New year, new me, new you!

In the spirit of new beginnings — and as a personal goal for 2024 — I wanted to revive this weekly dispatch. As you already know, things change quickly in the mobile tech space and it's often a struggle to keep up. This newsletter attempts to remedy that. To remind you of how this works, I round up a handful of the biggest stories from the previous week with a brief summary and additional commentary as it arises. I'll also include relevant upcoming events as well as any helpful resources I come across. Welcome back!

Week 1 (12/31–01/06)

CES 2024… is going on this week (the officially opening day was today, January 9th). Taking place in Las Vegas as per usual, we will see everything hyper cool to the super silly on the bleeding edge of consumer tech gadgets. For those of us who work professionally in this space, it may give us a good idea of what's to come — or just something to geek out over with fellow tech nerds.

Samsung… officially confirmed dates for the first Galaxy Unpacked of 2024. January 17th is the date you should mark on your calendar. In it, we expect the Galaxy S24 to be announced with specs, price, and availabilty date. We will also likely hear updates on One UI along with dates for its next major release. And given that Samsung is the primary OEM for Android phones in the US, it's usually a good idea to tune in!

Microsoft… released the Copilot app for iOS and iPadOS. Powered by OpenAI, the company brings its chat assistant technology to Apple users, available for free in the App Store. And since AI clearly isn't going anywhere, this is probably worth a download to play around with a bit. Or at least keeping an eye on.

Spotify… brought back its “Playlist in a Bottle”. If you're not familiar with this feature, it services as a musical time capsule for your current rotation that you can seal away and revisit the following year. A little gimmicky, yes, but it's also an interesting example of a long-term engagement strategy in consumer facing apps.

Clicks… gives you the feeling of Blackberry on your iPhone. As in, it provides a physical keyboard in the form of a case that you can snap onto your phone. As hokey as it sounds at first blush, I could see the appeal. And when tech personalities like Michael Fisher aka Mr. Mobile kept popping up in my IG feed with serious reviews, I felt obligated to include the link.

Events

• [Jan 9–12] CES 2024 (Consumer Technology Association)
• [Jan 17 @ 12pm CST] Galaxy Unpacked 2024 (Samsung)

Resources

• [Report] This Week in Apps - Seasonal Surprises (Appfigures)
• [Report] Global Premium Smartphone Market Continues to See Record Sales in 2023 (Counterpoint)