The New Smartphones.

Do you ever look at your smartphone and think it's just too stiff and flat? A growing number of tech giants have, and they're aiming to fix that with what may become the next wave of smartphone innovation. LG announced on Monday that it will start mass-producing a flexible, curved smartphone screen. Its first devices to use the new 6-inch OLED screens will be available next year. Several companies have shown prototypes of flexible displays before, but so far there haven't been any mass-market bendy phones. Samsung announced a similar screen technology last month and plans to release the 5.7-inch Galaxy Note 3, its first device with a curved display, later in October. Apple has long been rumored to be looking into similar technology for the iPhone. A patent filed in March describes an "electronic device with wrap around display" that would go around most, or all, of the device. Apple, like other companies, sometimes files patents for products that never come to market. What's clear in the minds of many is that the coming wave of flexible and curved displays is just the first step in what could become a dramatic shift in what we expect of our phones. "What we're seeing today is a big step toward a break from the rectangular norm of smartphone design, paving the way for more outlandish shapes and sizes for future devices," Aaron Souppouris, of tech blog The Verge, wrote Monday. Since Apple released the keyboard-killing iPhone, the physical design of smartphones has pretty much stagnated. The touchscreen rectangles have appeared in different sizes, and recently companies like Motorola and Apple have tried to spice things up with different colors and patterns on the back. But the basic look is the same. Most of the serious competition takes place inside the devices. Manufacturers compete for the best camera, the fastest processor, the widest selection of apps and, of course, low price tags. When all those specs are close and the devices start to blend together, companies turn to splashier -- some might say gimmicky -- features to try to make their 5-inch Android smartphones stand out from the other guy's 5-inch Android smartphones.