this is the Motorola 888 one of the most popular cell phone models back in 1994 I actually had one of these myself back then it only had like 50 minutes of talk time every month so it was basically just for emergencies jump forward 10 years and Motorola introduced the Razer V3 a wildly different design right out of Science Fiction that flipped open Like a Star Trek Communicator thinner than a pencil with hours of battery life and unlimited talk time also you could text and play games with it add one of these too once upon a time I kept all the cell phones that I had owned over the years and had them displayed next to each other so you could kind of see them getting smaller and smaller over time uh that was pretty cool I did actually lose them all in an apartment fire in the early 2000s so I lost them that kind of sucks but the point is that’s how much cell phones changed in those 10 years how much have they changed in the last 10 years in 2013 Apple launched the iPhone 5s and here’s the current model the iPhone 14 they’re basically the same phone yeah I know they’ gotten way more powerful the cameras are better there’s more functionality now than he had back then but design wise uh user interface Wise It’s fundamentally not that much different than it was back then in fact you can make the argument that you could go all the way back to the first iPhone in 2007 to see the first major difference I know all you Apple haters now flaming the comments saying that that’s because apple sucks and yes you are that predictable but the point is we’ve kind of reached Peak smartphone I mean where else can you even go with this device so one of two things is true here option one the phone has reached his final form and from this point forward the only improvements we’re going to see are just incremental changes you know just to get us to keep buying new ones because if we don’t they’ll go out of business or option two something else is about to come along and take its place something just as disruptive as a smartphone something that changes the way we interact with the world something that we’ll all have to go out and get just to not fall behind everybody else some of the wealthiest companies in human history are facing massive pressure to be the first to create this device whatever it may be so with that much at stake and literal trillions of dollars to invest in it I think there’s an argument to be made that the smartphones days are numbered and there are a few Trends happening in technology right now that might exacerbate that so today let’s talk about that what’s going to come next and how’s it going to change our lives in the way back this is a codex it’s basic basically a book but written by hand on something other than paper written or drawn a lot of Cotes were Illustrated Cotes is a fun word anyway before the Codex the only way to carry around words was in your head or on a scroll um sure sometimes you could etch them in stone but only enough for like you know 15 Commandments these 15 10 10 commandments the point is the Codex was a disruptive device that changed the way we communicated information as a species um perhaps the first disruptive Information Technology followed by the printing press in the 1430s but things really got disrupted with Alexander Graham Bell Bell of course was one of the inventors of the telephone as I mentioned in a recent video Edison also worked on a telephone but Graham got the patent so he got the credit the bellbox telephone went on sale in 1877 and for more than 100 years the design stayed pretty much the same I mean microphone speaker wires a dial later buttons what else do you need then came the cell phone and 1973 Motorola unveiled the first portable cell phone it weighed 2.4 lb and had to charge 10 hours for 30 minutes of talk time guys Battery tech has come so far it’s insane but the cell phone at first anyway was really more of an evolution than a revolution it was the smartphone that really changed everything I mean think about the revolution that the smartphone was it literally LeapFrog science fiction I mean the Star Trek Communicator was just that a communicator it didn’t play Angry Birds you couldn’t even text with a thing yeah I did a video a while back where I talked about the T&T you will add campaign from uh the ’90s where they kind of tried to predict where technology was going to go in the future it’s an interesting episode if you haven’t seen it you should go check it out but seriously even the people who made the future happen had no idea the change that the smartphone would bring and that was like 15 years ago the first generation iPhone was revealed on January 9th 2007 it launched in US markets in June 2007 and a few other countries in November that year in 2007 over 122 million smartphones were sold sales numbers climbed through the debut of other iPhones and Android phones and in 2014 1.2 billion smartphones were sold and sales have hovered around the 1.4 billion Mark ever since as of the recording of this video nearly seven out of 10 people on the planet owns a smartphone it’s become a fundamental part of our human experience at this point but as I asked at the beginning of this video like where do we go from here like what more can we get out of this black square if TV and movies are any guide future phones will be transparent and have holographic displays it’s kind of amazing how how ubiquitous that is as sort of a shorthand for future technology the whole uh transparent screen thing like one of my favorite shows parks and wreck in their final season in 2014 they kind of jumped ahead three years and in their version of 2017 just three years later everybody had transparent phones with holographic projections and stuff SW aous and yet there’s no real push for that in real life um Samsung filed a patent in 2020 for a partially transparent phone but nothing’s come of it um there have been a few trans AR displays uh but the challenges of creating a clear phone are immense I mean like all the battery and all the hardware would have to fit inside the bezel somehow not saying it’ll never get there uh I’m just saying that it’s more of a Sci-Fi convention than an actual Trend one place we can experience improvements is in battery life I know I just said the batteries have gotten way better over the years but so have the the power needs of these devices so um point is there’s still room for improvement graphine batteries we keep hearing about that could add capacity while reducing weight uh they’re also less prone to bursting into Flame than say lithium ion batteries um I’ve talked about graphine and all kinds of other alternative batteries in other videos now one area where phone companies usually tried to differentiate themselves is with the cameras but we’ve kind of got to the point where adding more resolution is pointless I mean once you’re recording in 4K video there’s just diminishing returns after that but there is still some room for improvement on the front cameras right now we still have to deal with these notches in the front cameras because we haven’t quite perfected the under display camera uh so that’s a technology it’s being worked on but in L of being able to improve the cameras we can improve image processing uh specifically with AI in fact the inclusion of AI is a big area where smartphones are expected to evolve like you can expect in the near future for these large language models to kind of act as digital assistants on the phone that can work between apps to solve problems for you like instead of ordering food from door Dash or Uber Eats you would just tell your phone order me some low M from Pearl’s Chinese Restaurant and it would just get on the app and do it for you or just say I need to order plane tickets to Boston and it’ll get on a travel app and give you options to choose from but I think that’s where smartphones are basically going at this point you know just basically becoming digital assistants and distraction devices but really beyond that like form factor wise where do you go from here because I mean like nobody thought that the smartphone was going to be like the end of progress right it’s going to be something that takes its place I think the question comes down to how far down the rabbit hole do you want to go cuz there is a bit of a backlash to um our smartphone addiction you know some say it would be great to have a device that provides all the advantages of a smart smart phone but without the distraction part you know so we can live in the moment and connect with people others believe the only way out is through to go deeper into the immersion this is say what Apple’s trying to do with the Vision Pro and meow with the quest in the metaverse I’ve talked about the metaverse before no need to rehash all of that but there is a push for more immersion which and this might sound kind of counterintuitive but it also kind of aims to make the technology invisible like what if instead of you know looking down at your screen all the time as you’re walking around that the world was your screen this is the potential for smart glasses and headsets so I know I’m kind of late to the game to talk about the Apple Vision Pro there not a whole lot here that I can say that you haven’t already heard so let’s just call this my take on it so obviously I don’t have a Vision Pro but I’ve Had The Quest 2 uh for a couple of years now was a kind of a pandemic purchase and I don’t know I go through phases with it sometimes I use it a lot sometimes it just kind of sits in the drawer for months at a time but it’s safe to say I haven’t found a use for it that really has integrated it into my life you know become a part of my everyday routine say the way my phone or the computer has become it’s mostly recreational for me but one aspect of it that I always thought was really cool was the pass through mode um now on the quest it’s low resolution and it’s black and white but it gets the perspective right and you can see especially when the guardian barri is up how seamlessly the digital content interacts with the real world like that really opened up for me what the potential for AR and and mixed reality headsets are that you know if you could digitally put computer displays or or artwork or TV screens anywhere you want wanted in your home or in your office like that opens up a lot of possibilities might even call it a game changer so when when the Vision Pro was announced like for me anyway it was like somebody took a list of the things that I wish the quest could do and made it a reality the high defin lifelike pass through mode that you could turn on and off with a dial the fact that it automatically became transparent when people walk into your field of view the fact that you don’t need clunky controllers in your hands this stuff just blew my mind and I got to be honest I really want to see this whole ey tracking technology thing that people will keep raving about calling it you know close to Magic it just looks sick so Apple calls this spatial Computing um instead of AR or mixed reality because you know Apple going to Apple uh but I think it’s actually a fairly accurate term to use because they’re they’re talking about taking the computer experience off of a screen and making it three-dimensional in the world which again in a way is kind of like having a transparent phone if you think about it and of course here come the comments about the price tag and me being an apple Fanboy because yes you are that predictable but the price tag is steep I mean it’s 35 $0000 that’s a good chunk of change especially when you compare it with the the quest or the quest pro at $500 um but the quality of the image and the mixed reality functions are just so far beyond the quest and and what lower price models can do like it really puts it more on par with higher-end mixed reality headsets like the varo VR3 which starts at the exact same price The Vision Pro is like buying a computer and a display in one but the display can be as big or small as you want it to be now I want to say I don’t think that Vision Pro is going to be a game changer it’s priced too high for most people um it’s really more of a developer product for professionals to get their hands on and see what they can come up with for it which I mean one could make the argument that’s what the original iPhone was I mean I I remember people laughing out loud at the price and saying there’s no way anybody would ever be willing to spend that much money on it that and it didn’t have a fraction of the functionality that it would have even 5 years later after the developer started creating more interesting and useful apps for it I see the Vision Pro as just a good first step you know like like something that will be refined in the coming years something that’ll get people used to this idea of spatial Computing so that when something more functional more price non prohibitive comes along you know it’s an interface that we all understand at that point and I do think that’s where this is going um like a lot of hay has been made about the fact that it has that front screen that shows your eyes which um yeah it’s weird maybe it’ll even a little dystopian but I think that’s just kind of meant as a Band-Aid of sorts until the technology gets sorted out for transparent smart glasses and whatnot here we are with that transparent screen thing again now you might not like the idea of smart glasses uh but if you want to talk about what could be the next smartphone what will be the next C change and how we interface with technology I think that’s a good bet like instead of being you know Tethered to a screen that you hold in your hand the screen will be right in front of you as big as you want as transparent as you want with helpful information displayed as you navigate the world probably with some kind of helpful AI assistant anticipating your needs like instead of having to carry something around you just put the glasses on and go about your day you know the technology would be integrated into your daily life and ideally become invisible now that’s one direction that things could go in uh there is another Direction though with the same goal of making the technology invisible it’s from a company called Humane Inc which was founded by two former Apple exacts Imran chadri and Bethany bonjourno Imran and Bethany are a husband and wife Duo who left Apple in 2017 a move they didn’t make lightly chrey worked as a designer for Apple for 22 years he often worked side by side with Steve Jobs he’s actually listed as a co-inventor of their patent for the touchcreen bonjourno was a director of software engineering at Apple she managed a number of notable projects including the first iPad and in case that’s not impressive enough before that she was an astrophysicist clearly these guys know a thing or two about building smart devices um they’re also good at keeping secrets they’ve been operating in stealth mode for nearly 5 years um everybody knew they were up to something big but nobody knew what there were some hints along the way like a 2020 patent application for a body worn device with a laser projector and there was a leaked investor document from 2021 that mentioned an always on camera and light R sensors and back in April of this year they finally reveal what they’ve been working on in a TED Talk and we agree sorry this is my wife I’m going to have to get this hello hey babe since that reveal they’ve given it a name the AI pin uh although I have a feeling they think people are going to drop the A and just call it the i pen but whatever their goal with the AI pen and the mission statement for Humane in general is to make the technology invisible and get rid of screens altogether and as talk chadre called the screens a further barrier between between you and the world and he claims that Humane wants their technology to fade into the background of your life the way it works is it’s a wearable device that sits on the top of your shirt either with a pen or a magnet and when you’re not actively using it it kind of monitors your surroundings and helps you to navigate or provide information when needed you interact with it with your voice and with gestures and when it does need to display information as you saw from that clip where you made the phone call you just hold out your hand and IT projects it on your hand with lasers the idea is it’s a little AI assistant that you can use to interact with like it’s a person it listens and anticipates your needs so if you’re hungry it might suggest nearby options like I noticed a moment in the Ted talk before he makes that phone call where he says the word wife and a little light goes on on his little AI pen so was that the AI listening and knowing that it was time to make a call to his wife or was that somebody off screen uh you know triggering it remotely it certainly seemed like something intelligent was paying attention and acting appropriately which is the idea charre talked about the tech being ambient and contextual and that’s what he showed a piece of tech that Waits quietly taking the world around it until it can be helpful like at one point in the demo he used a double finger tap to use the PIN to translate his words into French and the translation was in his voice using generative AI which is super cool for all the Travelers out there like granted we’ve had Google translate on our phones for a while but this just takes it a step further um again without the need for a screen it can also serve as a personal assistant managing your email on your calendar catch me up is coming to tomorrow’s design meeting Bethany wants to move next week’s dinner and Oliver is asking about soccer this weekend according to them it’s fully customized as well with the gestures and prompts so you can teach it what you want it to do with machine learning and because it learns from you the more you use it the more efficient it’ll get where it does get a little yikes see is the fact that its camera is basically always on um the idea being that like you know if you were watching your child take its first step you wouldn’t have to like whip out a phone and experience it through the screen you can just be present and enjoy it and then after it is over you can just tell the device to save what just happened which I get that I mean that’s that’s cool I get the reason behind it but um you definitely get into some privacy concerns there though I mean we’ve all got cameras in our pockets all the time now there’s security cameras everywhere you go but it’s something else when somebody’s just pointing a camera at you like the next time you’re out somewhere just just pull up your phone and and do this to the table next to you yeah people don’t like that and the coffee shop will not let me back it let you back back in there again which by the way that was one of the Hang-Ups people had with the the snap glasses and the and the Rayban smart glasses just the fact that there’s this big camera just staring at people when they’re trying to talk to you so I mean I do worry a little bit that is smart glasses or you know always on digital assistance like the AI pin if that really does become a thing um it might kind of change how people act which might sound like a good thing if you think generally that that people are bastards the idea that they might you know U act a little bit nicer and more civil if they know that they’re being recorded but I don’t know like I make video content for a living and I can tell you people just they just act differently when there’s a camera on them and yeah I’m a little worried that over time if these things become ubiquitous that people just kind of adopt a layer of falseness in our interactions with each other um that will never really be sure who we’re talking to like is this the authentic person or just the Persona that they adopt for the camera which I mean to push back against Humane just a little bit um that their stated goal is to remove screens so they can connect with each other more fully this could be a hindrance to that anyway the TED Talks link down below feel free to go check it out in full hum’s AI pen is expected to come out later this year um the company has not even hinted at the cost but if you want one you can go to h.m. to get on the waiting list who. yeah we’re gonna have to work on that the idea is interesting and I’ll be watching to see where it goes but I think the big question comes down to have we reached Peak distraction cuz the entire premise of company in their device is that we’re all clamoring to get off our phones and re-engage with each other which I mean I I think there’s an argument to be made that that would be better for society and and maybe we have reached a point where things have gotten so out of whack that there’s a movement or a trend away from technology and screens to uh uh log off and touch grass as they say but I think there’s also a solid argument that um people like distraction kind of a lot okay so this is a segment that I like to call Joe contradicts the entire point of his video I mean let’s face it there’s nothing stopping any of us from setting these things down and walking away from it right now but we don’t do we our phones are more integrated into our lives than ever before and maybe a clip on AI assistant could you know take on a lot of the major uses of the phone and and free us from our dependence on them but I mean come on let’s let’s be honest with ourselves most of the time that we spend on our phone is just mindlessly scrolling some feed or playing some meaningless game it’s a dopamine delivery device which is why if I had to make a choice between these two options I’d probably bet on Smart goggles or glasses because those would still allow you to engage in that sweet sweet distraction whenever you want or maybe we all have you know AI assistants on us that we use to kind of navigate our world and whatnot but we also have a screen of some sort a a phone or a tablet or a computer that you can consume content or do work with or maybe maybe my entire thesis is flawed maybe we landed on the perfect design a pocket size device that you can use to communicate with anybody in the world and contains all the knowledge in the world maybe that’s sci-fi enough hi I go out there have an eye opening rest of the week stay safe get those goggles on or off as you’re walking walking around and I’ll see you next Monday love you guys take care