Clodagh Finn: Camera phones have done more than teach us to pose for a selfie

All you need is a smartphone and an eye for detail to show the world what is happening in your own corner of it — this is both a good and a bad thing

The first camera phone emerged over 20 years ago but it was a number of years before they found their way into everyone’s pockets.

They are archaeological artefacts now. Or so it seemed to me when I excavated two little plastic canisters containing rolls of camera film from the forgotten flotsam and jetsam of a kitchen drawer.

I don’t know how old they are or where the photos within were taken. It can’t have been much more than a decade ago, even if the ritual of capturing adventures on Kodak and having them developed in one-hour photo shops feels like a lifetime ago.