Car manufacturers are smarter these days; in addition to all other safety features, cars have so-called crumple zones, which absorb the energy of the crash. I saw more than one car with completely crushed front part and untouched cabin. This lesson has yet to be learned by phone users and manufacturers.
One of the most beautiful phone out there is iPhone 4(s). What's not to love about its sleek glass and stainless steel body? Until it fells. I didn't like it from the first moment I took it. Phone is heavy, small, slippery and expensive, which is probably the worst combination of attributes. I held it in my hand for couple of seconds and then I carefully returned it to the table. Phew! It's not just me - statistics shows that every 6th iPhone will have screen accident within a year. Putting two big glass surfaces on such a droppable object was not a really good idea, neither was surrounding screen with materials that transfer shock wave well.
There are other ways to make casing that will act as Newton's cradle: I guess that new ceramic ones from HTC will not behave any better. Design of everyday's things should not just look nice but also take care of usage patterns and durability. So what is the right material for mobiles? Plastic! I love plastic! It is not scratch resistant, but it will absorb hits and protect expensive parts of the phone. When your battery cover fells off, that's because it become temporarily deformed absorbing all the crash energy.
Next time when you see plastic phone and think how cheap it looks, remember how cosy its parts feel.
Photo credit: By DemonDeLuxe (Dominique Toussaint) (Image:Newtons_cradle_animation_book.gif) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons
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