I am so over phones

I’m not planning on upgrading my smartphone once my contract ends in November. Firstly, I need to get as far away from Vodacom as possible. I cannot be their hostage any longer.

Secondly, I’ve realised that the main reason I need my phone is to keep in touch with the SO while we are apart. I could do that just fine with my N8, yet I needed to get a new phone because that 256MB RAM was killing me.

I don’t use my smartphone as a smartphone. This is a problem. It’s why the lack of apps on Windows Phone has never really bothered me. I may check my email on the phone, use Pushbullet to share articles with the SO, and check my Feedly, but that’s it. Those tasks also only happen occasionally.

Every “smart” task that I want to do, I can do using Astro. I don’t need a phone to do it. Dan’s treatise on the subject last week really got me thinking about this.

I agree with most of his sentiments – Microsoft (Ballmer) brought all this nonsense upon themselves mostly. They’ve made it extremely hard to support them. My colleague, who got his Lumia 1020 shortly after I did, is considering getting a Galaxy Note 5 instead. It’s just been too long – the processor in the 1020 was approaching end of life even before the phone was released, and that was two years ago now.

My younger sister just bought herself an LG G4, after her Lumia 925 finally packed up last week after months of doing random things. I don’t even bother using the 41MP camera in my 1020 anymore, because the camera software got so buggered after each “update”, rendering it virtually unusable and slow.

Literally, the main reason I delayed getting a new phone after my N8 was because I was waiting for the camera. It’s the reason I had to return to Vodacom after porting away from them after 10 years of being ripped off (because they were the only ones offering the phone immediately).

I haven’t bothered upgrading to the Windows 10 Mobile Preview even though I am a Windows Insider. I honestly can’t be bothered with phones anymore. When the RTM appears I will upgrade immediately, because I would like my phone to be faster. But I won’t be purchasing a flagship, or any other Windows Phone. At least for a while anyway.

That doesn’t mean I’m switching to Apple. On principle, that will never, ever happen. I make this statement on here, knowing that the Internet never forgets. I am that confident that I will never cross over.

Android is not a choice either – I’ve mentioned here that I only tolerated it because of my Note 8, and I’ve worked enough with it at work (device configuration for mobile data capture) and at home (parents’ tablets) to know that I could not use it for anything worthwhile.

In conclusion: I’m over phones. I’m just waiting for The One now.