Recently, I came across a tweet by chance, saying that "if one has premium memberships of all these software in one's phone, including Youtube, Spotify, Netflix and Tinder. Then this person should be seen as the middle class." （「如果一個人手機裡的YouTube Spotify Netflix Tinder都有加值會員，請將他是為中產階級。」）[1]
[1]: https://twitter.com/maluvis2much/status/1272811703806251008?s=20
This is an interesting argument that our social and wealth status is defined by the apps we use and the memberships status we are with the apps, not by our wages, our occupations or our personal estate. To a certain degree, the apps one uses represents how one receives information and interact with society. I feel the argument was somewhat exaggerated. People have premium memberships of the above apps could be using their spare money on them, and they get other plentiful consumer products in their lives. It could also be the case that, apps and their phones are the whole worlds for some people, so they spend money on these apps as necessities. However, the argument reflects some realities and expectations of apps from the public.
Obviously, Youtube, Spotify, Netflix and Tinder are mainstream and extremely popular apps. (Some people may want to add PornHub into the list, but it does not have an app version, only website.) They are so popular that one knowing nothing about these apps is likely to be excluded or difficult to immerse oneself in peers' groups. One knowing nothing about these apps is facing difficulties to interact with one's peers; literally, one cannot share with others or being shared by others a list of Netflix show or Spotify music. Furthermore, our expectations of apps or habits of using apps are that they should be free or cheap. Consumers do not really want to spend money on apps, either buying them or paying premium memberships. However, in most cases, apps are relatively cheap compare to we do similar things in a "conventional" way. For instance, a one-year Netflix membership costs from £5.99/month*12 = £71.88/year for a basic membership to £11.99/month*12 = £143.88/year for a premium membership, which allows up to four devices to use the Netflix at the same time. And it costs £157.50/year for a colour TV licence for a household in the UK starting from April 2020. Netflix is indeed comparatively cheap than tv licence if we ignore the cost of hardware and the internet. We seem to expect free or cheap apps and omit the cost no matter could be. [2]
[2]: You will not be able to guess how much an AAC app could usually cost. Take one of the most popular AAC apps as an example, it costs £249.99. It is actually much cheaper than dedicated AAC devices. The developer of that AAC app told me, the price is actually similar to the fee of one-year Spotify membership.
One more thing, when I open the editing page of this blog today, which I rarely and poorly maintained, the google suggested that there is a new version of platform to edit its blogs, which makes it easier to edit on a smartphone. It just looks like there is a trend that we develop everything as an app, and we move them to our smartphones.
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