Ten years ago, Apple’s then-CEO Steve Jobs began the 2007 MacWorld Expo with the following words:
“Every once in awhile, a revolutionary product comes along that changes everything.”
Jobs was talking, of course, about the iPhone, which was subsequently revealed to the public. There it was, in all its glory.
Flash forward to 2017. Steve Jobs has passed, but Apple is still leading the pack in technological innovation. The iPhone, the iPad, the Apple Watch. Bam, bam, bam. One device after another.
How did we function without them?
A decade ago, flip and slider phones were pretty much it. Devices like the LG Shine and Blackberry Pearl were some of the sleekest gadgets anyone could own.
There’s something endearing and nostalgic about these old cell phones. Sure, they were clunky, but they were also reliable, effective and foolproof. Simple, but brilliant.
For many, these (now) crappy phones were the first personal communication devices they ever owned. Cell phones weren’t as commonplace as they are today, especially among kids and teens. Ten years ago, it was a privilege for a kid to have a phone, especially one that wasn’t for “emergencies only.”
Every kid that grew up during the 2000s probably owned an old cell phone at some point, though. Remember when the Motorola Razr was the hot commodity? Remember when kids would spell their name like AAAAAAAJimmy just to be first in your contact list? Remember when Nokia was relevant?
Was life without smartphones as primitive as it seems?
For one thing, smartphones are weak. The tiniest bumps and bruises cause considerable amounts of damage. Unless you want to A) fork over money for insurance, B) fork over money for a LifeProof case, or C) fork over money to the Geek Squad for repairs, you better take damn good care of your phone or else you’ll be forking over a lot more for a new device. Old cell phones were like rocks. You could drop, step on, or throw your phone as many times as you’d want and — barring a few dings and scratches — that little sucker would still work like a charm. I had friends accidentally send their phones through a laundry cycle, and they still worked. These devices were practically indestructible, and they lasted forever.
They could also hold charges for days. DAYS. Even though old cell phones took forever to charge, you often needed to charge it only a few times per week instead of multiple times a day, like many smartphone users do.
Many old cell phones also had keyboards, a feature that was functionally ingenious. Not only was the feeling of typing out text on an actual keyboard more satisfying than a touchscreen, you never had to worry about sending a falsely autocorrected text. Older phones were also considerably less irritating than smartphones. Before the days of getting a million notifications per day about dumb stuff, you got notifications for texts and calls. That was it. It substantially decreased the chances of your phone buzzing at an inconvenient time.
Of course, not everything about old cell phones was sunshine and rainbows.
Remember minutes?
Before unlimited data packages were common, people had cell phone plans with limited minutes. If you had one of those plans, you had to carefully plan out cell phone calls to preserve your minutes. Many of these plans often limited text messages, too. The lucky kids who had unlimited calling and texting could go crazy and talk on the phone as much as they wanted. Usually the kids that got screwed with limited minutes and texts were the kids who had cell phones for “emergencies only.”
Let’s talk about this for a second. Parents who bought their kids cell phones for “emergencies only” were awful.
Buying a kid a cell phone for “emergencies only” might as well be a giant middle finger. It’s like, "Okay kid, you want a cell phone. Here ya’ go. You can’t send texts, and you have limited minutes. Use it wisely.” They unknowingly hampered their kids’ social lives.
Some kids followed their parents’ rules religiously and used their cell phones only when it was absolutely necessary. Others could care less, and jacked up their parents’ phone bill anyway.
Another thing about old phones: You had a lot of choices. Nowadays, everyone has more or less the same model of phone, running either Apple's iOS or Google's Android. 10 years ago, there were so many cell phones to choose from, it created a sort of class system based on the type of phone you owned.
At the bottom, you had your “emergency-only” phone kids who had to sit and wait for an emergency so they could actually use their phones.
Next were the middle-of-the-road users, who had something more affordable with cooler features, usually a model from Nokia or Samsung. If you had a “slider” or a “picture phone,” you’d probably be a few notches higher.
Somewhere toward the top, you had the kids whose parents bought them an iPod Touch (which came three months after the first iPhone) in lieu of a cell phone. Armed with an array of jailbroken apps and angsty punk music, they may not have had an actual phone, but they had a badass device to keep them entertained.
At the top were the entitled little brats who always had the latest and greatest in cell phone technology. Everyone knew at least one kid who was given a shiny new Razr when they were like 12. For real, these kids were the envy of every child who grew up in the 2000s.
Until the iPhone came along, then kids got real jealous, real fast.
Smartphones changed the game forever.They had internet, but good luck finding and/or maintaining a solid Wi-Fi connection in 2007.
Looking at old cell phones through a nostalgic lens reminds us of the minor inconveniences we used to have, but also the basic brilliance that these devices offered. 10 years from now, will we be thinking the same about smartphones? Will cell phone giants like Samsung and Motorola fade into obscurity just as Nokia and Blackberry did?
Unlikely, but who knows? A lot can happen in 10 years.
