Kendrick Lamar's company just dropped a limited-edition 'dumb' phone. It's already sold out.
Kendrick Lamar's company just dropped a limited-edition 'dumb' phone. It's already sold out.
Kendrick Lamar enters the tech space with a collaboration on the Light Phone 2. Light phones offer minimalistic experiences without apps or color.
They all sold out and they are all packed in one dudes garage. The actual sale of them will take place over the next year over a series of ebay auction, as is tradition for limited edition things.
It's $299, which isn't ridiculous for a phone, but this is kind of gimmicky with its Magic 8-Ball thing and, of course, its celebrity backing. I don't know, I guess it's not the worst price point, but considering you can get low-end Android phones for that with more functionality, I'm also guessing the people buying it are not really worried about the price.
Why not get a phone that can take, send, and receive pictures and video. It would also have maps, GPS, encrypted messaging, streaming music, audiobooks, e-books, home automation apps, ride hailing, food ordering, decent browser, etc.
Then, stay with me here, don't install social media apps. The lengths people go to so they can avoid social media when it is extremely avoidable is crazy to me.
What you're doing here is subtly shifting the burden of phone addiction from software companies and phone manufacturers back onto end users.
You're glossing right over the fact that these teams have the very best software engineers, mechanical engineers, marketers, ad people, psychologists, and doctors for the purpose of making these endlessly scrolling apps as addictive and hard to avoid as possible.
I read your comment and think about the people who say "why are you depressed? Just go lift some weights. It all comes down to you"
Shit, you can buy a phone for £15 and I bet it's got snake on it
Make 100,000 of that phone and it will cost a lot closer to £15.
The bulk discounts on components and the PCB itself are pretty huge once you get up into the 10,000 qty. I've never had that pleasure. Only thing I've been involved with was a few hundred units.
Do a run in the 100k range and I imagine you're calling chip makers directly and making some insane deals.
But at only 250 units your PCB and expensive components like display and shell will still be quite expensive.
I mean, you're quite clearly paying for the lack of features here.
Which makes the 8 ball even dumber.
Yeah, the 8 ball bothers me, as does the 'it's a dumb phone, but you can add a bunch of apps,' which is... a regular smartphone with no apps installed for the most part. The e-ink screen is unusual and interesting for a phone and I can see the appeal there, but the rest is kind of odd.
I'm guessing the majority of the phones were bought by people who are big fans of Kendrick Lamar. I sort of understand. An (impossible) equivalent to me would be if Stanley Kubrick came out with some piece of tech. I'd be sorely tempted to buy it just because I love Stanley Kubrick.
It’s 30 dollars of technology.
It is. Which is why it is so stupid that a company like Nokia or Motorola doesn't spend a little more on market research to totally own this market.
Or, maybe they did and partnered with Kendrick Lamar behind the scenes.
maybe they did and partnered with Kendrick Lamar behind the scenes.
Litephone has been around for a while.
more like 6 dollars on the BOM, would sell for 30 doll hairs to the consumer, tho
Considered this phone but couldn't commit to something like that, nor can I justify such a price tag for that. Instead I'm attempting to dumb down my phone. Moving to GrapheneOS and starting from the basics is definitely a good starting point.
I hate minimalism! This is a dumb phone that got rid of everything that made dumb phones charming.
I love minimalism, but dumbphones are not functionally minimal. They do less and seem "simple", but you're offsetting necessary utility elsewhere. Mostly they require making compromises that don't need to be made if not for a little self-control.
A simple black rectangle is perfectly minimal. How you set them up is everything.
I have owned the Light Phone 1 and the Light Phone 2 -- both were built with the intent to stay connected in a handful of ways without needing to have a full-spec'd, app-heavy, typically-sized smart phone.
If the intent and the vibe make sense to you, then it is a wonderful approach for a more 'minimalist' device: you can go outdoors, travel, hike, camp, etc., without having a smart phone to pick up and play with. I dig it.
If the intent and vibe don't make sense to you, the Light Phone may not be a good fit.
I really like the device, and use it often enough as a daily driver on weekends. Always glad to see some public attention on it.
Ridiculous price for a dumb phone
Not for a run of only 250.
Edit: I should have explained that I was referring only to economies of scale in manufacturing of electronics. Making only 250 of some electronic device means a much higher per unit cost than if one made 10,000 of the same thing. You can look at quantity discounts of microcontrollers or sensors or things like that ok Digi-Key or Mouser and see what I mean.
It’s an existing product. The only thing “limited” about it is it says phalange on the back. It’s a fucking stupid marketing gimmick. You can go buy a regular one right now, they are in stock
https://www.thelightphone.com/shop/products/light-phone-ii-black
Let's be honest, he could sell poop in a ziploc bag and his fans would buy it.
I hardly text and your call is going to voice mail. Phone things are not the reason I have a smartphone. I'd be happy with an updated Palm Pilot with connectivity.
Oh, how I miss my Treo. If only they made a next Gen, with a new OS that had backwards compatibility for Palm apps, which were tiny and used little power.
Who?
One of the greatest rappers.
Kendrik Lamar
Mike jones
Jitterbug 2
The Electric Boogaloo
Reddit moment
Not so dumb if it has voice recognition...
Possibly for accessibility reasons? No point in shafting blind people just for a gag.
The Nokia 3310 had voice recognition...
Missing lte band 71. Hope the buyers don’t have T-Mobile in an area that’s b71 only.
Yeah the Light Phone 2 has been out for a while now. I saw it and thought "oh this is kind of interesting." Then I found out it has a shit radio and a shit battery. You'd think that it would last days and says on one charge but nope. Also it has USB-Micro for charging lol.
If they fixed a few things like that, I would be all over it.
I can only imagine what kind of profit this company is making by selling a phone literally purpose built to be as lightweight as possible both physically and on features for $299.
I'd be willing to bet they could sell that for half the price and still make a reasonably-sized profit - so I might just take out my popcorn and see if somebody does.
You can go buy one right now. These have been out for years.
https://www.thelightphone.com/shop/products/light-phone-ii-black
It just doesn’t say phalange or whatever on the back lol. So fucking stupid.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The Light Phone 2 is getting some particularly strong star power courtesy of rapper Kendrick Lamar's creative agency pgLang.
His company, which he runs alongside childhood friend Dave Free, has released a limited edition version of the "dumb" phone.
The minimalistic phone has no web browser and its screen is paper-like similar to that of some e-readers.
In its simplest form, you can call, text, set an alarm, and use it as a hotspot, but there are add-on tools that include a music player, notes, a calculator, directions, and more.
Users are invited to ask the phone a question and shake it to find out an answer.
It's not clear if Lamar himself is an avid user of the pared-down device, but more people are turning to "dumb" phones to cut down distractions and screen time.
The original article contains 257 words, the summary contains 136 words. Saved 47%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
Just bought a Poco M3 Pro 5G for 75 bucks at AliExpress if they can beat it with their Dumb Phone I'm in.