Sorry for my late response, and thanks for all the extra info!

Why have a PC AND a games console? Why have a gaming PC? Why not just have the console BE your PC and media centre all in one box?

Yes, good point!!

They also use their phones to store Octopus card credit (the multi-use ticket for public transport, used on buses, trams, ferries, MTR etc), and I think you can buy credit online from your phone so you never have to find a ticket office that’s open.

That would be really helpful, wouldn’t it?

(And I love how in HK they have the Octopus card and in Great Britain they use an Oyster card for the underground.) We need better names here

It’s a different market with a different view on tech. Unfortunately for me, I live in the UK and have to tolerate all the decade-old tech (sold as the ‘latest thing’) such as 3G phones with crappy 512Kb mobile broadband and 5Mp cameras, when my brother-in-law who lives in Hong Kong has a nice 7Mp camera plus DV Quality video on his OLD spare mobile phone… the first time I ever saw a phone with mp3 ringtones was one he brought over – around about the same time we in the UK were being sold on polyphonic ringtones as the next must-have ‘feature’ for your phone!

You walk into a mobile shop in the UK and see maybe a couple of hundred models on display. In HK you’d get twice that number crammed into a single tiny point-of-sale display in any old backstreet phone shop. And what’s more – they’re all free from provider lock-in. You just buy the phone and put your existing SIM in there with no fixed term contracts or anything (even works for PAYG). It’s a much freer way to buy and gives you better choice and cheaper products with greater features and service.

Unfortunately, most consumers in the west aren’t tech-savvy enough to see how they’re getting screwed over and over, but instead they keep buying the same old hand-me-down tech dressed up as something new! Gish….!

I’ve also seen those ‘barcodes’ used in HK. Bands have info on the flyers they hand out – if you scan it into your phone it can put you on a ‘mailing list’ for gig updates, give you access to music you can buy as ringtones, let you buy tickets there and then using e-cash, so you just go to the gig and scan your phone at the door to get in. They also use their phones to store Octopus card credit (the multi-use ticket for public transport, used on buses, trams, ferries, MTR etc), and I think you can buy credit online from your phone so you never have to find a ticket office that’s open.

It’s another world entirely!