
I foresee a problem
If you try and throw this phone away, there's a good chance it will come straight back.
Should sell well in Australia though.
Ask any consumer technology pundit and they will tell you the future of communications gadgets is all about physical flexibility and wearability. With its new G Flex tablette, LG has embraced the former and produced a device with a flexible screen and a flexible battery. It's a handset that trumpets its form just as loudly as …
Frankly, the £300 Nexus 5 already looks to be an extravagant luxury compared to a £100 (easily unlocked) Motorola Moto G from Tesco. I bought one for my parents the other day, and for that amount of money it's a phenomenal device - fast, KitKat enabled and a lovely screen. If I didn't have vision issues which mean that, for me, large screen phones make a lot of sense, I'd not buy anything else, because there's nothing massively compelling in any other device that justifies the extreme hike in price. I'd certainly have one over a Nexus or any other sub 5.5" device.
"And will there be multiple versions in store that we can hold to our arse until we find one that matches ones natural curvitude?"
Don't be silly. You buy the phone (which as a fairly large curve radius) and just eat until your arse fits the phone. At a guess LG have done their research and the curvature is in the sweet spot for a standard Merkin hambeast, so Brits may need to pile on a few more pounds, unless they already have the desired shape.
The tighter and perter your arse, the more burgers you need to munch. Could be a cross-marketing opportunity for fast food restaurants.
The idea of bendiness (is that a word?) suggest a construction with less brittle materials, which could help keeping the phone screen alive a bit longer. There is a buoyant market in aftermarket screen repairs because in a battle between glass and gravity, gravity usually wins. It would be nice if the bendy components go some way towards addressing that vulnerability.
" It would be nice if the bendy components go some way towards addressing that vulnerability."
It would. But I can't help wondering if LG and their supplier will be pioneers in extending our understanding of glass fatigue. I look forward to other people testing the innovation on my behalf.
"A feature no customer is asking for that provides next to no extra functionality but the industry desperately hopes............"
It's called "innovation". As a general rule, you can't rely on the public to tell you what the next killer product is. Certainly they'll help you refine what you've already offered them, but quite often you have to offer them something new they haven't asked for, and just see if they'll buy it.
That was one of the nice things about the HTC Hero/Legend devices - the "chin" at the bottom both brought the microphone closer to your gob
Ah, prior art here. I have that on my old but trusty Motorola v3i (the original RAZR). As a flip phone, it places the mike close to my mouth by design..
Personally, I class the v3i as having the best ever form factor, even thought the shiny keyboard sucked and the OS was rubbish - mechanically, it was perfection. Which is why I still have one :)
"Woo Hoo" I thought - "A phone you can fold in half to make it smaller and protect the screen when it's in your pocket". But of course no, it's just a phone that is slightly curved but you can bend it flat if you want to.
I already have a flat phone - why the hell would i want to buy a curved phone just to bend it flat?
So we're supposed to think that this is a good thing?
It's not like they've made gorilla glass any less brittle (if ya'll haven't noticed, it's common for the gorilla glass on a screen to be damaged before the display itself), so the screen will still break the same way as before. I think they're just hoping the flexibility will deflect attention from the miserable screen resolution (seriously? Phablets should have full HD at a minimum...) and otherwise unremarkable specs and questionable design decisions (like the button positioning)
It'll be a facinating study in the durability of flexible electronics though. My betting is that reliability will be miserable.
Dunno about that. Gimmick to me is things like Siri. You ask her stupid questions, like does she like boys or girls once you get your phone and you never talk to her again.
This curved feature actually seems nice and useful every day. I'd give it a shot if I didn't already have a cool phone.