SMART PHONES – smart people?

I’m sure you fully realize how addicted we are to techno-gadgets today and especially to the somewhat pathetic dependence on our cell phones. The term smart-phone was invented as a marketing gimmick back then, but in this rare case it is certainly true as advertised; these phones are very smart. Of course they are only as smart as ‘we, the people’ want them to be, simply by the way we use them. So considering the way we use as well as abuse these smart-phones, can we honestly call ourselves smart-people?

Many years ago, I was stuck for 8 hours in Helsinki-Vantaan lentoasema; mechanical problems they told us. For those very few of you who do not understand Finnish, that would be Helsinki (International) Airport - in Finland, that is. I was on my way back to California from a visit to Denmark and Sweden.

Passing time, I placed myself in a restaurant that had a great view of the terminal from above. The myriads of travelers below made it all look like a high energy ant-hill, which by itself is rather normal for a busy airport. But what really caught my eye was that all the ants had a cell-phone glued to an ear. Quite an eye-opening sight – really.

Sure mobiles were up and coming in the USA at that time, but most certainly not to the extent it presented itself that day in Finland. Then I realized that through my travels in Denmark and Sweden it had actually been very eye-opening already, but I had not fully acknowledged this trend before the moment of viewing the ant-hill. And here we are, years and millions of smart-phones later.

We didn’t even have a phone in my early years. Due to my father’s job (police-work) we finally ended up with a land-line party phone. 'No', not a designated phone to find out where the nearest action was, but a phone-line with two subscribers. At times I would pick up the phone to make a call and the other party was chatting away – for the most part some really hot stuff. My Mother told us not to listen and hang up at once; which I rarely did if my Mother wasn't home. I even remember our number from back then (60+ years ago) SO:3182U, yeah, really.

69 43 08 was our phone-number when we got a rotary unit. Yeah I know, this is all museum-style information for most of you, but please go with it. Many years later it was key-punch. So a lot of verbal communication was attached and depended on the availability of land-line phones; we survived and conducted business and private lives without a problem.

When I arrived in the USA in 1975, it was still land-line phones and a computer would not be able to fit inside my house - even if I could afford one. 10 years later (please don’t quote me) car-phones were introduced and I was first in line - seriously. They weren’t cheap, but they were so bloody cool. Had one installed in my huge 8 cylinder Ford Station-wagon and on the way home from the shop I desperately tried to get the connection going to make that first historical (hysterical?) call. I’m a right-handed phone chatter, meaning holding phones (and cute kittens) to my right ear. But as I was driving home from the shop, I kept holding the phone to my left ear, so people driving by could see that I had a car-phone; the na na na na na na syndrome; and then I eventually grew up...

I remember at a trade-show in New York that one of the exhibitors had this huge box, like a really big thing, that he hauled around. It was an early cell-phone and he obviously needed to look important. When I asked him if the phone came with a fork-lift, he didn’t smile at all, because he was busy looking cool. 

My first cell-phone was not little either, but after heavy training and arm-muscle build-up I handled the weight well – didn’t tip over that often. I believe there were very few cell-towers and to get a really good reception, you pretty much had to sit on top of one, while hoping the person you called was sitting on top of a tower as well – (sigh) those were the days, my friends...

So we finally arrived in super-gadget land of amazing computers, tablets and phones, smart-phones. It took me a while to catch on, as I was satisfied with flip-phones and the fact that they could make and receive phone-calls; I mean wasn’t that the idea of a phone?

The time had arrived for Peter to meet a smart-phone and I opted for an iPhone (3, I think it was, some years back). I was so totally against all the crap it could do – stuff I most certainly would never need. The multitude of applications I couldn’t see anybody would have the slightest interest in – except for the ones with dysfunctional brains or no brains at all. And there seemed to be so many of them... (not you and I, of course).

Now I have about 44 apps on my phone that I seriously use on a regular basis. A fitness app, soccer apps (Manchester United follower), bank accounts app, apps for setting TV programs to record, dictionary, quotes, several travel apps (flights, hotels, car-rental reservations), and so forth. But I don’t do social things apps, other than using texts, E-Mailing and then of course that novel thing called telephoning...

So we have all acknowledged the extreme uses available for our smart-phones, and I hope, also all the crap that doesn’t really do anything practical – is not even entertaining. My point is that I have certainly embraced a lot of what this little gadget can do for me, but I am not controlled by it –at all, like some I see around me on a daily basis, staying around here or out traveling.

Smart-phones are really that: smart, but only as smart as we want to make them, because the choices of applications are close to infinite (perhaps even longer) but we need to be in control of every single one we apply and use, otherwise we are really not that smart, are we?

My beef concerning how these gadgets are used, the way they interfere with common sense, ethics, respect and consideration, is another thing – and not a pretty one. My brief history concerning where I started fitting in with phones, and the experiences I went through, explains my overall ethics with respect to how, what, where and when to work these gadgets.

As with anything in a functioning society, we must be considered and respectful.  With that in mind, I find it utterly rude when spending time with friends, family, just about anybody, chatting along and having a great face-to-face communication, that we let a phone-call, text-message, anything beeping or vibrating in our back-pocket break that moment, by pulling out the damn thing in mid sentence. Yes, to me that is utterly rude, because it makes me feel unimportant; what’s on the phone is more important than our moment together face-to-face?

Some people chat away and socialize, but suddenly they find a need to check sports-scores or what the heck else this smart-phone demands them to react to. To me there is NOTHING more important than you and I, socializing, communicating and do that real human thing – not hiding behind a monitor or cell-phone. To let that special moment be broken by anything is extremely offensive to me. I mean, it is not even a rare occasion when people are sitting in a restaurant with their damn phones up their noses, communicating with something or somebody other than the person sitting across the table from them. How rude is that? And I see it all the time – are you one of those people? Yes, I’m of the old school, where courtesy and respect rule – and I'm proud of it.

Oh and let us not forget the irritating loud-mouthed on-the-phone persons next to you and/or in a crowded area. I don’t know about you, but are you interested in what they have to say – so loudly? Where’s common sense and consideration?

Today, most people are walking around with phones in their hands, having them readily available anywhere. Yes, I checked. They are constantly staring at the damn screen as if their life depended on it. That’s a sad realization, because it seems as if they did not have that (*&^%$) phone in their hand, they were not wanted, needed and/or important or at least not looking important, wanted and/or needed. To me, that is so utterly pathetic. And this is where we need to ask ourselves who the smart part is: the phone or me – I already know my answer.

I embrace the fact that many people, especially anybody with insecurities, anxieties, social disabilities, etc. actually do communicate by phone, where they perhaps wouldn’t communicate with anybody at all if such phones were not available. But I really hope that they also seek real human contact at times. But for the most part we carry it to the bloody extremes of ignorance – and that is so sad.

By day’s end, done with dinner and ready for some down-time with a movie or some TV or reading or music, I turn my phone off. I love and fully enjoy the company of my best friend ever (my wife of 30-plus years) and I don’t want to be interrupted by anything that comes from my phone – because it is normally NOT that important. Our kids know how it works and in case of any supreme emergency, they also know how to get hold of us. Anything else can wait till tomorrow - it really can.

It is so utterly awesome to be part of all this gadget stuff, and I do take advantage of what I want to profit from, by being in control. Early on I got into a lot of application-fluff, but all the fluff is now gone and the apps I use today, actually seems to make me a smarter consumer, a smart people – so how are you doing; are you being smart?