The 90s kid in me yearns for a phone with Fm radio, headphone jack, IR blaster, stylus, memory card slot, slide out keyboard and one of those click on projectors the Motorola phones used to have. I would call it the Donatello and it would be radical.
And a translucent purple case!
I've refused to buy these "flagship" phones that don't have a headphone jack. The 90s kid in me will live on, damnit!
Same I use wired earbuds everyday at work and I refuse to buy a phone without one
I hate this idea. FM channels have more advertisements than they have music. And there's no technical way (yet) that I know of to automatically block said advertisements. Advertisements have driven the world into madness, as now anything that requires them to stay profitable either jams them into everything, or has a huge focus on rage-bait in order to get people to listen/watch/click. This rage-bait has made our world more angry, more divisive, and more chaotic than ever. Fuck advertisers.
The point of the article is to have them there for emergencies since we already have systems in place to broadcast emergency info over radio, and it's a lot simpler to implement than satellite for when cell signal is down.
It's not like you have to use it. My phone has it, I've used it to listen to local football games while camping. Worked great. Some people like to have the option to use it though.
There are some channels that aren't like this if you're lucky enough to live in an area with something like NPR stations, college/highschool stations, or donation funded music radio.
If you live near a University, tune in to the local student radio.
It's usually run by the University without ads.
I rock out to WPTS radio in Pittsburgh and both WUOG and WPPP in Athens, GA.
There are gaming phones, phones with crazy cameras, and iPhones where the lack of features is a feature. What I wish to have is a phone with as many features and functionality as possible.
That includes (but not limited to): IR blaster Headphone jack MicroSD card slot FM Radio RGB Notification/Status LED
Rather than a slim phone with a glossy finish that will pick up scratches right away unless wrapped in a phone case, the outer cover of the phone should be rugged and replaceable. Like with old Nokia phones. I don't care about few extra grams, or another millimeter of thickness. And I'm sure I'm not the only one.
I was hopeful about the Fairphone at first, but they started removing features as well.
When I changed in my iPhone 3g for an original Galaxy S, with barometer, I thought that by the iPhone/Galaxy 10 we would all be rocking tricorders. What kind of crazy sensors would they jam in by then? Zero. Here we are at generation 15 with no additional cool sensors.
"You don't need practical capabilities, you need to be an obedient consumer."
—OEMs
I've been saying this for a while now. FM radios and such are invaluable in emergency situations.
There have been times in the past where I've lost power to my house. No internet, no electricity etc in the middle of an emergency weather situation. I had to rely on battery powered radios to learn about what the situation was elsewhere and how long we'd be stuck etc. There is basically no reason why this can't be incorporated into phones, aside from the fact that phone makers would rather you use Apple Music etc. It should be legislated for I believe.
One reason is that every implementation I've ever tried relies on using the wired earphones as an aerial and Apple magically convinced everyone that having a 3.5mm port is somehow a bad thing.
Just buy a $15 FM radio. Especially since you can't charge your phone when you have no power, but a small radio takes AA batteries which can sit in a drawer for 10 years until you need them.
You'd think so but every device around my house that I "put batteries in it and forget it" when I need it I find the batteries have exploded and the device is ruined (regardless of the decade on the expiry-date label of the battery). So my plan now is to keep the device separate from the batteries like it's a freaking handgun and make sure my phone is charged so I can use its light to make my way to the drawer where we keep the batteries.
In addition to being able to take AAs, my FM radio has a solar panel and a hand crank to recharge the included rechargeable battery, which can charge a phone in a pinch. Win all around!
I've come to the realization that the phone I want is a Nokia 3310 "brick".
Why? Have you heard radio? Every station is just a glorified shitty playlist that they cycle through a dozen times a day
Because if the cell networks fail, right now there's no backup method to get crucial information to everyone's hands.
Radio are an easy secondary, really long range mechanism to get information INTO disaster stricken areas when normal means of communications have failed.
Back home we had a local station, felt like a way of tuning into "the city." Very few breaks outside of their pledge drives once/twice a year. Listening to the Jazz station here on short drives these days. Very few ads, and some pretty gnarly shit. College radio stations are also pretty easy to find and escape that ad insanity.
Don't let radio and broadcast TV die quite yet, it's still very viable, especially as we sort out net neutrality and failsafe systems in cases of emergency.
That's what happens when we "removed regulations" and allowed Clear Channel (aka iHeartRadio) to buy up most every major station in the country.
However you can still do short range FM transmissions yourself, as a lot of people do with elaborate Christmas light displays, plus it's useful in emergency situations.
Then you'd need to include a headphone jack since the headphones acted as the antenna.
Good.
It's funny how the few who're totally sold on Bluetooth go "ugh, but then you'd need a headphone jack" as if it isn't an upgrade for others which wouldn't affect their ability to use Bluetooth at all.
You say that like it’s a bad thing. You can still use Bluetooth even when your phone has a headphone jack, and headphone jacks can be IP67 rated so it’s not a concern for waterproofing.
Maybe if you live somewhere with good radio stations... the radio is pretty much dead here. Nothing but Christian talk and static.
I'm going to chime in here to plug the ulefone power armor 18t I just got. I was pretty nervous to get a chinese phone as I've only had samsung and lg phones before, but this thing legit blows me away. Not only does it fully support every band that my carrier uses (rare even for phones made for the US market), but it has:
Replaceable battery that lasts 3+ days between recharges
Extremely rugged, IP69 waterproof and designed for underwater photography (physical shutter button and diving camera app)
3.5mm jack, sd card slot, FM radio (with built in antenna - no headphones need to be plugged in), and an RGB notification led
Dimensity 900 chipset that beats a lot of the snapdragon chips on the market.
12 fucking GB of RAM... yes, 12...
Wifi 6(ax)
Wireless charging and reverse charging
A fucking 60x magnification microscope? (Why???)
A FLIR thermal camera (Just because, why the fuck not)
Runs mostly bloat free stock android
All that for under $600 (on aliexpress)
The only thing it's missing is an IR blaster, otherwise this is the best phone I've ever had, bar none. It is a chonky beast though, be warned.
This has really changed my view on Chinese electronics, especially at a time when phones for the western world are losing features and functionality all the time (including stuff from South Korean). Turns out capitalism isn't that great for innovation!
Wait, you guys don't have FM radio on your phones?
Most scrappy overpriced phones doesn't have mini jack so no antenna to get radio
For emergency purposes, mandate cell tower batteries with solar supplement.
And generators for bigger hubs.
Cellular internet is critical infrastructure now.
Same for ISPs. My internet wifi has battery backup, so as long as the ISP stays up we are good.
Cell towers nearby all went down during the last big power failure. I could hit one distant tower that still had power, but the signal was weak, and the tower was swamped. It could barely push data.
Next big earthquake will be a total shitshow if that's not fixed.
i remember old ipods could listen to the radio using the headphones as an antenna and i thought it was the coolest thing in the world. listening to a live feed like that is so much more...viscerally satisfying than just streaming a song or even listening to internet radio, where it could easily be just a computer. it's nice knowing someone is actually creating a show for you in real time
Imagine if every American had a shortwave radio transmitter in their pocket. Endless September for hams
A lot of posts in here complaining about shitty commercial radio. Do you all not have local radio stations? I love my local stations.
I don't even remember the last time I listened to FM radio. I just don't like listening to the same 20 songs on repeat with annoying ads
I've never bought a phone without FM radio. I regard it as an emergency tool.
That doesn't help much if your country has shut down FM broadcasting though.
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