, even just scrolling news can become unhealthy time sinks for me. I manage this in a few ways; I don’t do social media full stop, I only play games on my tablet which is too big and unwieldy to use at a moments notice or to leave the house, I disable the default apps and news scrollers that come with my devices and try to avoid browsing the websites.

    Even with these self imposed rules from time to time I sometimes start to feel like I’m spending too much time on my phone. Other times I feel like I’m just becoming too reliant on it. Most recently I felt like the Samsung S25 was so over the top with it’s data collection I was completely uncomfortable using it. When these things happen I like to spend some time using what’s referred to nowadays as a “Dumbphone”. I’d estimate I generally end up doing this once or twice a year, and do it for between a couple of weeks and a month. However in the past through Covid I did it for 6 months solid.

    My first purposeful dumbphone was a Nokia 105 that looked like the below:

    This phone still works perfectly fine to this day, but unfortunately 2G reception is getting worse and worse in my area and can’t be relied on.

    I then got the Nokia 110 4G 2023 model:

    This saw me through my last “Digital detox” but had some real flaws that lead me to end it prematurely out of sheer frustration. The keyboard seemingly just ignored about 20% of my button presses. This made typing a nightmare, more than going back to T9 predictive already was.

    So a few days ago when I decided I needed a break from smartphones and put my SIM in this phone again I was quickly reminded of it’s downfalls. Being seemingly one of the only people that don’t hold a grudge against HMD for using the Nokia brand I took a look at their now HMD branded web store and came across the HMD 105 4G, and HMD 110 4G. These are very clearly a continuation of the Nokia counterparts with the same naming convention. The differences between the two models are slim; the 110 has a 0.1MP camera and a ceramic coated shell, the 105 does not. I certainly wasn’t going to spend extra money on either of these features so opted for the 105.

    As can be seen below (unfortunately the old 105 can’t be compared as I lent it to a colleague for a detox of his own) the sizes between the Nokia 110 and HMD 105 are very similar, with the HMD 105 being slight bigger, but having bigger, more pronounced buttons and a much bigger screen:

    Aside from the lack of a camera on the 105 there aren’t really any differences, so I think a comparison is still fair.

    If you own a Nokia 110 4G 2023, and aren’t having any troubles with your keypad this probably isn’t a worthwhile upgrade. It’s very much an incremental upgrade, and lets be honest there’s only so much that can be done with the S30 operating system.

    That being said there are some differences. Texts on the HMD are now threaded, so makes for much easier tracking of conversations. The screen being bigger helps with basic web browsing and reading. Icons on the screen can now be rearranged, unfortunately still not removable though. The entire operating system has had a bit of a spruce up, with new settings, higher resolution and a less budget feel.

    There are some things that I would consider downgrades too: The auto power off/on has been removed. The weather app is gone. The unlock combination has become more awkward, with you now having to reach for the * key.

    Overall though I’m impressed. It’s everything I want from a “Dumbphone”. It allows me to call and text when I need to. It has a select few “tool” applications, a couple of very simple games (snake and blackjack) ignoring the trials and very little else.

    More importantly it doesn’t ask much of me. There was next to no setup of the device to be done, absolutely no accounts to sign into and other than calls, texts and alarms the phone cannot start sending me notifications. I can’t get invested into this device enough that it becomes invaluable to me, because it’s so simple. I know that “burner” phone has bad connotations, but this truly is that. It’s a tool. Other than your contacts (which you should have backed up elsewhere) if you lost this device other than your SIM card you wouldn’t really have lost anything of value. You wouldn’t be fearful that someone may find it and gain access to your entire life and all your secrets. And that is very refreshing.

    On a side note, this phone uses the BL-L5H batteries that have been used in previous models too. These are readily available online, and cheaply so the dream of having multiple spare batteries and being able to stay away from a charger for weeks is an achievable reality now!

    UPDATE: After some more real world usage I have noticed a couple of things that have annoyed me. The first is that ringer and ringtones, there are only 4 ringtones to choose from and none of them are attention grabbing. I missed 3 calls over the weekend, even with the phone on max volume in my bag I didn’t hear the phone while walking. The 2nd and this is not specific to this phone, it seems to apply to all recent button bound phones and this is the emergency dialler. If the phone is locked, screen off and in a pocket it only takes catching the 9 key to begin dialling. 3 accidental presses of this button and you will begin to call the emergency services. This essentially means the phone is unsafe to keep in a pocket. I would not want to put additional stress on the emergency services or get in trouble for accidentally dialling them. We are nearing double digits on the amount of times I’ve pulled the phone out of my pocket to find that the screen is on with a 9 already in the dialling screen.

    Feature phones of the time didn’t have this problem, why do we have it now? What is the point of a key lock if it doesn’t apply to one of the keys?!

  • The attention economy

    In my constant battle of trying to find balance in today’s world I’ve been going on a trip filled with nostalgia back in time a decade or two.

    I’m 31 now so some of my fondest memories are 15–20 years ago which takes us back to the time period of 2005–2010. Now I imagine everyone of different ages has a period of time in their heads they consider to be the “golden times” but I truly do believe these were great times, for technology and the internet at the very least which is something I enjoy focusing on.

    Myspace was in it’s final days, the most addictive part of Facebook was Farmville, Tumblr was where we pretended we were very deep and complex individuals and I never really got my head around what the point of Twitter was. We accessed these sites with intention, because it involved sitting down at a PC, more often than not the family PC in a shared space in the house. We still used MSN messenger, and Facebook chat was just getting started. Messages would only be replied to when we were on the PC.

    Our phones were what I consider to be the ideal scenario, they were complex enough that we could play basic offline games, they had rudimentary web browsers so we could obtain information in a pinch but the lack of memory and slow data meant that it was not an enjoyable experience. Other than that they made calls, sent texts and took very pixelated photos and videos.

    Most people gamed on an Xbox 360 or PS3 and most households had a Wii to play as a family. Online gaming was experiencing it’s first generation for most people who never owned a gaming PC. You bought the game and a year subscription to online services (or not in the case of the PS3, it was free!) and could play to your hearts content with your friends. Nobody was competing on who had the most expensive cosmetic items, and there was very little in the way of DLC.

    At some point in time, which I struggle to pinpoint, around 2012–2015 there was a major shift. Mobile devices became more advanced, mobile internet speeds improved and prices decreased, and WiFi became commonplace everywhere. The internet became a thing that followed us everywhere we went, rather than something we sit down to pay a visit to. Social media began to boom, and multiple different platforms began popping up. As time went on a cultural shift happened, most people no longer used or even owned a desktop PC or a laptop. Everything could be done on the ever expanding smartphone in our pockets.

    A war began across the internet, and the target was our attention.

    Very quickly marketers discovered that someone’s decision making process could be altered by what they saw on their social media feeds. Be that making a decision to buy a product based on advertisements that were displayed to the user, political opinions based on videos and material the user was fed, even lifestyle choices could all be altered.

    Social media platforms began monetising their platforms, but not to us the users. We were the product. Our attention was and is still sold to the highest bidder, they can pay money to target very specific demographics with their material. Think what you may but it’s very effective, these social media companies are now some of the wealthiest in the world, and their only product is a platform and its users.

    Any successful company will ensure it’s product is available and in plentiful supply, and this is where the addictive nature of these platforms come into play. Huge teams of people engineer their platform to be as addictive as possible, to keep you coming back and for as long as possible to ensure you are there and ready to view their customers advertisements. A notable example of this is when Facebook introduced notifications. At first the notification dot was blue, and users generally left it unread. When the colour was changed to red however it got much more attention, the colour red is well known to provoke a response in humans (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4413730/). These companies openly utilise our human nature and instinct to assure our attention.

    Humans have developed very rapidly over the last century. In evolution terms it’s been the blink of an eye since we were simple tribal or nomadic hunter gatherers. Our brains are not equipped to deal the cheap thrill that is social media. We are social creatures too, so when we receive a “like” it simulates social acceptance from our peers. Our brain rewards us for this good action with a little rush of dopamine. We crave this dopamine and repeat the behaviour. In more primitive times this would’ve been beneficial in that humans would act in ways that other members of their group liked, and this in turn would strengthen their bond which in survival terms is a good thing. In terms of social media a like costs nothing, and often means very little however the primitive circuitry in our brain cannot differentiate that from genuine interaction. Very easily people become addicted to this instant gratification, and in turn spend more time on social media which leads them to spend less time on genuine interaction.

    As you probably already know, or are finding out now social media isn’t beneficial for average people. There are genuine use cases for it, such as long distance relationships or friendships where face to face or a higher quality interaction is impossible but in general it is a lower quality social interaction. People are lonelier than ever but more connected than ever, why is this? I’d argue it’s because we’re replacing face to face interaction, or even a phone call with a like or a comment on a post, and somehow that feels like we’ve touched base with that person and removed the need to contact them in another manner.

    Social media then, is only really beneficial for the social media company itself, who make money from exploiting their users and keeping them active, and the companies that pay the social media company to advertise to it’s users.

    This is where we are today, and it only takes an altered perspective and you’ll find it impossible to avoid. AI generated sites litter search results. Social media can make you lose hours without realising just by choosing to open the app. We feel disconnected, dissatisfied and lonely through poor quality interaction online. Teenage boys are using steroids so they can look like their idols on Instagram, teenage girls are struggling with eating disorders for the same reason. Buying a genuine product online has become a minefield of ads and inferior products. There are so many bots online now it’s hard to tell if we’re talking to a real person, and in some cases bots end up talking to themselves.

    It feels like somewhere along the lines we went wrong with the internet, and I suppose where money is involved this was bound to happen. But I wish we could go back, and enjoy the internet for what it was again when it was fresh, exciting but not yet addictive and completely capitalised.