Wouldn’t it be interesting to travel back in time to the distant, pre-smartphone days of 2010 and see how we survived using separate devices for listening to music, navigating, and taking pictures?
Sure, it would… but it would also be terribly inconvenient.
So the WSJ’s Joanna Stern took the plunge and used nothing but 2010-era technology so you don’t have to. Here are a few things she learned:
In 2010, it was still common to carry around digital cameras to take pictures, Garmins to navigate via GPS, and mp3 players to listen to music.
But in the past decade, smartphones consolidated those and other devices into a single device — and are hoping consumers will start paying closer to $2k than $200 for cell phones.
As feature-rich smartphones became ubiquitous, they pushed a number of industries to the brink of extinction.
In other cases, the smartphone didn’t completely kill off companies, but it forced them to shift their entire business models.
At the start of 2010, it wasn’t even possible to post a selfie on Instagram.
Instagram launched 3 years after the iPhone, and its growth wouldn’t have been possible if it weren’t for the booming popularity of smartphones that made it easy to take and share photos.
But social media wasn’t the only industry turned upside down — smartphones also changed the way people watch TV, listen to music, and get around.
Here are some other things that Americans couldn’t do at the beginning of 2010 that are now part of our everyday lives, in part, to smartphones:
So, even if you’re pissed off that the 2010s are ending and you still don’t own a flying car, just remember… we’ve come a long way.