Samsung phone folds like a cheap suit

Samsung has unveiled something resembling a VTech learning toy to try to maintain its foothold in the smartphone market.

Commentators humoured the announcement, though, referring to the bog-standard tablet it folds out into as a “wow factor”. Surely they only mean that in the sense that a nan would say “wow” at a grandchild shooting her in the face with a Nerf gun.

Who says “wow” at anything being folded or unfolded? Nobody’s ever pulled a map out of their pocket and been distracted by a passer-by going “wow!” That we can now do that with bits of electricity is frankly the least the Helix Flexi Ruler generation expects.

We think Samsung knows it, too. Let’s face it, the room went dark when the audience was shown the thing in its closed form, and that’s because what’s being flogged here is a Nintendo DS for short-sighted Candy Crush commuters.

If an infant had come up on stage, grabbed it and smeared jam all over it, everyone would have sportingly cheered. If that had happened at the iPhone launch, the audience would have campaigned for that child to be expedited to Guantanamo Bay.

Nobody cares about a flexible screen when the product design itself bends time backwards to the fusty clamshell era. If this is really the best we can do, Steve Jobs will be bending in his grave.

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