Samsung's foldable fiasco splits readers down the line
Last week, in the wake of a host of issues that lead to Samsung officially postponing the launch of its Galaxy Fold, we asked APit readers if they still believe in foldable phones. The results are in and, like the Fold's display, it's split!
It was the biggest fiasco in the tech world since, well.... the Note 7 started exploding! But with the highly anticipated launch of the Samsung Galaxy Fold - the South Korean company's first smartphone with a flexible display - just days away, everything went catastrophically wrong.
Reviewers who had gotten the device early started posting pictures and videos of the Galaxy Fold falling apart, the screen tearing and coming away from the frame. Samsung initially blamed them for taking off a film on the display, before pulling the plug on the whole launch, for now at least.
We asked APit readers if the whole sage had altered their perception of foldable phones in general. Skepticism for this first-gen tech was already quite high, and we wanted to know if Samsung's woes had made things worse. The result showed that 38% of you still believe in the technology, with 40% saying they didn't and never had done. Those still undecided accounted for 12%. You can see the full results below.
There was some interesting discussion in the comments with several of you, such as Gavin Runeblade, expressing that the early adoption of tech such as this is more for "showing off" than a wise investment. Sanjai Joseph is waiting for the second generation of devices to emerge, whilst other readers suggested three to five years into the future is a more reasonable expectation for these devices to go mainstream.
LONGLIVEWISDOM remains positive on our foldable future, commenting that the development of foldable glass will be a major breakthrough in this segment of the market, but agreed that the technology needs to mature.
Are you surprised at the results? Why do you think foldable phones are such a polarizing issue in the smartphone market today?
I do not think users are ready for foldable phones: the price is extremely high and the mode of operation is not even approaching a tablet. Also, I can not figure out how many times that screen can be opened, because it can not resist infinitely. This combination of tablet-phone or tablet-phone (!) Does not seem to me to be an optimal direction.
I rather see a utility for flexible screens, as well as a large display screen that can be attached to a phone. Or even flexible brace-shaped screens, in which case they are useful rather as fun.
Flexible screen technology is absolutely awesome, it just does not fit for phones. At least not for foldable ones.
Previously humble Suzana Maam used to be active in generating pole centered articles. :-)
I miss her a lot :+)