Everywhere I go, anytime of day, everyone I see is bowing their heads.

Why? Because they're holding a phone, tablet, book, whatever and have almost all their attention on it. I just went downstairs for a snack and actually made a concerted effort to find people who weren't on their phone.

2 people! Both of them were walking. Everyone else who was walking was also on their phone while walking.

Am I the last one left who thinks that's crazy? Or does everyone think I'm the crazy one?

</rant>

Several times people times i've had people step out in front of my car while driving through parking lots.

They have no idea that they almost just died. If they do look up, it's to give ME a dirty look.

Sometimes I wonder how civilization ever made it without the cell phone. I've come to dislike them.

I have one, but I don't use it very often. Never, ever, while i'm driving. I avoid drivers who are on their phone the same way I would avoid a drunk.

I like to know what's going on around me. I would never use my phone while in a parking lot.

Whether an intended mugging or a sexual assault, predators look for people who aren't paying attention to their surroundings.

I think it is crazy people do this. I go to dinner with my daughter or boyfriend or my ex and all they do is do things on their smart phones. I have one, too. I don't find it interesting at all. I use it only for a phone unless I'm desperate.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/11/2013 04:05PM by cl2.

My 25 yo daughter and her college friends decided they wanted to talk to each when they go out to eat. So they pile their cell phones in the middle of the table and the first one to touch his/her phone has to pay the entire bill. I thought that was so cool.

People need to wake up and relate to the people right in front of them!

My mom used to tell this story about my great-grandfather who lived within 100 miles of the ocean but never saw it until right before he died.

Imagine if he'd had a smartphone. He probably never would have looked up.

You are not the crazy one. People seem to think it's rude to completely ignore the person in front of them in favor of a few pixels on a screen.

True confessions, however: I use my phone as my iPod. I get bored walking the dog so I like to listen to music while she sniffs stuff. Great time to check out a newly dropped album! So it might look like I'm walking my dog while texting, but what I'm doing is looking at my phone to change the music because Pandora is crap sometimes (or I'm switching to Spotify or Soundcloud or Sirius satellite radio -- all of which are apps on my phone). I do make sure I'm not stopping and standing right in the middle of the sidewalk or in the street or something. I move the hell out of the way, so nobody plows me over while I'm not paying attention and I look around first to make sure I'm not making a target of myself before I engage in the distraction. Generally, the dog takes up a lot of my attention as she is 75 pounds of wagging, eager curiosity.

The thing is, if you have a smartphone, it's not just a phone. It's a tiny laptop, it's an MP3 player, it's a map/navigator, it's a messaging service, it's the news report, it's a camera, it's a video recorder... It pretty much does everything except shave my legs and I'm sure that app will be along shortly.

That said, I still tuck the thing away in my purse when I'm visiting people, or at work/in a meeting, or you know, interacting with humans. If I don't want to talk to anyone (say, I'm waiting for my sammich at the sub shop), I have my nose buried on my phone checking my Facebook feed. Or I'm looking at the radar so I'll know if I need an umbrella for that dog walk.

Speaking of which, one game I play is this: while I'm walking said dog, whenever we're approaching traffic that's stopped at a traffic light, I count how many cars pass us before I see a driver who ISN'T on the phone while driving. Also, I have bluetooth in my car and my phone is "paired" with that signal. So if a call comes in, I can hit a button on my steering wheel to answer. The music fades out, and I can hear and talk through the car's speakers. Conversation over, I hit another button and the phone hangs up. So I can actually talk hands-free on the phone while driving, but I don't like to because it is distracting.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/11/2013 04:06PM by dogzilla.

Looks like you are not the only crazy one out there. I too find the use of smartphones and tablets by many people to be crazy. I carry a cellphone because my wife insists. I haven't used it for months.

Then again, I spend a lot of time on this website that I could be spending with other people in real life. So to each his or her own, I guess.

I hear you. My girlfiend and I share a phone since we're together all the time anyway, but she makes me carry it! She hates them even more than me.

I'm mostly on RfM at work, when I'm forced to be on a computer anyway, but hey... this is therapy ;)

Good thread! I see people driving (badly) with them. Really, you can't wait 10 minutes til you get to work/home?

My cell phone is a basic flip phone and I love it. I can text if I need to, but I don't text much. I call people and leave voicemails - crazy, huh?

I've never used a tablet, but it seems like just an expensive toy. These things are just to kill time I think.

Unless its an emergency, our family has a no phone rule when we're together.

We realized we were all sitting in the same room, but having conversations with people who weren't there. All of us were either on a phone or our lap tops. Crazy. We stopped doing that. Amazingly it was my kids who made the rule.

Mia Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Unless its an emergency, our family has a no phone
> rule when we're together.
>
> We realized we were all sitting in the same room,
> but having conversations with people who weren't
> there. All of us were either on a phone or our lap
> tops. Crazy. We stopped doing that. Amazingly it
> was my kids who made the rule.

Have you read Alone Together by the MIT researcher Sherry Turkle? Her research reveals that children and young adults frequently report frustration, sadness, and anger regarding the amount of time their parents spend on their cell phones, tablets, etc. (This is even when the kids are on their own devices all the time.)

The smartphone has ushered in the zombie apocalypse! (Heheh, I'm on one right now).

I admit to being on my smartphone a lot, but I still make sure to pay attention. I don't use it when driving. I don't use it when I'm having a conversation with someone, etc..

No you're not the only one. I don't have a high tech cell phone and I don't care to either. I have a laptop. I'm home with my kids all day. In my case, I just don't see the reason for all of that. Once you have it, it becomes very addicting and almost everybody I know is addicted to their technology.

That link is a great one.

I love technology. Loooooove it. Love how it helps me access info so quickly or communicate with someone far away when I can't talk with them on the phone. But I'm not "connected" to my devices when I'm working, or walking, or driving, or eating with friends/family, or having social interactions. I love being in the present more than having the thrill of constantly glancing online or looking at and responding to text messages or playing a game in my hand.

Besides, I think I'm one of those people who'd be so engrossed in typing or playing while walking that I'd get hit by a car or trip off the curb and break my ankle...

When you ride a bike in traffic, you can look down into cars and seem people texting and surfing the net while they are driving.

Scary!

The two times I almost got wiped by cars while riding my motorcycle, both drivers were using cell phones. This ought to get severe fines just like drunk driving, IMHO.

I don't text at all and always pull over to use the phone. I have enough issues with age-related loss of reflexes and sensory sharpness not to add to it. I haven't noticed these losses, but know they exist. I'm gonna hedge my bet by paying extra attention when driving!

The thing I do that might be dangerous, though, is listening to my tablet through ear buds while walking around, shopping, etc.

Anyone read Nicholas Carr's The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains? He goes a little far with his argument, but I think he makes a good one.

I don't think people who are looking at their cell phones while out and about are crazy at all. It is enjoyable and efficient for many people to use the phone in this way.

I feel like there is an element of our population that has attached some sort of morality to the use or non-use of cell phones. Somehow people think that it is better, or more moral, or more healthy to not use the cell phone. I don't think those opinions are very well examined or have much merit.

It reminds me of how my grandma was disturbed at how my mother listened to rock music instead of whatever grandma listened to. As times change there are just people who irrationally dislike the new way of doing things.

I don't think there is anything immoral about the use of cell phones. But it seems to me that the more we use cell phones, the more we cheapen conversation. And the more we use texts and tweets, we cheapen it even more. Even emails and posts like this one on an Internet forum seem like a tawdry imitation of an intelligent conversation.

Writing seems the same as conversations. People used to read and write letters and articles and books. Those took a little thought. Ideas were actually developed and shared. Now we have blogs. Not exactly the same.

And things like television and video games. Many people spend hours a day on those things, while actually doing things and developing skills by playing the piano or building electronics or exercising or playing sports seem to attract fewer people.

I'm not against new technologies. Many times new technologies let us do things we could never do before. But they are often mixed blessings. They can suck up huge amounts of time and deliver little in the way of rewards.

So I don't think it is an issue of morality. But it does seem to me that as our society progresses, we see us overindulge in these gaudy new toys. And perhaps not coincidentally, in food that we eat until we are fat. And in comfort, where we are always heated or cooled to the proper temperature even though outside it can be blazing hot or bitter cold.

So although I sometimes feel the temptation to overindulge, I rebel against it. I rarely watch television (mainly just ice hockey, so this year with the National Hockey League strike I have not turned on the television for months). I usually read a book a day. Sometimes two. I go to the gym three times a week, and take a walk every day. When it gets cold, I am often out in the cold. Same with the hot. Many times my cell phone sits at home. Even when I carry it, I rarely use it. I try to eat simply and what is in season. I often fast for a day or two, and then eat a lot.

My children consider me odd. My wife thinks I am crazy. But I think all this has made my mind and body fitter than I would otherwise be.

There is a lot of speculation that something like television, video games, etc, cause people to think less or to understand less. It has been studied a lot and there are very few links shown between spending time watching tv and a lack of knowledge or lack of ambition to learn new things or try to learn new skills. In fact, I think it is non-existent. The amount of artists and musicians have doubled since the 1960's and in the last twenty or so years (as the internet developed and became popular) have remained exactly the same. People are learning these skills now just as often as they used to learn these skills.

I can't find any data on people who do electronics though, so I don't know specifically about those skills.

People also still write letters and read books. I'm writing to you right now, in fact. Why would you think that our conversation here on this message board is any less important or educational just because I'm typing the words instead of writing them with a pencil? Why would writing a blog be any less thoughtful than writing a book? Why would reading a blog transfer less ideas than reading an article?

In fact, I would consider that any blog worth reading would require a much greater amount of thought and consideration than an article because the amount of people who read it will be much higher. It has the potential to transmit much more information as well because it is a dynamic form of communication and can change to fit new trends, new information and incorrect assumptions.

Still, I see kids reading books constantly as well. In fact, book sales (non-print, mostly digital) have gone up over the past couple of decades.

I'm not sure this is a real problem. I feel like it has been invented just like how my grandma's generation invented the idea that rock music was bad and that society was going downhill because of how kids were reacting to new things.

About morality, I totally agree with you. Maybe it isn't an issue about morality, or perhaps I'm using the wrong word. Thanks for catching that one. :)

Good points. My thoughts and feelings on this topic are just that, thoughts and feelings. I don't have any rational arguments based on real data. Just observations--mainly of my own immediate family--and reading books like Nicholas Carr's The Shallows and Nassim Taleb's Antifragile. So it's good to hear your thoughtful, contrasting views.

Sounds like I need to read some Nicholas Carr and Nassim Taleb :) Thanks.

I'm reminded of an old Star Trek TNG episode where everyone was playing this hand-held game and was mesmorized by it. The next thing they knew - some enemy was taking over. Does anyone remember that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Game_(Star_Trek:_The_Next_Generation)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/11/2013 10:11PM by wine country girl.

I had some brothers comes to town that I don't see very often. Went out to dinner with them and 2 of the 3 were messing with their phones almost the entire time. So much for having a conversation with them. I thought it was rude, personally. They couldn't put down their phones to have a conversation with their sibling and brother-in-law. Everything else is more important, I guess.

Can't tell you how many times I've almost had someone hit me because they were on their phone. It's dangerous. Talking on the phone is distracting and texting while driving is crazy. Are kids going to grow up with zero patience because they have to know "X" right now and can't wait for one second? I find myself doing that sometimes. I will drop what I am doing and run to the computer to look it up. Did I really have to do that right then? Most likely, no.

Another problem I have with the smart phones is that people have to immediately respond to something on facebook or whatever. Sometimes they say rude things that they might not have said if they thought about it for a second or two. They text one liners back and forth. Not much discussion or conversation going on. Then there are the people at the store on their phones that are paying zero attention to their kids or are about to run their cart into you. I also don't really want to hear one end of someone's conversation in the break room at work, at a restaurant, walking between work and my car, etc. I could go on and on.

The benefits of the smart phone for me would be to be able to find places when I'm on the road like a place to eat, to stop for a break, or to find a place to shop. But I don't need to do that while I'm driving. I can pull into a parking lot and look it up while I'm not driving. It might also be nice to have the GPS part, but I have a separate GPS anyway. I personally don't have a smart phone. Do I really need to pay more and more money to be connected when the reason I got a phone in the first place was for emergencies?

Nobody looks UP anymore! (Or rarely!) Who is "smelling the roses"???
Ya, I get a kick out of people riding a bike and texting, or smoking, and walking around a store oblivious of people around them, texting!!
Strange world !!
Ya. I have a cell phone. It won't text or fwd pics! Never!

That's one thing I've had to really work on is being aware of my surroundings while being on the cellphone. I get distracted easily so I've learned to focus as much as I can on my surroundings and in turn, learned to do that also while using my cellphone because it is important for me personally to be aware (it helps to not get too absorbed into what you're doing on your cellphone and/or iPod/iPad/tablet because a lot of people's cellphones basically become their life). Plus, I don't want to be a non-attentive a**hole like some people I've seen.

It is definitely possible to have a cellphone and still be able to look around...too many people just don't care enough to do so

I'm often looking down, but it's because I scan the ground for coins! I'm finding more of them lately, too. Perhaps all of those cell phone users are too absentminded to keep track of their money.

I'm pretty particular about what I watch on TV or at the movies, so I was peeved when my local grocery store (back in Utah) installed TV monitors in the check-out lines to pacify those who were waiting. The programs they'd display wouldn't be those I would choose to watch so I'd pick a time to shop when I knew I could quickly go through a line without listening to crap. Plus, I missed the interaction I'd had with others in line (I lived in a small town in central Utah). Crazy, stupid.

To open up another can o' worms, here's an article about the myth of multitasking referencing studies from around the world: http://faculty.winthrop.edu/hinera/CRTW-Spring_2011/TheMythofMultitasking_Rosen.pdf

I cancelled my cellphone about a year ago and do not miss it at all. I hated it. I love being disconnected, unfindable and not contactable!

I like my internet, connected, contactable time but only on my limited terms.

It is crazy. I deleted my facebook and all social apps for this exact reason. My pet peeve is two people on a date or whatever, both on phones.

Sometimes we get so caught up in capturing moments to remember later, that we aren't really in them in the present moment...