Just days after the launch of its flagship Pixel 4 lineup, which sadly isn’t coming to India, Google has acquainted us with a special experiment that would help you break free from the digital world for some time. Dubbed the Paper Phone, it’s exactly what it sounds like and will see you printing out a phone booklet to carry around with you instead of actual smartphones.
Paper Phone is part of the Digital Wellbeing Experiments platform, which today saw the launch of five new Android apps that can help curb smartphone addiction, but in a more meaningful way. Paper Phone is an Android app that lets you print out a “customized booklet with all of the key information” that you may need during the day.
The app connects to your Google account and gives you the option to choose what you want to display on each side of the paper booklet you print. It could be contacts, tasks, weather details, maps, and even cutouts to store your debit/credit cards. The app also includes customizable paper apps, including recipes, phrasebooks, and sudoku that are going to come in handy when you are distracted or bored, as they call it nowadays.
Paper Phone is an experimental open-source Android app and we can’t wait to see how Google evolves it into a feature that people adore and use on the daily.
Google researchers talk about this experiment saying, “Existing approaches often involve going cold turkey and completely cutting out the use of a digital device, but we feel this is sometimes inconceivable to people who rely heavily on their devices and can put them off the idea entirely.” Thus, they decided to give users access to some info and cool ways to relax while they’re away from their phones. This way they are not completely missing out and it’s actually pretty decent.
So, if you are looking to cut down on smartphone usage, then don’t forget to check out Paper Phone from this link right here. It’s quite a simple yet crazy experiment that will change how we view our smartphones, which is swamped with information. You will be reaching out for it more often than not but the Paper Phone is all about self-control. So, would you try the Google Paper Phone over the Pixel 4 (as one of them is at least now available) in India? Share your thoughts with us in the comments section.
