Why our obsession with how we get things done is killing our ability to see what actually matters.

In 1974, a woman in Australia couldn’t open a bank account or apply for a loan without her husband’s or father’s permission.

Let that sink in.

Not because it’s shocking in hindsight (it is), but because it reminds us that what seems normal today is often just temporary power disguised as permanence.

We forget that the mouse was once revolutionary. We treat the QWERTY keyboard as if it descended from the heavens. And we still carry smartphones like they’re permanent extensions of our bodies.

But none of these are the point.

They’re form factors. Delivery systems. Temporary tools. They exist because of the constraints of their time. And every single one of them is on borrowed time.

Is ChatGPT About to Kill the Smartphone?

A recent report reveals OpenAI’s secret project to build a device that could replace the smartphone.

Think less “new phone” and more “new interface.”

One that blends AI, wearables, spatial computing, and gesture or voice-based interaction.

But here’s what matters: it’s not the device.

It’s the destination.

What we want is seamless intelligence.

Ubiquitous access.

Tools that anticipate rather than respond.

What we’re fixated on is the shape of the thing that gets us there.

That’s a strategic mistake.

When you obsess over maintaining your product’s form, your belief systems, your decision-making processes, or the way your teams are structured, you risk losing the real plot the plot of its purpose.

The smartphone isn’t dying because we want something prettier.

It’s dying because its job is about to be done better by something else.

Immediate Futures® View: This Is Not About Phones

We have to stop planning around objects, and start planning around outcomes.

This shift is not about the death of smartphones.

It’s about the evolution of how humans access intelligence.

That includes:

• Ambient computing that surrounds us instead of sitting in our pockets
• AI assistants that know context, history, intent
• Wearables and invisibles that remove friction and surface insight

Just like Netflix made the DVD irrelevant.

And Uber made knowing how to hail a cab obsolete.

Or how banks no longer define their future by branches.

The same fate awaits smartphones and anything else still confused about its job-to-be-done.

And this extends beyond the tech.

Just like I wrote in my HUMAND™ framework jobs are no longer fixed roles they’re becoming fluid, task-driven, and continuously decoupled from the tools we once clung to.

3 Lessons from Obsolete Form Factors

1. The Fax Machine Fallacy
   Once a core business tool. Now a punchline. We built industries around its limitations. Then better tech came, and the whole world moved on.
2. The Pager Problem
   Designed for a world where reachability was rare. Once phones became affordable, the pager died without a farewell.
3. The Medical Mandate
   Not long ago, a doctor’s word was final—unchallenged and absolute. Second opinions were rare, patient rights were barely discussed, and the idea of participatory healthcare was laughable. We now live in a world of patient empowerment, digital diagnostics, and AI-assisted medicine. What once passed as wisdom now looks like dangerous certainty. That’s how quickly norms and power structures evolve.

So What Does This Mean for You?

Here are the ripple effects to think through:

For product teams:

• Are you designing for the device or the destination?
• Could your product still be relevant in a world without screens?

For business strategy:

• Are you defending an interface instead of elevating an experience?
• Are your workflows built around legacy tools that may vanish?

For leadership and org design:

• Are your teams skilled in outcomes or toolkits?
• Are you measuring effectiveness through the wrong lens?

For marketing and messaging:

• Are you still telling people how you work rather than what it does for them?

For mindset and management style:

• Are you still leading like it’s 2004 or 1984?
• Would your approach survive a mythical competitor who designs from first principles, not history?

PTFA: Past Trauma, Future Anxiety

This is a textbook PTFA moment.

The Past Trauma: Constant change fatigue. The fear of losing the systems that made us successful.

The Future Anxiety: A world where our customers, staff, and business models no longer want what we sell.

So we freeze.

We double down on what we know.

And we hope the next big shift waits a little longer.

But it won’t.

If this resonates, read more here: PTFA Explained

Strategic Foresight: What To Do Now

1. Audit every interface you use. Ask: If this disappeared tomorrow, what would it take down with it?
2. Track emerging experience platforms. Voice, gesture, eye-movement, ambient sensors, brain-computer interfaces.
3. Design for outcomes. What does your user want done? Not how they do it.
4. Scenario plan 5-15 years out. Not because it will be right. But because it’ll show you where you’re rigid.
5. Choose evolution over nostalgia. Every legacy tool was once new. Every new tool will become legacy. Don’t cling.
6. Challenge yourself. Imagine a mythical competitor with no history, no sunk cost, no internal politics. How would they deliver what you do now? What would they never carry forward?

The Bigger Truth

Innovation doesn’t ask for permission.

It asks if you’re paying attention.

We do the best we can with what we have and know today until we have and know different tomorrow.

It’s never a matter of better or worse. It’s always evolution.

The smartphone isn’t dying.

It’s evolving into what we really wanted all along.

The question is: are you?

Choose Forward.

For more insights listen live to Hong Kong Radio 3’s Phil Whelan chat about this on our weekly segment (14 minutes 48 seconds)

Morris Misel
Business Futurist. Foresight Strategist. Human-Centric Provocateur.

Heard by millions across media and stages each year.

I don’t predict the future I help leaders prepare for it.

www.morrisfuturist.com

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