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Life before smartphones (2020)

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Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#301

Post by kernoble »

mrweasel wrote: post #93
kernoble wrote: post #14

The unmentioned thing here is why? Why does the world with a smartphone and today's hyper-connectivity seem so different now compared to what it used to? Did people feel the same way when the railroad and other forms of rapid transport showed up? What makes things feel so different? Is it more competition, and for what? Is it that things are just faster, and the certainties have changed? Has it fundamentally changed…

> Did people feel the same way when the railroad and other forms of rapid transport showed up? To some extend yes. When I was a kid, we'd rarely go to the only major city in our part of the country. Maybe two times a year. Now I live in that area, but I can easily go visit my parents for dinner, just because someone decided that a motorway was a great idea. It cut somewhere like 40 minutes to an hour of the drive. It…

Point being: increased speed, and therefore frequency, of communication/interaction changes the nature of our relationships.

So the change in the "underlying" doesn't have to be 10x to have a 10x effect on the relationships.

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#302

Post by emerged »

Tons of kids ride their bikes around my parents neighborhood. They are always fiddling on their phone while riding. It seems so sad to me, not much different than if they were all smoking cigarettes. They literally can’t help themselves.

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#303

Post by ghaff »

jzawodn wrote: post #176
rapnie wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And he doesn't even mention that you could just be outside, and be unreachable and not able to reach other people too. As a kid I used to play outside a lot, and my mother had no clue where I was, nor could she easily find out. I could be outside all day without her worrying that I'd be abducted or involved in an accident. Now that all has completely changed, and my mother has too. Some years ago when I walked into t…

What the actual...? One would hope the cops at least apologized for nearly destroying your front door all because you didn't answer the door. It's not like they had a warrant for your arrest or something!

Did you read the part where his mother made the 911 call?

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#304

Post by JohnTHaller »

krylon wrote: post #57

Now I feel old. I remember vividly running around with my first camera, looking for objects worthy of being photographed. The film cost money, so did developing it into pictures. I really had to weigh the pros and cons of taking a particular picture. And in a class of ~25 kids, I was one of three who owned a camera. Not that it was such a luxury item, but most people weren't into that. These days, (nearly) everyone c…

One thing I've noticed is that while everyone can take photos and video anytime they want to, many folks simply forget to. How many people have you seen who have timelines of only selfies, food, and/or cats/dogs. I've been making a point to take just a few photos or videos while spending time with friends after a show and many of my friends are thankful when I do and share them (directly, not online and tagging them).

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#305

Post by ghaff »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #292
sylens wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am optimistic that I can use the upcoming Focus mode in iOS 15 to start broadcasting my unavailability to my contacts

I feel like not replying is a simpler solution. Text messaging is asynchronous communication, if someone is expecting an immediate response, they should be calling.

Then it had better be really urgent unless you're one of a handful of people. Even as an older person, I mostly ignore phone calls if I don't recognize the caller ID--and, even then, unless it's a call I know I want to take for whatever reason.

ADDED: Where I work, chat is a more time sensitive than email but basically no one phones out of the blue.

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#306

Post by derwiki »

handrous wrote: post #251
theyellowkid wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking back, I wish everyone had taken pictures of everyday life (probably with an Instamatic). Christmas pictures, awards, meh. What I really want are pictures of the halls in high school, street racing, parties with giant bonfires and beer.

One thing I noticed when looking through my parents' (pre-digital) home videos and photos from my childhood is that 90% of the subjects are me, and 10% anyone else, while what I want to see is the inverse of that. I want to see everyone else, mostly. I try to keep that in mind when snapping photos or taking videos of my kids, and pan over to the oldsters in the room from time to time, even if all I want is to record…

The play _Our Town_ addresses this a little: given the chance to go back and relive any day, you should choose an unremarkable day vs a momentous one.

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#307

Post by oceanghost »

hughrr wrote: post #274
oceanghost wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wanted to say this. I hate how small the world has become and how we're supposed to be "reachable" all the time. Some of my friends will freak out if I don't text back in as little as 5 minutes. A particular needy friend once tried to get me to "promise" that I would always return her texts within 10 minutes. I said "hard no" explaining that it meant that it meant that I could never watch a movie uninterrupted, rea…

My ex wife was like that. One reason she's an ex wife. I lost a job due to her once because she phoned the office after I didn't respond to an SMS while I was in a very tough meeting with a client. I now have my phone on do not disturb 24/7. I will choose when I participate in messaging. I also disable iMessage on my Mac. If someone comes up to me and talks to me, I may not even respond immediately. I took this to ex…

So I left one story out of my little rant-- which was my ex-wife would do exactly what you described. She would text and then if I hadn't responded in a few minutes she'd call the receptionist and/or my desk phone. It was infuriating because she rarely answered a text in less than a few hours.

She said that it upset her when she couldn't reach me--and that's one of the reasons she's an ex-wife. Her go to manipulation tactic was this sort of ask for some sort of compromise or make some sort of promise with absolutely not intention of keeping her end of the bargain.

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#308

Post by gnicholas »

ghaff wrote: post #288
gnicholas wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. I've been missing this since AIM went bust. I also wish there were a way for me to send a low-priority message to my wife so that it didn't notify her regardless of her notification settings. We send each other news articles throughout the day but don't really want to interrupt each other. It would be great if there were a sender-side option that could enable this. I've thought about using a shared document i…

Email? IMO, no one should have have email that sends notifications.

When we're on our computers, email notifications come up unless we're in DND (and even then, they show up whenever your email client is visible regardless).

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#309

Post by ghaff »

rapnie wrote: post #145
cryptoz wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's terrifying, I'm sorry that happened to you. Something I have done (accidentally at first, now on purpose) is to not respond to messages (personal) quickly, most of the time. People adjust to that rather fast and stop worrying so much. People in my circles know now that I am rarely going to answer within a few hours and expectations are adjusted. So then going outside for a few hours with no phone is no longer…

I do that too. My phone is still on silent most of the time. It is funny the reactions you get when people aren't yet used to not getting a quick response. They are sort of outraged and questioning: "I called you, but you didn't answer??". Also I go outside without a phone on occasion. That feels like you leave a burden behind, and you are somehow more free. The phone is that easy thing you just grab to do a quick ch…

Maybe it's an age thing. Maybe if we're coordinating an imminent get-together, but for the most part no one I know expects anything other than a telephone call to be immediately answered and even then understands reasons why it might not be.

Re: Life before smartphones (2020)

#310

Post by tharne »

Sebb767 wrote: post #229
swayvil wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Soon they will replace the "phone ring" with an electric shock. Mark my words. Like in 1984. People who want to "spend time alone" are deviant, diseased and antisocial. And must be stopped.

You're missing the tree in the forest. No one is forced to look at their phone, the reality is that people have trained themselves to want it.

> No one is forced to look at their phone, the reality is that people have trained themselves to want it.

Not quite. Tech and social media companies have spent billions to make their devices and apps as addictive as possible.

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