My daughter brought home a busted up Motorola Razr flip phone yesterday. She got it trading stuff with neighbors.
It’s still a beautiful piece of hardware. She couldn’t understand how it was so cool when it came out despite doing nothing but calls and texts. I couldn’t explain.
It took me back to the days when cells phones all did nothing but calls, yet they were incredible status symbols. The model you had said so much. It was pure bling to go beyond a basic phone. And there was nuance in the choice.
The iPhone ended that. There is no way to signal status with a cell phone anymore. There’s nothing better than a standard issue iPhone. In fact, new models now rarely innovate, so even two or three models back is not any kind of negative status signal.
It’s interesting to watch in real time as goods go from luxury only, to widespread with luxury options, to standard commodities. Like cars, I suspect it will move into commodity plus collectible or customized market.
Maybe some retrofitted flip phone or custom home built job will be next.
