En smartphone, lätt att personifiera

Abstract

Take your phone out from your pocket and look at it. Chances are that a certain California-based company made it; in 2013, it was quite likely. If you flip it over and remove the shell you have added (or look through the protective film), you might also learn that it was assembled in China. Flip it over again and look at the picture of something or someone you find great affection for, protected by yet another thin film. While who made it and who assembled it might vary, and it does not matter from now on, the other parts about protective barriers and personalization might be more accurate. We buy increasingly expensive phones, with well thought out idioms, and yet we add protective shells to either shield them from harm or to keep them in pristine condition, which also obscures the same design idioms. - Why is that? We carry our phones around during most of our waking hours, and why should we not? Phones are an integral part in our social and professional lives. We as humans tend to want to personalize items we keep for extended periods of time, phones being no exception. That protective shell you picked for your phone may well have your favourite band on it, or something similar that relates to you as an individual in some way. Neither is your background image an accident. I have made a phone that affirms to our desire to protect and personalize our phones, while it also has a defining design idiom of its own.