iPhone 5 is launched... But Why Do People Care?

Nerds rejoice, because Wednesday saw the launch of the iPhone 5! Yay! But wait, I am a nerd and I could not care less. Oh, I know why... because (SPOILER) the iPhone 5 is going to be the exact same thing. First of all, look at the iPhone 5's appearance - with all these drastic changes to it. The new one is 7.6mm thin, whereas the iPhone 4S was 9.3mm, because that 1.7mm really makes all the difference. If Apple's CEO Tim Cook had walked onto that stage in California and presented a phone that did not resemble the same, glowing rectangle as before, then I would of taken notice. Next, let us look at the iPhone 5's performance rates. This is the real interesting part because it shows just how good and improved your bloody expensive chopping board will be. Standby time is improved by 20 hours, 3G use is improved by two hours and Wi-Fi can be used for an hour longer - but video and audio playback stay the same. So what is new? There is a new connector called "Lightning" which you could imagine had the marketing executives patting each other on the back. Oh and we will see "a big increase in speed" which is good, considering how slow and irresponsive Apple technology can be. And that is that, which poses the question - why do people care about this so much? I do not understand the gurgling idiots who clap and woop our Apple overlords as they make the game-changing announcement that this one will be thinner and therefore, better, than the last. At this point, I would like to clarify that I am not one of these hipster "slate-Apple-because-they-are-popular" critics. My problem is with the mobile phone industry as a whole. It seems Apple, Samsung and Nokia are content to roll out the latest models of their biggest moneyspinners without making drastic change. If I am perfectly honest, I can see the logic in their business model: create a popular phone, improve it slightly for minimal cost, rinse and repeat. I am not naive because I know how business works. Apple sold 26 million iPhones in the third quarter of 2012, which contributed to $8.8 billion in profit. Yet as a customer, I am bored by what is on offer. I appreciate the wealth of apps and technology that are packaged together on the iPhone or the Galaxy or the Lumia, but I want something new. I want a mobile phone that is different; one that does not look and feel the same as the rest. I eagerly await the day that Tim Cook or his counterparts stand in front of the world and give me something different to play with. Until then, I am going to stick with my beast, the Alcatel One Touch 355. It may have a WAP internet connection (and no kids, WAP is not slang for awesome) and a barely-functioning alarm clock but it amuses me more than the iPhone 5 probably would