Will smartphone ownership become a de facto requirement?

[hotdogPi]

No card = pay inflated regular price.

At Stop & Shop and Shaw's, they'll put the store card in for you if you don't have one, unless the cashier forgets to (which almost never happens). You can do so at self-checkout by clicking "Forgot Card", but it's not obvious that you can do so. CVS won't put the store card in, though.

Clearance items don't require a card at Stop & Shop and CVS (haven't tested Shaw's), so even if you don't have a card, you can still get clearance Easter/Halloween/Christmas candy at CVS.

[Dirt Roads]

Add to list of places that require a cell phone:  US Postal Service for setting up a vacation hold for mail.  It doesn't insist that the "cell phone" number be filled in setting up the account, but if you don't it will not verify the account until you have a postcard with a code number mailed to you.

We used to have an online account with USPS to set up a vacation hold, until they changed over to this policy.  Now we have to fill out the old-fashioned yellow cards again.

[mgk920]

And there are plenty of stores (especially grocery) that use "shopper's cards" giving them personal info and a record of what you buy.  No card = pay inflated regular price.  One place that doesn't use them is Meijer, but they still mail me coupons based on my previous purchases.

The Festival Foods stores here in NE Wisconsin always have piles of their current ad inserts by the entrances.  They scan the code from the ad insert and give all of its discounted prices at checkout.  Yes, they know that the various items in your cart have been sold, but they have no idea of to whom if you used a regular lane at the checkout and paid with cash.

Mike

[kkt]

Add to list of places that require a cell phone:  US Postal Service for setting up a vacation hold for mail.  It doesn't insist that the "cell phone" number be filled in setting up the account, but if you don't it will not verify the account until you have a postcard with a code number mailed to you.

We used to have an online account with USPS to set up a vacation hold, until they changed over to this policy.  Now we have to fill out the old-fashioned yellow cards again.

Last time I filled out a paper hold mail form, the clerk at the counter accepted it... and then they didn't hold the mail.  The carrier just stuffed it all in the mailbox even though it didn't fit.

[kalvado]

And there are plenty of stores (especially grocery) that use "shopper's cards" giving them personal info and a record of what you buy.  No card = pay inflated regular price.  One place that doesn't use them is Meijer, but they still mail me coupons based on my previous purchases.

The Festival Foods stores here in NE Wisconsin always have piles of their current ad inserts by the entrances.  They scan the code from the ad insert and give all of its discounted prices at checkout.  Yes, they know that the various items in your cart have been sold, but they have no idea of to whom if you used a regular lane at the checkout and paid with cash.

Mike

You hope they don't know.
Paying cash is a good start, but nowhere near enough.
They can certainly use security cameras footage for face recognition identifying you as "that guy who uses cash in store #1234".  They may do a license plate match on top of that if you park too close.
Don't use in-store pharmacy or win lottery as you need to identify yourself in those cases. No tobacco or alcohol buying as date of birth is a powerful id tool.

Growing food in a backyard garden is a bit more secure, but you still have to get seeds and fertilizer....

[GaryV]

^ Meijer uses MPerks, which is the only reason I know my wife's cell phone number. You have to key it in. Then they can track your purchases to tailor coupons specific to you. Many of them digital coupons inside the MPerks app.

[ZLoth]

From Daily Mail Online:

50 items you'd have to carry to replace your smartphone

Some couldn't live without one, while others see them as a curse of modern life.

But whatever your view of smartphones, without one in your pocket you would have to lug around the equivalent of 50 separate items.

Its technology replaces the need to carry a map, a camera, train timetables and a host of other essentials.

While a smartphone easily fits in the palm of a hand and weighs about 5oz, researchers estimate it would take two rucksacks to haul all the extra items around.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

[kalvado]

From Daily Mail Online:

50 items you'd have to carry to replace your smartphone

Some couldn't live without one, while others see them as a curse of modern life.

But whatever your view of smartphones, without one in your pocket you would have to lug around the equivalent of 50 separate items.

Its technology replaces the need to carry a map, a camera, train timetables and a host of other essentials.

While a smartphone easily fits in the palm of a hand and weighs about 5oz, researchers estimate it would take two rucksacks to haul all the extra items around.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

Pretty bad one.
CDs and  MP3 player are pretty much same functionality. No CD player included, though.
Not sure how a phone can replace a checkbook, at least in US.
I have only rudimentary ruller capability, no tape measure - and I didn't see anything with built-in weighting capability.

[ZLoth]

CDs and  MP3 player are pretty much same functionality. No CD player included, though.

The core purpose of CDs and MP3s was to play back audio material. You can now stream or download your music, audio books, or other audio to your phone, replacing a separate player.

Not sure how a phone can replace a checkbook, at least in US.

Instead of writing a check, you can "PayPal", "Venmo", or "Zelle" your payment as an ACH payment from your checking account. You can also use NFC to "tap and pay".

I have only rudimentary ruler capability, no tape measure - and I didn't see anything with built-in weighting capability.

Yeah, that one is a stretch, but they do have "bluetooth scales" and "bluetooth rulers".

[kalvado]

CDs and  MP3 player are pretty much same functionality. No CD player included, though.

The core purpose of CDs and MP3s was to play back audio material. You can now stream or download your music, audio books, or other audio to your phone, replacing a separate player.

While true, they either have to add tape player and turntable to the list; or list just 1 item. Alternatively, they may say that phone replaces every single album released and make a claim "it replaces  million+  items"

Not sure how a phone can replace a checkbook, at least in US.

Instead of writing a check, you can "PayPal", "Venmo", or "Zelle" your payment as an ACH payment from your checking account. You can also use NFC to "tap and pay".

I still have to see a contractor willing to accept Venmo or Zelle. Venmo would incur card fees, I assume; and Zelle/ACH does not provide a real proof of payment. Not to mention that ACH itself is a  sad and pathetic excuse for what the modern payment system should be. 

I have only rudimentary ruler capability, no tape measure - and I didn't see anything with built-in weighting capability.

Yeah, that one is a stretch, but they do have "bluetooth scales" and "bluetooth rulers".

I have on-screen ruler which somewhat works. Measuring screw length is OKish.  And TOF cameras may get some tape functionality eventually, not sure what the status of those are. 

[Scott5114]

And there are plenty of stores (especially grocery) that use "shopper's cards" giving them personal info and a record of what you buy.  No card = pay inflated regular price.  One place that doesn't use them is Meijer, but they still mail me coupons based on my previous purchases.

The Festival Foods stores here in NE Wisconsin always have piles of their current ad inserts by the entrances.  They scan the code from the ad insert and give all of its discounted prices at checkout.  Yes, they know that the various items in your cart have been sold, but they have no idea of to whom if you used a regular lane at the checkout and paid with cash.

Mike

You hope they don't know.
Paying cash is a good start, but nowhere near enough.
They can certainly use security cameras footage for face recognition identifying you as "that guy who uses cash in store #1234".  They may do a license plate match on top of that if you park too close.
Don't use in-store pharmacy or win lottery as you need to identify yourself in those cases. No tobacco or alcohol buying as date of birth is a powerful id tool.

My wife works surveillance in a casino so I know a fair bit about this, and...that's a bit beyond the current limits of technology, or at least providing a enough of a benefit to provide a positive ROI is. Certainly it would be defeated by a pandemic-style face mask. The most reliable facial recognition software is what runs in the cashier's brain.

The magic that happens in a casino is merely getting a few times and places where a given customer is known to have been, then running the tape backward to see if they interact with something that would force them to give up personally-identifable information (using a player's club card, going to an ATM, cashing a check, buying alcohol, getting into a car, etc.)

In my experience handling personally-identifiable information, date of birth is really only helpful to identify which John Smith you have. In isolation it's not all that helpful because birthdays tend to cluster (there are far more people born in September than there are any other month, for example, and there are certain holidays almost nobody is born on because doctors don't schedule C-sections on those days).

[kalvado]

And there are plenty of stores (especially grocery) that use "shopper's cards" giving them personal info and a record of what you buy.  No card = pay inflated regular price.  One place that doesn't use them is Meijer, but they still mail me coupons based on my previous purchases.

The Festival Foods stores here in NE Wisconsin always have piles of their current ad inserts by the entrances.  They scan the code from the ad insert and give all of its discounted prices at checkout.  Yes, they know that the various items in your cart have been sold, but they have no idea of to whom if you used a regular lane at the checkout and paid with cash.

Mike

You hope they don't know.
Paying cash is a good start, but nowhere near enough.
They can certainly use security cameras footage for face recognition identifying you as "that guy who uses cash in store #1234".  They may do a license plate match on top of that if you park too close.
Don't use in-store pharmacy or win lottery as you need to identify yourself in those cases. No tobacco or alcohol buying as date of birth is a powerful id tool.

My wife works surveillance in a casino so I know a fair bit about this, and...that's a bit beyond the current limits of technology, or at least providing a enough of a benefit to provide a positive ROI is. Certainly it would be defeated by a pandemic-style face mask. The most reliable facial recognition software is what runs in the cashier's brain.

The magic that happens in a casino is merely getting a few times and places where a given customer is known to have been, then running the tape backward to see if they interact with something that would force them to give up personally-identifable information (using a player's club card, going to an ATM, cashing a check, buying alcohol, getting into a car, etc.)

In my experience handling personally-identifiable information, date of birth is really only helpful to identify which John Smith you have. In isolation it's not all that helpful because birthdays tend to cluster (there are far more people born in September than there are any other month, for example, and there are certain holidays almost nobody is born on because doctors don't schedule C-sections on those days).

It may also be about what is available commercially, and how much casino is willing to go towards identifying those who may not want to be. My impression is that training on social media datasets can do a lot. Certainly Chinese social indexes can do a lot with face recognition.
On the other hand, how important is full identity vs relative one? Anonymous patterns may be as useful, but less challenging legally. "#12345 - male in his 40s" could be good enough if same person can be recognized on each shopping trip.

[Scott5114]

It may also be about what is available commercially, and how much casino is willing to go towards identifying those who may not want to be. My impression is that training on social media datasets can do a lot. Certainly Chinese social indexes can do a lot with face recognition.
On the other hand, how important is full identity vs relative one? Anonymous patterns may be as useful, but less challenging legally. "#12345 - male in his 40s" could be good enough if same person can be recognized on each shopping trip.

Generally, a casino is willing to go quite far, since their motive in doing so is normally to find out who is doing something illegal so they can turn it over to police. Having drug dealers and thieves around is bad for business, and tracking for potential money laundering is required by federal law. But yeah, there's no AI or anything involved, just a team of operators watching the cameras very carefully. At least out here. Las Vegas might have more advanced systems.

When I was working in the cage, we'd usually just track people for anti-money-laundering compliance with just a post-it note reading something like "Guy in red hat–cashed out $1300" and update the running total until it hit the threshold where we were required to get his ID.

China has some pretty impressive tech, but they have 1) the financial backing of the entire national government 2) no profit motive and 3) no privacy laws they have to comply with. What they can do is certainly not going to be viable for Kroger to use to track someone's salami purchases.

[kalvado]

It may also be about what is available commercially, and how much casino is willing to go towards identifying those who may not want to be. My impression is that training on social media datasets can do a lot. Certainly Chinese social indexes can do a lot with face recognition.
On the other hand, how important is full identity vs relative one? Anonymous patterns may be as useful, but less challenging legally. "#12345 - male in his 40s" could be good enough if same person can be recognized on each shopping trip.

Generally, a casino is willing to go quite far, since their motive in doing so is normally to find out who is doing something illegal so they can turn it over to police. Having drug dealers and thieves around is bad for business, and tracking for potential money laundering is required by federal law. But yeah, there's no AI or anything involved, just a team of operators watching the cameras very carefully. At least out here. Las Vegas might have more advanced systems.

When I was working in the cage, we'd usually just track people for anti-money-laundering compliance with just a post-it note reading something like "Guy in red hat–cashed out $1300" and update the running total until it hit the threshold where we were required to get his ID.

China has some pretty impressive tech, but they have 1) the financial backing of the entire national government 2) no profit motive and 3) no privacy laws they have to comply with. What they can do is certainly not going to be viable for Kroger to use to track someone's salami purchases.

Remember, once created technology can be replicated on a cheap.
There are certainly commercials products with face recognition, e.g. from Avigilon or Verkada. Legal limitations are, certainly, a big part of the situation.
There were reports that it is virtually impossible to enter Manhattan without being identified against federal dataset but who knows how true those reports are and how efficient that is.
But I assume that things would only change for the worse. After all, there is a long history of people living in smaller settlements where everyone knew everyone, nothing new with total identity...

[kphoger]

Out of personal curiosity, I've started keeping a list of uses of my smartphone that I'm noticing through their lack.

So far:

• Telephone / text message device (I call my wife every night when on the road)
  
• Phone book (Getting in touch with corporate IT to find a workaround to the above will be interesting, since our Canadian business and US business operate pretty independently except for oddballs like me)
  
• Camera
  
• Watch
  
• Alarm clock
  

Additions to my list of things I wish I had my phone for:

• Calendar
  
• Calculator
  

My non-smartphone can do all of the above.

• Access to my corporate network (I have an RSA token app on my phone, required to log in)
  
• Note-taking device (e.g. I would have made a few notes about where I left my car at the airport, since I didn't fly out of my usual airport)
  

In addition, I have workarounds for the above two:

  1.  When I got rid of my smartphone, I switched my security token settings to text me the code instead of using an app.

  2.  If I need to make a note of something, then I just type it in a text message draft.

Some businesses train their clerks to ask for a cell phone number from all customers, because email is too easy to ignore.

You can say no.  If they already have your money, they don't need your damn phone number.

The correct answer to the question "Could I get your phone number?" or "Could I get an e-mail address?" is "No thanks."

[SectorZ]

From Daily Mail Online:

50 items you'd have to carry to replace your smartphone

Some couldn't live without one, while others see them as a curse of modern life.

But whatever your view of smartphones, without one in your pocket you would have to lug around the equivalent of 50 separate items.

Its technology replaces the need to carry a map, a camera, train timetables and a host of other essentials.

While a smartphone easily fits in the palm of a hand and weighs about 5oz, researchers estimate it would take two rucksacks to haul all the extra items around.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

I was today years old when I learned that Brits call bubble levels a "spirit level". That's a new one for me.

[1995hoo]

This seems appropriate for this thread. Look what came in last night's mail.

[hbelkins]

Not just smartphones, but the latest and greatest smartphone.

There are already a number of apps I've used often that don't work any longer on my iPhone 6. As I have no possibility of getting a newer phone until a bucketful of money lands in my backyard, I'm relegated to using those apps on my work phone (an iPhone XR) if I want the benefits from them.

[abefroman329]

Not just smartphones, but the latest and greatest smartphone.

There are already a number of apps I've used often that don't work any longer on my iPhone 6. As I have no possibility of getting a newer phone until a bucketful of money lands in my backyard, I'm relegated to using those apps on my work phone (an iPhone XR) if I want the benefits from them.

There's a wide gulf between the iPhone 7 and the latest and greatest, some of which don't require a bucketful of money.

[Bruce]

I replace my phones on a four-year cycle, and at this point my 2018 LG G7 is still serviceable for most uses. Only a few apps have performance issues that I can bypass with a little tweaking, the camera is lacking but is not my primary, but the lack of software support sucks but is to be expected of a company that has completely abandoned the smartphone market.

[kalvado]

Not just smartphones, but the latest and greatest smartphone.

There are already a number of apps I've used often that don't work any longer on my iPhone 6. As I have no possibility of getting a newer phone until a bucketful of money lands in my backyard, I'm relegated to using those apps on my work phone (an iPhone XR) if I want the benefits from them.

There's a wide gulf between the iPhone 7 and the latest and greatest, some of which don't require a bucketful of money.

I wonder what are the limiting apps. My phone is 5 model years and probably 4 physical years old. Android 9.
Some games are slower than I would want; battery is showing the age; but really it is still ok with me. I flirt with idea of replacement once in a while, but that's it ..

[J N Winkler]

I was today years old when I learned that Brits call bubble levels a "spirit level". That's a new one for me.

It's not just the Brits--spirit level is the term I grew up with in the Midwest.

I wonder what are the limiting apps. My phone is 5 model years and probably 4 physical years old. Android 9.

Some games are slower than I would want; battery is showing the age; but really it is still ok with me. I flirt with idea of replacement once in a while, but that's it . . .

My current phone is eight years old or, to be precise, is a reconditioned like-for-like replacement that a repair shop supplied two years ago when the original phone would not boot after having the battery replaced.  It still runs Android Marshmallow and shows "Your device is currently up to date" with version 24.91.5, applied in March 2017.  Chrome will still update (I tried just now).

I suspect the battery will prove to be the real constraint on usable service life.  Based on my experience with the failed battery repair, I would not attempt battery replacement (or hire it done) without a full backup of phone data.  (I lost no texts or Evernote notes, but did lose several weeks' worth of photos and GPS logs--in principle they could be lifted off the memory chip, which is unencrypted, but the value of the stranded data does not justify the costs of recovery.)  Many of the people I have talked to who have had their phone batteries replaced have come to feel the service was not worth it and purchased new phones within a year.  I think it's time for me to get a new one, frankly, but I have struggled to summon enthusiasm for phone shopping.

[ZLoth]

I replaced my own Pixel 3 phone and my mother's Samsung S8 last November/December with Pixel 6 phones. Part of this had to do with firmware, as the Pixel phones have a three year cycle when they receive updates to the core operating system, and my workplace's IT requires a minimum level of iOS/Android version (Usually the current version and 1-2 previous major releases), and your mobile device is utilized as part of two-factor authentication when logging into the network. Part of this had to do with battery life as my Pixel 3's battery was lasting only two hours, and the battery replacement is considered extremely difficult. Part of this is the storage capacity as the model I obtained has 256GB of internal memory and no SD card slot. Part of this is support, as it helps when your mother has the same phone you are using when troubleshooting.

Because my plan includes unlimited data now, I'm taking full advantage of it when I'm driving. Since my mother and I both rarely drive now, the SiriusXM service will be cancelled at the end of September as the contract expired. The replacement will be service-included Apple Music, steaming music from the Plex server, and Radio Garden for streaming "local" stations from around the world. Unless something changed recently, you can't stream Audible books, but you can download them.

[Bruce]

One of my hangups with getting a new phone is the de-evolution in recent years, fueled by manufacturers blindly following Apple. I absolutely need expandable storage (so that I can have backups saved there to be easily retrieved in case of failure) and a headphone jack (so that I can connect with my car's stereo), but these features have been relegated to budget models that have awful cameras or underpowered chips.

[Ted$8roadFan]

Not just smartphones, but the latest and greatest smartphone.

There are already a number of apps I've used often that don't work any longer on my iPhone 6. As I have no possibility of getting a newer phone until a bucketful of money lands in my backyard, I'm relegated to using those apps on my work phone (an iPhone XR) if I want the benefits from them.

There's a wide gulf between the iPhone 7 and the latest and greatest, some of which don't require a bucketful of money.

Indeed, there are iPhones out there that arent exorbitant (by Apple standards, of course). I have an iPhone 7 Plus, 5+ years old, that still runs well and has had no problems with software updates. On paper, anyway, the iPhone SE has the same or better capabilities as the 7 Plus, and is much less than the 13 or 14. If/when I do upgrade, it may be to the SE.