Apple Wants your Phone to Fly Instead of Fall to the Ground

Smartphones are wonderful little pieces of technology, aren’t they? At the end of the day, they add up to about the equivalent of carrying around a tiny computer in your pocket all day, which is saying quite a lot. For as valuable as they are, though, they sure are fragile. One good drop on the pavement somewhere without a case on the thing, and the awesome touch screen looks more like a spiderweb than a phone. Take it from someone who learned the hard way – ALWAYS leave a case on your phone, because the second you take it off, that’s probably when you’re going to accidentally drop it and crack your screen. It’s really easy to drop your phone – whether you’re struggling to get it in or out of your pocket, we all tend to drop them from time to time. Again, with a protective case it’s not much of a problem, but without the case it’s a completely different story. That’s why Apple is hard at work dreaming up ways to get our phones to land softly while falling from midair.

They’ve recently been given a new patent which details all kinds of ideas on how they can get iPhones to change directions while falling, so as to minimize the impact once they do eventually hit the ground. Not all of the technology needed is included in the iPhone as of yet, so it remains to be seen when (and if) these changes will be implemented. The protective feature would use the iPhone’s gyroscope, internal vibration motor, GPS, accelerometer, and other parts to figure out just how the phone is falling and what needs to happen for it to reorient itself before it inevitably hits the ground. If this sounds a bit futuristic to you, that’s because that’s exactly what it is.

In 10 years, if you drop your phone, it might just sprout a pair of wings and fly back into your hand – you never know! What do you think?

[Image via BGR]

SOURCE: Techcrunch