Today it is hard to believe that there was ever a time when we lived without smartphones. This smart device accompanies us every day and through it we can easily communicate with loved ones, surf the net, take pictures, and more. There are features of the smartphone that we are all familiar with, but there are still details you don’t know about this advanced device. Here are some surprising facts you did not know about your smartphone.
The iPhone was not the first smartphone
It is common to think that Apple’s iPhone is the first smartphone to feature a touch screen and use of apps. But you will be surprised to find that this is not the case. In fact, the first smartphone came into the world as early as 1993. This is many years before the launch of the first iPhone, which was in 2007. The options on the first smartphone were probably not as advanced as they are today, but it did offer the option of sending emails from the phone and even using different apps. Also, this phone incorporated a touch screen that could be used with a special pen.
You will not believe how many apps exist in the world
The smartphone was not a smartphone without the sophisticated apps that help manage our lives more easily. Whether it is photo editing apps, fitness apps, or social networks, our smartphones have it all. Even banks have switched to a smartphone app and in bank apps you can see your account with the click of a button. You can even open savings accounts, perform account transactions, take out loans, and more. Apps are a particularly lucrative field so it is not surprising that there are so many of them. In fact, the Apple App Store has nearly two million apps to choose from. In the Google app store, almost three million apps are waiting for you to download. This is a huge and almost inconceivable amount that only increases as the years go by.
Some people suffer from smartphone-related phobia
Most of us are familiar with different types of phobias (fears) related to external factors like: snakes, spiders, elevators, heights, and more. But you probably haven’t heard of nomophobia yet. This is a new term coined in 2008 and it actually describes a person’s fear of losing his smartphone. The phobia may appear due to forgetting the smartphone somewhere, the loss of the smartphone completely, draining the battery, various malfunctions, and more. The symptoms of nomophobia are difficulty breathing, nervousness, tremors, and anxiety.
Google never invented Android
We now know that Google is an integral part of Android and the entire operating system of these devices is manufactured and operated by it. But the two did not always go hand in hand. In fact, Google was not the company that invented Android. Android started out as a startup for connecting digital cameras to computers. Google acquired the startup in 2005.
The surprising connection between the smartphone and NASA
The US space agency NASA has a surprising connection to smartphones in several areas. The first surprising fact is that the agency enlisted the smartphones to use them as cheap satellites. The standard satellites we know require a lot of work time and their cost can easily reach hundreds of millions of dollars. The power of the smartphone system is so strong that NASA has decided to turn it into a satellite operating system. This helps NASA significantly reduce the cost that it takes for construction and launch.
The computing power of the smartphone is so powerful that it is tens of thousands of times faster than the computers that will operate the spaceflight of the Apollo 11 in 1969. The one in which the first landing on the moon took place. In fact when you think about it, the modern smartphone alone could have navigated the flight into space to the moon and back to Earth.
