Predictive Texting – A Blessing Or A Curse?

Most mobile phones in this day and age have an option for predictive texting – a system whereby using the alphanumeric keypad on your phone, you can tap in messages one key press at a time, as opposed to the older way of hitting the “2” key twice to get a letter B, and so forth. This is a beneficial innovation in many ways, but as is the nature with all predictions, predictive texting can be inaccurate.

If your phone has an alphanumeric keypad, take it out and have a look at it. As you will notice, the keys each have more than one letter corresponding to them, and predictive texting works by taking the most likely meaning for your combination of key strokes and allowing you to change it if inaccurate. This would be fine, if people never sent a text in a hurry or without checking.

Thus it is that you can be trying to drive home in thick fog, and send a message to your friends or family saying “Slightly delayed. Stuck in dog!”. The looks you will get when you do arrive will be quite something to behold. As, I’m sure, were the looks that one man got when he sent a text to tell his wife he was sat outside a café sipping wine – only for the phone to interpret this as “ripping wind”.

Another thing to look out for with predictive texting is that it often does not recognise proper names. So, if you happen to be travelling with a friend named Anna, bear in mind that if you send a text to tell someone this, it may come out as “Will be there soon, am sat on a bus with bomb”. And that’s never a good place to be.

Taking Photographs With Your Phone

There was a time, and it was not too long ago, when the idea of a phone that takes pictures would have been the stuff of a James Bond storyline. Sure, it would be nice to have, we thought. But when you think about it, is a phone that takes photographs any more sensible or necessary than a shoe that tells you what day it is?

Fast forward to the present day, and camera phones are a way of life. About twenty years ago, there were some prototype videophones that allowed you to make phone calls where you could be seen and heard – and this may be what most of us had in mind when we thought of video phones. But in the present day, most of us use them to capture and store images and moving video of things we see and do.

The camera phone has taken off to such an extent that the camera technology used is developing at an astonishing rate, with many phones on the market that have more powerful cameras than most people would have in their homes as a dedicated camera. Camera phone footage is increasingly being used in news broadcasts and on websites.

In some cases, there has been an argument for the theory that camera phones have their own problems for society. With the fact that they are phones as well as cameras in mind, it is possible to take photographs surreptitiously while pretending to be sending a text. This is a problem that has some potential solutions, but which will continue to cause issues for some time to come.

Cheap Mobile Phones – The Best Approach?

There is no disputing that for the best in technology, the user will need to pay a higher price. If you want a better mobile phone, you need to pay more for it. That’s just common sense. But if you aren’t greatly concerned about whether your phone can send email, surf the internet or provide you with directions to your destination, then it may be that you would benefit from a cheaper phone.

Most people have a bottom line when it comes to what their mobile phone can do. For a number of people, that would seem to be the very bottom line of being able to send and receive text messages, and to make and receive calls. Although there are some phones available that even cut out the text capabilities in order to make the handset even cheaper to produce.

It’s all about what you need from your phone. Some people feel that they would legitimately be the poorer for being unable to take photographs with their cell phone, while others feel that internet capability is their bottom line. It goes without saying that you will have to pay more for greater capability – so if you want to save money, think of features you do not need.

When it comes down to it, it is a mobile phone. All it needs to be able to do is make and receive calls. The more diverse capabilities will come down in price as time goes on, but if you can live with just being able to communicate then a budget phone is worth a try.