#one of the profs keeps criticizing is for using cell phones during breaks when we are away from campus for a week during fucking finals

[chaos-coming]

Ive spent an entire week at a field camp for my grad program and i am so sick of trying to make polite conversations with the rich white european professors who are the absolute embodiment of useless academics and snide european privilege. And the cohort is like okay, but half of them are super young and coming from wealthy privileged families and have very little understanding of how the world works. The other half are a more normal age but theyre a little conservative and really alcoholic and im tired of trying to be nonargumentative about the way they talk about certain things. These are so not my people not the students and not the professors. I dont regret moving to this country but it was not the right decision given the way im finding out this school is. It doesnt align with 90% of what i want from a grad program or place to live and if it hadnt been corona time i would have made different choices

[nickgerlich]

Dumbing Down

I remember when Steve Jobs proudly announced the coming of the iPhone on 9th January 2007. It was the beginning of the mobile revolution, although it had already begun with the Blackberry in 1999, and IBM’s Simon Personal Communicator in 1994. But while those were bold advances in their own right, they still paled compared to iPhone and the many things it could do.

Those early Blackberrys and SPCs were primarily the domain of the business class, meaning that the rest of us were blissfully living in the Stone Age with our dumbphones. Remember multi-tap messaging? Yeah, that was painful.

Today, 97% of Americans own a cell phone, and 85% own a smartphone. In short order the smartphone--first the iPhone, and then the slew of competitors running the Android OS--became not just a means of  communication, but rather a lifestyle device.

Think about it. How do you use your smartphone? GPS and mapping? News, weather, and sports? Games? Music? Photography? Social media? Oh yeah...and let’s not forget talking and texting.

But now there is a small trend afoot in which people are returning to the dumbphone. No kidding. This is not an early Aprils Fool’s joke.

These are admittedly bare bones in terms of features (think talk and text), but they are much cheaper to own and operate. During times of inflation, shedding those two massive expenses can breathe fresh air into a fragile budget.

I won’t criticize anyone for living within their means and purchasing something that is radically downscale. I also cannot find fault in someone who wants to simplify their life and steer clear of all the drama on social media.

But the Digital Marketing prof in me is profoundly worried that, if this were to ever take off, we wouldn’t need too many courses and programs in this field. If many people become voluntary Luddites, it means that a lot of the corporate efforts of the last decade or so will have been for naught.

After all, we’re supposed to be using these handy little devices to be good shoppers, not just talkers and texters. It’s hard to imagine returning to our old ways.

Dumbphones quickly became the domain of those engaged in unsavory dealings, like the drug culture we saw in AMC’s Breaking Bad. Known as “burner phones,” they were inexpensive, and could be used for a short time to make necessary communication, and then broken and tossed. When you have to cover your tracks, that’s the way to go, I suppose.

But with Google searches for dumbphones (including the ones I did for background info here) on the increase, and global sales rapidly approaching the level of smartphone sales, this might be that “come to Jesus” moment we hoped would never happen. If these numbers keep growing, digital business will ultimately suffer.

Dumbphones are the vinyl LPs of the telecom world, but while those LPs have become retro-popular and selling faster than the CDs that once replaced them, they do not carry the same macro-environmental implications as a return to low-tech phones do.

My hunch is that, while there are certainly some people in the western world turning back the tech clock, the bulk of the interest and sales are in less-developed areas with less cellular, and specifically data, coverage. Well, I can hope anyway.

I understand why some people crave the snap, crackle, and pop of needle on vinyl, but willfully returning to the world of basic cell phones is beyond the pale, unless you simply cannot afford it. As I said in my class this morning, our smartphone is probably the most important thing we own. And as one of my students replied, our phones are seldom ever more than one or two meters (he’s from Ireland) away from us. Steve Jobs knew what he was doing, and may very well now be rolling over in his grave.

To those turning back, I bid farewell and offer good tidings as you contemplate your self-exile to the technological desert. Send us an SMS when you have time, as well as the patience to tap out your 160-character-max message. Or would some soup cans and a string be better?

Dr “Not Turning Back“ Gerlich

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