In all sorts of industries, analogue products are making a comeback
I realise everyone’s desperate for good news these days, but even so, there was something startling about the elation that greeted reports of the relaunch of the Nokia 3310 phone. (You know the one: that iconic plastic brick with 12 pressable buttons, and a screen you couldn’t crack.) Partly, no doubt, this was simple nostalgia. But it was also because the 3310 “just worked”.
You hear that phrase so often these days, in praise of some old-fashioned bit of tech, that it’s easy to forget how strange it is: why would there ever be a market for gadgets that didn’t just work? Yet many don’t. Apple’s fingerprint recognition doesn’t really work. Nor does autocorrect. Few smartphone batteries work, if “works” implies a long day’s use. And why do we tolerate iPhones not being waterproof? Measured by the usual yardstick – how much you can do with it – consumer technology keeps getting more amazing. But, judged by how reliably it does it, we seem to be heading backwards.
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