Sidegrading

This week the opportunity to "upgrade" my phone arrived. This comes once every two years, or earlier if I agree to pay an "early upgrade fee". I elected not to do this, and so acquired my upgrade for free. Which was nice.

I'm posting about this here because I've been feeling at odds recently with the original spirit of this blog, as little by little I've found myself becoming more preoccupied with money again. Money and stuff.  It may be because last month I had to dip into an overdraft again to cover some necessary expenses, and that's something I haven't had to do for a good many years.  Although I try not to care about such things, I still do, and to be honest it unsettled me how much I did.  In any case, I bootstrapped my way out of the red like a good productive worker by putting in a little overtime and yes, I know, lucky me for being able to do that, and all that but the experience kicked me in the proverbial arse.  This is a good thing.

Stuff

My new phone is a Huawei P20 Lite. My previous phone was a Google Pixel (1st generation). The obvious, and indeed promoted, choice would have been to upgrade to the new Pixel 3, which in all respects Google would like you to acknowledge, is superior to last year's Pixel 2, which was needless to say, in superior to the now frankly embarrassing Pixel original. Under a higher monthly contract, I could enjoy improved performance and speed, a brighter and more vibrant screen, higher storage capacity, more monthly data, and so on, on the newest phone on the market.

I was tempted, in all the normie ways one normally is by the prospect of a shiny new toy, but I explored my options some more because choice is intrinsically good, because capitalism. I noted that another option was to upgrade to the less ambitious and aforementioned Pixel 2, with still mostly superior features to my current contract and phone, and for more or less the same price. The obvious choice, right? Yes, but also no.

A further option was for a Pixel 2 - not brand spanking and shrink-wrapped just-shipped from-Chinese-hell-factory (probably) new - but "good as new". For £5 a month less than I am currently paying. That's right: the rate of mobile phone development has outpaced the length of the average pay-as-you-go contract in an over-saturated market to such an extent that a provider isn't even able to offer the customer the next best model as an upgrade for the same price to what he is currently paying for the putatively obsolete one. I'm not going to try and pretend the economics of this any more than that, but something seems...off, here.

In any case, as I said, I opted for a Huawei P20 Lite. This, too, came as a reduced price "good as new" form. "Good as new" means, it turns out, that the original packaging of the phone has at some point been opened. That's it. The phone itself remains completely untouched, still with that slightly sticky blue protective cover you peel off from each side, ready to run with all its factory settings, unmarked, unblemished and in a entirely literal sense "good as new". As in, indistinguishable from new. As in, new. So, for a further £5 less a month than I would have paid for the honestly new, identical phone, I found myself signing up to a new contract a full £25 cheaper a month than previously, and for a phone that is (I can confirm after about a day of fairly heavy use) to all intents and purposes indistinguishable from my last one. Some things are different: the screen is a different size and shape, it's made by a different company so comes with some apps and features I'm unfamiliar with, but it still runs Android (what version? - I don't care) and does everything my last phone did just as well. 

I have to say as well, that after using the camera yesterday for the first time (to make this video) that for everyday use, this phone is every bit as good as my previous one.  Even though the rules of the game suggest that it shouldn't be.  So that's it. Consider that my review of the thing.

Related posts

On Not Gawping at Your Phone All the Time
Thoughts from a non empty room
No Buy April: The Results
Why Isn't Everything Beautiful?
Taking the Zero Waste Plunge
Imagining No Possessions

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