Buying In. Selling Out?
It’s been one week, three days and twenty-two hours since I bought my very first cell phone. An apparent bargain, the Nokia 1100 cost 79 dollars and a sliver of my soul.
For as long as I can remember I have resisted new technology. As a child I shunned the brand of fantasy and adventure found in video and computer games; I played in real forests and built real forts. As a teenager I listened to vinyls rather than CDs. Though we had a burner, I crafted mix tapes until my old tape deck broke down. I stuck with a 35 mm camera given to my dad for his high school graduation, I said “no thank you” to mp3s, and I swore to never EVER have a cell phone.
What caused my technophobia? Was it rebellion? Snobbery? Ignorance? Nostalgia for some imagined ideal of the ‘good old days’? Or was it just that I didn’t need techno-gadgets?
So much for my principles. In the last week and a half my mobile has glued itself to my hip. Regardless of where I am and what I’m doing, the moment my Nokia sounds its friendly tones I spring to attention. I type texts and I take and make calls on busy streets and in buses- behaviour I used to scorn. The battery in my watch died but I haven’t replaced it. I have worn a watch since the age of nine, but now I just use the clock on my phone.
I haven’t yet decided whether I’ve sold out. Nor have I decided whether it really matters. Any thoughts?
For as long as I can remember I have resisted new technology. As a child I shunned the brand of fantasy and adventure found in video and computer games; I played in real forests and built real forts. As a teenager I listened to vinyls rather than CDs. Though we had a burner, I crafted mix tapes until my old tape deck broke down. I stuck with a 35 mm camera given to my dad for his high school graduation, I said “no thank you” to mp3s, and I swore to never EVER have a cell phone.
What caused my technophobia? Was it rebellion? Snobbery? Ignorance? Nostalgia for some imagined ideal of the ‘good old days’? Or was it just that I didn’t need techno-gadgets?
So much for my principles. In the last week and a half my mobile has glued itself to my hip. Regardless of where I am and what I’m doing, the moment my Nokia sounds its friendly tones I spring to attention. I type texts and I take and make calls on busy streets and in buses- behaviour I used to scorn. The battery in my watch died but I haven’t replaced it. I have worn a watch since the age of nine, but now I just use the clock on my phone.
I haven’t yet decided whether I’ve sold out. Nor have I decided whether it really matters. Any thoughts?
posted by Anonymous at 3:27 pm
3 Comments:
I say go back to no phone! Having said that, I don’t know if I have the bravery to do it myself. I have this love hate relationship with mine. I hate it that I can be contacted when im peacefully listening to music or going for a walk or reading a book. I could just choose to not take it with me… its just that it’s also sooo useful and gives you this incredible social mobility and freedom. This again I love and hate though… I don’t know… keep searching…
I find it somewhat strange with all you people who complain about things like gadgets and complicatet mobile phones and things like that while at the same time doing this paper... Is it so that you can despise the new media even more? Or is it a subconcious wish to be "turned around" so you can start loving it...? ;)
You're right, Julia. This paper isn't meant to be just a celebration of new technology (though it may seem to shade into that at times through the bias of both myself and a good number of the students taking it!) Responding to Reuben's comment, I have been toying with the idea for some time now of setting up a research project whereby participants who are normally heavily dependent on tech such as their cell phones agree to try and live without them for a period of, say, a fortnight and report their experiences in a blog, journal or online focus group (or some-such). But I do not know if such a project could be successful. Would I get willing volunteers (without expensive incentives)? Would they be able to stick it out or cave into their habits after the first 48 painful hours of withdrawal symptoms? And would I get ethics approval for a project that requests people give up a device that has become such a taken-for-granted form of security to help people out when they break down on a rural road or find themselves in an uncomfortable situation with a stranger... is it even ethical anymore to encourage people to ditch the mobile, even though we seemed to function just as well without it only a small number of years ago?
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