To be frank, it’s sort of hard to see many devices that could be more useful than the modern “phone,” which btw the phone part is almost superfluous at present. Now the an always connected general purpose compute device with a nearly complete environmental sensor array, extraordinarily high resolution screen, integrated multilens camera array, capable of doing AR with LIDAR, etc etc. It’s difficult to imagine a more capable device. These “new” devices are reductionist and trying to tackle the non-problem of carrying these wonderful tricorders of 2024. Converging devices has been a theme for the last 20 years, and now it’s almost entirely been achieved. There may very well not be another class of devices forthcoming if you factor in the connected wearables with bio monitoring that are essentially extensions of the “phone.”
There was a sci-fi story written in 1960s which described pretty much what smartphones ended up being:
> The remote-access computer transponder called the "joymaker" is your most valuable single possession in your new life. If you can imagine a combination of telephone, credit card, alarm clock, pocket bar, reference library, and full-time secretary, you will have sketched some of the functions provided by your joymaker.
Interestingly, the author came up with the idea after he got acquainted with the details of time-sharing mainframes common of his time. Consequently, the devices themselves are actually mostly hollow, just processing input and output, and all actual smarts are done on central servers elsewhere - which becomes a major plot point eventually.
It even got the social aspects of it - i.e. it being a standard device that people carry around them everywhere, it's used for most day-to-day communication etc. Just about the only thing about it that feels off from a modern perspective is their size - they are large enough to require carrying them on the belt (like 90s cellphones) rather than in the pocket.
Now, one thing that is still missing compared to the model is the "pocket bar" part (which in the novel also includes recreational drugs). Now that would actually justify a new device like Rabbit. ~
It’s the Leatherman vs a toolbox. The advantages of phones is their convenience. If you seldom use any of the extra parts, then it does a great job. More often and you’d better go with a proper device. And that includes the camera.
I would note that people use their camera constantly on the phone. I would posit people only use a dedicated camera in very specific situations where a superior lens or sensor is required, such as nature photography or some special event. I’ll wager $20 almost every photo taken by humanity YTD was on a “phone.”
I didn't say anything about it being more useful than a phone, but the next big thing would have to solve problem(s) that a phone (and other existing devices) cannot solve to the same degree.
