Most public health experts in the UK, with some notable exceptions, think e-cigarettes could save lives. Nicotine is strongly addictive but not proven to do harm, whereas the smoke and tar from tobacco kill up to half of those who use cigarettes. But e-cigarettes have developed a bad name in the US, at first because of Juul, a stylish device looking like a USB stick that took off among high-school pupils.
It contains three times the level of nicotine permitted in Europe. A panic among parents and teachers became a national scare when reports began to pile up of adult vapers with lung diseases.
As of mid-November, the authorities have reported 2, cases of lung injury and 42 deaths. If e-cigarettes can weather the storm and irrefutable data is collected to show they are a big help in quitting smoking, they could still have a bright future. The technical specification says it all. In , the top-of-the-line iPhone 3GS had a pixel-high screen, 32GB of storage and a 3-megapixel camera. Going into , the equivalent iPhone 11 Pro has a megapixel camera, GB of storage, and about 17 times the pixels in the screen.
That, more than anything else, shows the real change that smartphones have wrought over the past decade: from an optional extra, sold to boost the value of phone contracts, to the core of modern life. Apple can charge such a price because phones are firmly established as central to productivity, to entertainment, to communication and to education. The proliferation of phones across the globe is one of the stories of the decade. There are an estimated 3. Once, the internet was a place you sat down to connect to.
Misinformation on Twitter makes the front pages; CGI-Instagram influencers are licensed for fashion ads. That change will last. Phones may alter unrecognisably over the next decade, with smart glasses , voice assistants and wearables taking more of the interactions, shrinking the phone down to an always-on and always-on-you hub. But the blending of realities is here to stay. Alex Hern. In , the traditional media ecosystem was fraying but largely intact: television still attracted big ratings, print newspaper sales were struggling but had yet to fall off a cliff and many people still used traditional phones that could do little more than call and text.
