10 Ridiculous Phone Features Nobody Needs

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When I was in high school, my brother had a flip phone with an incredibly awesome but arguably unnecessary feature. If you pressed a button, the screen turned into a mirror. Not just a blank screen, mind you, but a blank screen with a distinctively reflective surface. I’m not sure why this particular bit of Japanese voodoo technology never made its way to the U.S., especially. When you consider all the crazy phone features that worked to get approved on this side of the pond. A pocket mirror is much more helpful. Than a feature that adds sound clips to your still photos, wouldn’t you agree? Check out these ridiculous smartphone features that nobody ever asked for but were imposed upon us all the same.

Two Screens

How about two screens if you need more screen space but don’t want a bigger screen? That’s what the makers of the Kyocera Echo the Yotaone 2 thought, anyway. I’m shocked this hasn’t caught on.

Eyeball Tracking

Remember Samsung’s Smart Scroll? The face-tracking feature that scrolled pages automatically when your eyes trailed near the bottom of the page? Because a phone that tracks your every little movement is precisely what people don’t want.

Curved Screens

Let’s make phones even harder to hold onto by curving the screen! Great idea, Great idea.

Projectors

Watching movies on your smartphone’s tiny screen is no fun at all. But what if your phone had a built-in projector? The Samsung Galaxy Beam had a mini projector built right into the top. Too bad its battery life couldn’t keep up with the tiny, dim, super low-resolution projector.

Dual Camera Mode

Selfies often lack context, but dual camera mode. This feature lets you simultaneously take a photo with the front and rear cameras. Gives all your selfies context. Because your Instagram followers must know what you were looking at when you took that selfie.

Or is it just a way to pretend to take a selfie. While being creepy, taking a photo of that hottie in the corner?

Sound & Shot

Sound & Shot is another feature that gives your photos context. Featured on the Samsung Galaxy S4, Sound & Shot allowed you to take a photo and record a short sound clip that would play every time you viewed the picture. That’s what everybody wants, right? And, of course, that sound clip doesn’t follow the photo when you share it on social media. So nobody else ends up hearing it, anyway.

Group Play

Samsung’s Group plays feature also on the Galaxy S4. And billed as a way to share music with your friends on their S4s, naturally. For some reason, Samsung tried to push the idea that you could simultaneously play music over your phone’s speakers. In other words, you could make a surround-sound system with your friend’s phones. Because, you know, smartphones are known for their high-quality speakers.

Blow to Unlock

When you go to unlock your phone. Do you ever think Gee, I wish I could blow on this instead of swiping or entering a password? If so, Micromax understands you. That’s why the Micromax Canvas 4 offered a significant, convenient, ridiculously insecure Blow to Unlock feature. You can always download the app if you don’t have a Micromax Canvas 4.

Kickstand

Motorola clearly thought the built-in kickstand on the back of its Photon 4G would give it an edge over the competition. What will all those kickstand-less people do. When they want to prop their phones up on their desks or watch a movie? Oh, right, buy a $30 kickstand case.

3D

If you really want to see stuff in 3D, while you’re using your mobile phone. May I suggest looking up at the world around you?