Anything that provides a spark of dopamine can become addictive. Smartphones and social media have been engineered to be as addictive as possible to maximize attention in a world where that is directly connected to profits. A dumb phone can combat that addiction with a design that respects your attention rather than farms it. However, in 2026 too many things depend on or require apps that a dumb phone can't run. Plus, many of the cheaper dumb phones aren't built to reduce addictive qualities, they're made for the same addicts but with a smaller phone budget.
And before someone says "self-control", some folks can't quit smoking or drinking cold turkey. They need a patch, gum, a 12-step program, and in extreme cases medication. I think of all the iPad kids folks currently make fun of. Someday they'll "wake up" and realize they want their attention span back. Some already have. A phone like this is a tool to help a smartphone addict recover without losing the features they need to participate in society. I just wish it were cheaper, but they seem like they're looking into it. Carrier subsidizing goes a long way to making ANY phone affordable.
@no_donatello Certain discs can be read unencrypted like the wii and gamecube. As for the encrypted discs, I think they could get read, but then we travel more murky legality with needing to extract encryption keys from a modded system or aquire them elsewhere.
Side note: Wii is written twice in the title. "Wii, GameCube, Wii and Xbox
@KingMike @Coalescence There was a link to another article and a video and while I did not fully watch/read either, I skimmed through enough. He used the GBC CPU and RAM. He used a RPi to act as the display driver. Then for the carts he used a design that integrates the FlashROM, Mapper, Battery, etc from a GBC cart. The design ultimately just makes the cart smaller and use a M.2 style connector.
I'm no electrical engineer, but from where I'm sitting, the project uses enough parts from the GBC to convince me it's not emulation. At the very least, it seems further away from emulation than any FPGA project could be considered.
(Also, Hi! First post! Not sure why this motivated me to finally make an account.)
Comments 3
Re: "This Isn't Your Granny's Flip Phone" - Commodore Defends Its $500 Dumbphone
Anything that provides a spark of dopamine can become addictive. Smartphones and social media have been engineered to be as addictive as possible to maximize attention in a world where that is directly connected to profits. A dumb phone can combat that addiction with a design that respects your attention rather than farms it. However, in 2026 too many things depend on or require apps that a dumb phone can't run. Plus, many of the cheaper dumb phones aren't built to reduce addictive qualities, they're made for the same addicts but with a smaller phone budget.
And before someone says "self-control", some folks can't quit smoking or drinking cold turkey. They need a patch, gum, a 12-step program, and in extreme cases medication. I think of all the iPad kids folks currently make fun of. Someday they'll "wake up" and realize they want their attention span back. Some already have. A phone like this is a tool to help a smartphone addict recover without losing the features they need to participate in society. I just wish it were cheaper, but they seem like they're looking into it. Carrier subsidizing goes a long way to making ANY phone affordable.
Re: You Can Now Legally Rip Your Wii, GameCube, Wii And Xbox Discs Using A Blu-Ray Drive
@no_donatello Certain discs can be read unencrypted like the wii and gamecube. As for the encrypted discs, I think they could get read, but then we travel more murky legality with needing to extract encryption keys from a modded system or aquire them elsewhere.
Side note: Wii is written twice in the title. "Wii, GameCube, Wii and Xbox
Re: This Wristwatch-Sized Game Boy Color Doesn't Use Emulation And Runs Physical Carts
@KingMike @Coalescence
There was a link to another article and a video and while I did not fully watch/read either, I skimmed through enough. He used the GBC CPU and RAM. He used a RPi to act as the display driver. Then for the carts he used a design that integrates the FlashROM, Mapper, Battery, etc from a GBC cart. The design ultimately just makes the cart smaller and use a M.2 style connector.
I'm no electrical engineer, but from where I'm sitting, the project uses enough parts from the GBC to convince me it's not emulation. At the very least, it seems further away from emulation than any FPGA project could be considered.
(Also, Hi! First post! Not sure why this motivated me to finally make an account.)