this post was submitted on 27 Sep 2023
595 points (95.1% liked)
Technology
59554 readers
3385 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I am not in the US and not locked into a contract and neither is anyone I know IRL but nonetheless we do upgrade at the same cadence. As for the people who upgrade their phones yearly, unless they're keeping the old phones in a locked box I think it is not that bad if those old phones see use as an upgrade for someone else (either given or sold as a second hand device) or even if those phones run duty as a makeshift device.
I personally think it only becomes a problem if it's literally e-waste or if the majority of people were upgrading yearly (which is again because it'll lead to the first problem but felt like putting it separately too). If it's playing some role in the world it's okay¹ in my book.
^(1: I wonder if people who use their old phones as a secondary device (eg: a music player for running)^) ^(are creating e-waste or not. As in if it would've been better if they used only one device for both purposes and either gave/sold the old phone or didn't buy a new phone in the first place. After all one could make the case that battery degradation would make them need an earlier upgrade)