The smartphone didn’t ruin those things. Capitalism did.
I have a smart phone with a custom ROM, and a dumb phone (Sunbeam Mobile). No, I am not a drug dealer. Sometimes I change out my SIM card and will use the smart phone (especially if traveling to another state or country), and because it can make my life easier.
Here are some rambling thoughts I have on the topic:
-If you don’t want to have a smart phone, and opt for a dumb phone, you need to be careful not to let your PC “replace” your bad smart phone habits in terms of scrolling, etc.
-People are isolated and need a way to build and maintain communities. These days, it is difficult to walk places and build community in the physical world. So that is why you have people getting together on Discord, Instagram, etc. I have definitely been isolated or lived in rural areas and having these outlets has been more helpful than harmful for me.
-If you want a dumb phone, I do recommend a Sunbeam Mobile phone. It supports group texting, navigation (with HERE Maps). I have an SD card full of music I put in the phone and it supports Bluetooth. I recommend the models of phones that are completely de-Googled.
-I don’t think people should feel bad if they need a smart phone, especially if they are living in circumstances beyond their control which puts them in an isolating position.
-I think that ultimately people need to want to wake up to all of this. I want to be more involved in making my life more community oriented. I do live in a city, but it is very car dependent. I think that we need to push for development and policies that support community building over the long term, because most people are not happy having smart phones a fixture of everything. For example, is creepy to me that in any moment of time, I can guess what most people are doing (and that is that they are sitting on the Internet in some capacity or a smart phone).
-I hate Google and Amazon. Any way that I do not support them and boycott them is a win for me and society.
-I find it interesting that whenever I am using my Sunbeam phone, that younger people will come up to me and start asking about it. People are desperate to escape smart phones, but there are so many macro political and macro economical problems that create the situation we are in now. We see ourselves as so atomized that there is no examples of any organization or collective rejection of this crap.
Here is a great blog post, which I highly recommend reading: https://wrongthink.link/posts/re-life-in-dysfunctional-world/
Amateur photography has gotten pretty darned good.
Anonymous does have valid points. The devices and internet all released with the governments blessing, for tracking and spying.
I like having maps and gps with me
Dumb phones had that too (and cameras, and internet). I was using GPS on my Motorola Razr back in 2004.
Dumbphones have had a lot of the functionality we now use with smartphones. It’s a vague distinction anyway
Ruines photogrpahy ?
Rhien II sold for $4.5 Million in 2011
I’d suggest that ruined photography.
That really is an unimpressive photo. Most of the photos on that list are terrible.
“There’s something so human about taking something great and ruining it a little so that you can have more of it”
Yeah definitely the smartphone is why I still don’t have a girlfriend yup yup
Dating sites with the usual business model of pay-to-play have an incentive to sabotage long term relationships by not showing the most compatible people to each other.
Proved the underpaid math teacher wrong when they said we wouldn’t always have a calculator in our pocket.
Yeah, none of that is the phone’s fault. That is like blaming fast food for being a fat ass.
There is a legitimate comparison there. There’s shared culpability. Sure, you’re responsible for what you eat. But those fast food companies hire teams of nutritionists, psychologists, and sociologists, people with PhDs in their fields, and task them with developing the most addictive foods they can. It’s no different than cigarettes. Sure we’re ultimately responsible for our actions. But it does end up feeling a bit like victim blaming.
I understand the position and the line of thought that leads to the victim blaming idea, but ultimately there is not a “victim”. It is not being forced upon the “victim”. While it is entirely true the playing field is violently unfair, it is still a choice to participate.
This is why regulation is a good thing. Level the playing field and make it safer for those that choose to partake…but it is ultimately personal accountability, unfortunately.
Yeah it is totally the phone’s fault that this person is unable to date other people, that is their biggest problem with smartphones, not the Internet.
GPS, music, and I disagree about the camera. I’d love a dumb phone that could do GPS music and a camera and nothing else besides text and calls.
And authenticators, password managers.
The flashlight to.
The flashlight to where?
Ehh… I hate anal-locked phones. They are turing machines. They are mathematically proven to be as capable as any other turing machines.
anal-locked
new kind of biometrics?
Insert authentication dildo to continue.
Or anal-guarded. Yes. Translation of анально-огороженные.
Is this how Russians call the iPhone gay?
Ruined pointless but enjoyable arguments with mates in the pub. In the old days you could get a good 15 minutes of entertainment out of ‘Was it Matt Damon or Mark Wahlberg in that Three Kings movie?’
Now some asshat with a phone will kill that argument in 5 seconds.
The Guinness Book of World Records was created to do just that, settle pub arguments.
Yeah, but up to the point where you could have it on your phone, no-one took a copy of the Guinness book of records to the pub with them.
There’s plenty of pub topics Google can’t kill. For example Would you rather have hands made of chocolate cake or an armpit that squirts cream?
That’s a complete no-starter though. Cream squirting armpits every day of the week. After all, I’d have usable hands to be able to harvest the free cream, therefore profit. Whereas hands made of chocolate cake wouldn’t be very usable and once they’d been eaten (and with my wife and daughter around they soon would be) I’m just left with the stumps. You’ve not thought this through. So. Armpits that squirt cream. Definitively.
Yeah we need more info? Do the cake hands regenerate because if so you’re basically deadpool at that point
They ruined clubs, too. The flip phone cameras were shitty enough to make it a non-issue.
How does everyone everywhere having a really decent camera ruin photography? One of the things we had to do in photography class was use a disposable to take well composed shots (but also we developed the film ourselves). A phone camera would make those look way better.
Photographic art is drowned in a world of snapshots. That which we obtain too cheaply we esteem too lightly. Of course, there are a lot of awesome upsides and people can still do photography as a hobby, but there’s a real “you can’t go home again” feeling. You probably would have had to been into the hobby prior to the smartphone to appreciate the loss.
What do you mean “is there anything good about smartphones at all”? It made a ton of money for Apple and its shareholders, that’s the only thing that matters. Who cares that it caused anxiety in a whole generation and ruined social life?
Ruined photography?
Professionals or hobbyists can still use a proper camera but the old maxim “sometimes the best camera is the one you have with you” often applies and cellphones do fairly well in that regard
And some phones have some excellent cameras. I’ve taken some pretty decent shots with my phone camera, like this one of a squirrel eating pizza. Without carrying around a camera literally all the time, I never would have caught that shot.
Same with many of the abuses that we’ve seen caught on camera recently. There are some problems with videos that lack context, but authorities can’t just act with impunity in their face and expect to not have a camera in their face.
I think is more about how the smartphone and apps like instagram uses a bunch of filters and things like that.
That part I can agree with. Plus the “AI editing” bullshit.
The auto editing bullshit that you don’t even know that is active
I hate that people have taken to filming/taking pictures vertically
We were so close to everyone knowing not to do that
They changed literally to mean figuratively because the internet wouldn’t stop doing it.
This timeline is fucked in so many ways.
Yeah. I am a new-ish hobby photographer and at the moment I have a 50mm lens for my Canon R10 (I will buy a bigger lens soon). The camera with its current lens doesn’t zoom well but my smartphone could sometimes take a better photo zoomed in depending on how I play with the settings, angle and lighting.
