WOF: What should be the next major development in smartphones?

Smartphones have come a long way since the first PDAs with phone capabilities hit the market. But as the market matures it's getting increasingly difficult for companies to come up with truly revolutionary new features year after year.

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It should be illegal to sell them locked.

What they'll try to push: expensive high end tablets with LTE, wearable devices, augmented reality, real-time outdoor/indoor location reporting to social networks, phones with advanced sensors (infrared thermometer, scent, etc).

What we'll actually want: the things you mentioned off the top of your head. In addition I expect to see most phones go prepaid: low and mid-range devices will be available off-contract at launch, and many will only be sold prepaid. Most people will only be getting the newest and hottest devices on contract 2-3 years from now. I also expect a minor renaissance for physical keyboards as phones and tablets replace laptops for more people.

Er, the megapixel phenomenon?

Sooner or later a chip put into your brain will be the phone and your vision will display everything.

What about the Mozilla Seabird?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG3tLxEQEdg

I wan't to be able to say, "computer!.. Turn on and tabbed techspot.com new stories", "also, tabb my e-mails and load my facebook page.". I want to say that every morning, wheter its on my pc or my cell phone. I want cell phones to make life easier for me.

People realizing that iphones aren't worth what they pay for, wait that's never gonna happen.

Apart from far better battery life I personally don't want anything else, in fact I'm more partial to my old Samsung feature phone than my SIII.

Nothing wrong with that. Sometimes simpler is better. Personally I think the Nokia E-series was the pinnacle of high usability for day-to-day tasks. A shame they started making them too small for human hands.

How about a worldwide chain of rehabilitation centers catering exclusively the cellular phone addiction! Once they're fully staffed and the website is up and running, you'll be able to check yourself in by voice, text, web, or Skype, right from behind the wheel of your car.....

Edge to edge displays...and I hope no transparent displays, they're utterly stupid...
Better battery ofc, and loads of processing power to spare

I think you will see projectors built into phones, Acer already makes one that fits in your pocket.

Battery life >week with heavy usage
bigger and cheaper built-in storage
bigger and cheaper memory expansion cards (haven't see a64gb microsd for <20$)

Edge to Edge curved displays, better battery, maybe some kind of built in screen cover.
I'd also like to see Android OS fragmentation disappear, or I'd like to see Android disappear and have Ubuntu OS phones come in (assuming the OS will be better).

HELL YEA!, carriers have some nerve trying to offer something their competitors don't! Proprietors and exclusivity should go the way of the dodo!!!

:|

lol why would you want the display to be curved? maybe you mean fold-able so you can fit it into a pocket?
and so much hate for android

there are other projector phones too, samsung made the galaxy bean I think...but they suck...2 problems: they draw tooo much power, and secondly, projectors just suck and im not even talking about mobile projectors...lets hope for a breakthrough in projector tech (laser projectors maybe ? ), then I would hope for that too

I actually like my Windows phone as is, I'd just like to see a way to have a holographic image of it pop out double in size so I don't have to wear my glasses to text

LOL@projector phone. What the fack does that have to do with my comment? But yea, I prefer sharp images, not sharp images blown up to blurry ones.

No, I mean curved. Foldable coming later.

I have no hate for android. I have a dislike for Google/Carriers for how they handle OS updates. My Galaxy S running JB 4.2 (Slim Bean) and LG Optimus 4G LTE running JB 4.1.2 (CM10) prove that. Maybe you love GB or ICS because you only use your phone to make calls, but I'm a techie, and I want it all... for all.