Fairphone: Making the Right Call

In the highly competitive smartphone industry, some companies endlessly innovate while others shamelessly imitate. Fairphone wants to break the rules of the dazzle-the-consumer game by asking an even bigger question: How can a phone be produced conscientiously?

Smartphones have heavy social and ecological impacts, from documented child labor to the gadgets’ planned obsolescence — buy the new model next year and simply toss the old one. By contrast, Amsterdam-based Fairphone is a social enterprise that boldly aims to revolutionize the industry. The brand’s handsets are built to last and take into account the well-being of workers all along the production chain. The latest version — Fairphone 2, first released in December 2015 — is the first smartphone to score a perfect 10 with iFixit, as the phone is designed to be easily repairable by the average user. It is also one of the first modular smartphones, meaning its major components can be separately replaced with substitutes from open-source hardware stores and further upgraded in the future.


公平手機：為公平致電

在高度競爭的智慧型手機產業中，有些公司永無止盡地創新，有些則恬不知恥地模仿。公平手機公司想打破讓消費者驚艷這個遊戲規則，方法是提出更遠大的問題：如何能有良心地生產手機？
智慧型手機帶來沉重的社會及生態環境衝擊，從有記錄的童工事件到計畫性報廢的小配件──隔年買新機，然後就把舊機扔了。相反的，總部位於阿姆斯特丹的公平手機公司是一間大膽地以革新產業為宗旨的社會企業。這個品牌的手機是為永續持有而打造的，且顧慮到所有生產鏈上勞工的健康。最新版本的 Fairphone 2 於 2015 年十二月首次推出──是第一支 iFixit 評鑑為滿分十分的智慧型手機，因其設計對一般的使用者來說很容易維修。它也是第一支模組化的智慧型手機，意思是它的主要零件都可分別在共享資源的硬體商店中找到替代品，也可在未來進一步被更新。