04. May 2023
Have you noticed that our two current SHIFTphones have recently become available at a significantly lower price?
The two price reductions and the SHIFT6mq + upgrade have also been shared on our social media channels. If you are still wondering which offers it is actually about, here is a brief summary:
1. SHIFT6mq with fast delivery for €577 instead of €677
2. SHIFT5me now for €277 instead of €333
3. SHIFT6mq + upgrade to the SHIFTphone 8 for €633
(All prices plus €22 device deposit)
* Important to know: For the free upgrade, your SHIFT6mq must be in good condition, with only signs of wear consistent with age. However, if repairs are necessary, we will invoice you for them. Otherwise the conditions as described on our upgrade page (shift.eco/upgrade) apply.
Normally we at SHIFT are very economical with special offers. It goes against our values to release a new super sale every week. For us, our devices are valuable in many ways and not junk. That’s why we think a lot before we lower prices and create new offers. We would like to share these thoughts with you and include you in our considerations.
The perfect format for this is our Brothertalk (Currently only available in German. But you can activate the subtitles for translation!) Here Carsten and Samuel talk frankly about what moves us and in particular about the considerations behind the new offers.
With this in mind, we cordially invite you to take a look at the latest issue of Brothertalk. From 3:26 min it’s about the price reduction and the upgrade. This Link will take you directly to this part.
26. Apr 2023
relate – relate
We feel connected to everyone involved in the process of production and use. It’s about appreciation for our people on the shop floor and beyond, and our relationship with our customers. For us, selling a SHIFT is the beginning of a relationship, not an end Distribution. At the same time, we would like to see an appreciative attitude towards the purchased product, so that the device can be used for as long as possible.
Relationship with our employees
Fair and pleasant working conditions are important to us for all of our employees. Especially with the employees involved in production in China. Questionable working conditions in the technology industry in China are repeatedly reported in the media. It is therefore a matter close to our hearts to effect changes on site. With our own manufacture, we can make these changes possible and create pleasant working conditions and guarantee fair payment for our employees.
As a result, we are also in close contact and exchange ideas with each other every week. In addition, part of the development team travels to Hangzhou at regular intervals to spend time together, cultivate relationships and exchange information on the latest developments. During the peak phase of the corona pandemic, we had to pause our visits to China, so we are all the more looking forward to the next trip to the SHIFT manufactory.
Relationship with SHIFT customers
We may have surprised you with a “you” in an e-mail. We don’t call you first out of a lack of respect, but to express that we share the same values and are a community at eye level. For us, maximizing profits in customer contact does not play a role, we see the potential to build a trusting relationship.
We notice again and again how you place this trust in us. Especially in the crowdfunding phases of our products, we take the leap of trust very seriously. The joint realization of a product is what makes these phases so special. Because, as is so often the case, things only achieve their beauty when they are shared. As a thank you for the trust you have placed in us, we offer our pre-orderers discounted pre-order prices and provide insights into the development phases of the products.
Also, we enjoy every SHIFTtalk where you give feedback and us with questions. This shows us that we can achieve a lot as a small company and that we have taken the right path.
Appreciation towards products
In the context of technical devices, relationship is not the right term for us, you know our warning notice that adorns the back of every SHIFT product:
“WARNING: Smartphones can be time killers. There is no greater gift for you today than the next 24 hours. Use them wisely. People are more important than machines”.
However, out of love for our environment, we would like to appreciate the devices. In order to make consumption more sustainable, we also have a responsibility to deal with the products we buy accordingly.
In this Blog post.
30. Mar 2023
The biggest (adjusting) screw in the development of smartphones is on the back of the device.
redesign – redesign, redesign
Even before Samuel and Carsten founded SHIFT, they were enthusiastic about technology and innovative ideas. With each of these products, one crucial point was increasingly missing – a fair and sustainable product design. You can read about everything that makes up a product design here. But not only the technologies became more and more efficient and faster, marketing also expanded, while the leaps in innovation became smaller and smaller. To this day, profit maximization is the top priority for most tech companies. Our goal is to orient our thoughts and actions towards the common good of society, i.e. for us: maximizing meaning instead of maximizing profit. We strive for this maximization of meaning through a modular design and fair working conditions.
Modularity as a design concept
If a smartphone ends up in the garbage due to a defective battery, the term “smart” should be questioned. Because a nice smartphone for the garbage is an ugly problem for our planet. Smartphones and tablets are usually not modular, i.e. the modules in the device are glued together, which makes repairs difficult and sometimes impossible. As a result, users cannot repair their devices and have to switch to a new device.
With modularity, on the other hand, the modules are connected to one another by means of plug-in connections. Depending on the model, up to 23 components can be exchanged on a SHIFTphone. Our A-frame (display unit) and B-frame (device frame) are also not glued together, but fixed with screws of the same size. All you need to open the device is a screwdriver. The structure of the device is based on repair statistics, i.e. the defect that occurs most frequently in a smartphone is the easiest and fastest to fix. According to repair statistics, the display is the most common defect. You can see how easy it is to change a display here:
Modularity means fairness
A modular design is not only “fair” to the environment, but also to the users. Reparability allows users to extend the useful life of their devices. The obsolescence of a product, which means that certain functions are no longer available, is referred to as obsolescence. In the technology sector, products are developed where the manufacturers consciously accept obsolescence. When products are manufactured and designed to have a shorter lifespan, it is called planned obsolescence. You can read more about this topic in our blog “Spring cleaning: Your Read the article against obsolescence”.
23. Mar 2023
may we introduce This is Fred or scientifically correct Stauroteuthis syrtensi. It lives in the deep sea at over 1000 meters below the sea surface and is one of the few octopuses that luminesces.
Only at the end of last year, almost 200 countries reached an agreement in Montreal that might also define the future of Fred and his kind decides. A global plan to protect biodiversity with specific objectives is intended to stop the ongoing loss of habitats and biodiversity worldwide.
When we think of biodiversity, we have we often see blooming meadows and less the diversity of life in the deep sea. The deep sea floor covers more than half of our earth, but so far humans have only explored a fraction of this vastness. One thing is undisputed: the ocean and its ecosystems have countless and important functions for people all over the world, be it as a source of food, an opportunity to earn an income or for climate regulation. It is well known that life in the deep sea is a fragile system that is home to hundreds of thousands of species and where more new species are discovered with every research voyage.
Deep sea mining and IT technology
Meanwhile, the possibility of deep-sea mining is repeatedly discussed, especially in relation to the increasing demand for raw materials and precious metals, especially for IT technologies and products. Before we know more about Fred and the complex and fragile ecosystem of the deep sea, we should definitely not start mining resources there commercially. Because this serious intervention would have unforeseeable consequences.
In addition to the activities of states, it is also important that companies see themselves as key players and take a stand, after all they are the processors of the resources. That’s why we as SHIFT recently signed the moratorium on deep sea mining along with other companies.
If we have been able to win you over to this topic so far, then we recommend this impressive video< /a> from the WWF, in which again many connections and which touched us deeply:
Finally, good news: After more than 15 years of negotiations, the Convention on the Protection of “Biodiversity Beyond National Legislation” (BBNJ) to protect the oceans was completed at the UN in New York at the beginning of March 2023. The agreement is the next logical step after the Montreal World Biodiversity Conference late last year. There, the international community had agreed to designate 30 percent of the seas as protected areas by 2030. to set up protected areas in the so-called high seas, i.e. in areas beyond national jurisdiction. The UN agreement will now create such a set of rules when it comes into force after ratification by 60 states. In addition to a mechanism for designating protected areas, it also stipulates that the effects of human activities on the marine ecosystems in the high seas must be assessed using so-called environmental impact assessments.
