14 DAY TRIAL // We've been complaining about smartphone makers’ lack of design innovations for years. Every time Apple or Samsung or HTC puts out a handset, none of us expects anything else but a rectangular-shaped device.
There have been some exceptions like the Golden Buddha Phone, but let’s face it, these products never stood a chance against iconic devices such as the Apple iPhone or the Samsung Galaxy S lineup.
Well, as all eyes on tech will go to Samsung in a few days, who is expected to unveil its latest Galaxy S6 flagship, a product that has been also accused of lacking any innovation in design, California start-up Monohm announced a very peculiar smartphone.
Runcible is a smartphone that looks like a pocket watch
It’s called the Runcible and unlike its brothers, it ditches the usual rectangular form factor to take on the round one. Yes, you heard right, the phone is round in shape, so round it actually resembles a real pocket watch.
The Runcible will arrive with a camera and offer LTE, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth functions. It will run Firefox OS out of the box (made by Mozilla), which means users won’t have access to Google Play or anything like that.
However, Runcible will be able to run apps written in HTML5, the design language of web apps. Yet, the lack of an extensive app ecosystem will surely put a damper on things for most customers, the handset is far from being a replacement for your Galaxy S5 or HTC One M8.
Runcible is basically designed to be your silent companion and will never beep, alert or otherwise interrupt you. It’s so sleek and slides in your pockets so well that you’ll probably even forget it’s there.
So instead of the noisy notifications, you’ll just see swelling bubbles appear on the screen (in case you’re looking at the screen, that is).
Runcible is non-disturbance
While the creators of Runcible say they love devices like the iPhone 6, they claim modern smartphones are too distracting and annoying with their never-ending beeping fests.
The company also said that one of Runcible’s major focuses would be photography, but sadly the device will be unable to run apps like Instagram. However, features like being able to rotate Runcible to focus the shot might turn out to be quite nifty after all.
Runcible might have its heart set in the right place, but it’s pretty hard to believe this weird looking gadget will attract a lot of customers.
The mobile market follows certain parameters and atypical devices will find it hard to dislocate the rectangular always-connected smartphone perception.
Nevertheless, Runcible will be displayed at MWC 2015 so if you find it interesting enough keep, an eye out for it.
