The article leads with, "With Carphone Warehouse claiming to be the biggest camera retailer in Europe, Nokia saying it is the biggest camera manufacturer in the world, and shares in photographic retailer Jessops taking a tumble, some are penning obituaries for the standalone digital camera."
This relatively brief article concludes that the obituaries are premature. The Guardian says, "Companies such as Canon are banking on the phone evolving to suit different roles (phone plus camera, phone plus music player, phone plus digital TV tuner etc), leaving plenty of space for standalone cameras."
I'm thinking the main reason that PDAs, digital cameras, and cellphones don't all merge into a ubiquitous fusion-device, subsequently destroying the market for discrete devices, is a matter of sheer esthetics.
I fully expect advances in engineering and optics will greatly expand the usefulness of cameras in cellphones. I expect the number of megapixels in camphone-light-sensors will eventually equal anything in the professional market. I also expect the need to keep cellphones looking "cool" will mean camphones won't have the cachet to have professional-type glassware protruding from it.
I agree with Mr. Reiter that certainly low-end consumer digital cameras will be severely impacted by advancing camphone technology. I further suspect the impact on discrete camera sales might be felt even into the prosumer markets, if standardized lens-interfaces are adopted, and if someone can adapt the optics to the restrictive form-factor of a cellphone (three basic lens types for any beginner 35-mm. film photographer: A wide-angle lens, a "normal" 50-mm. lens, and a zoom 80-135-mm. telephoto).
Posted by: Tychocat | Sunday, March 27, 2005 at 01:18 AM