automated society

[jim]

I still use my map reading skills - predominately 24k topo maps. Finding a spring can drop the water temp several degrees in the vicinity of it, and be the difference between catching fish and going home empty handed. I can plot a bearing with a compass, sight an object, know the declination of the area I am in (a little more than 3 degrees West where I live and almost 0 where I fish), but I still turn down the wrong street going home about 5% of the time.

[ghostrunner]

Reading a map isn't hard, it's cumbersome. That's why the map apps are so good. You can take one "map" with you everywhere, you can find another route quickly if needed, and you're not sitting there with a big piece of paper in front of you. I don't even use turn by turn most of the time.

This is kind of a silly argument because the damn things are just plain useful. But here's the big list of what I use a phone for.

Store phone numbers
Find maps
Take notes
Grocery list
Read email
Order stuff on Amazon or elsewhere
Deposit checks
Pay bills
Reminders
Check the weather
Store and play music
Alarm clock
Scan expense receipts for work
Store and take pictures
Browse the internet
Store recipes
Text
Phone
Compass
Enable/disable my house alarm
Pay for coffee
Flashlight
Watch baseball
Games
Remote control for Xbox and AppleTV

That doesn't even include a bunch of stuff I do for work. Talking on the phone is probably not even in the top 10 things I use it for. Initially I balked at the cost when they came out, but having had one for a couple years, I'm convinced it's saved me both time and money. There's a number of tools, books, and appliances potentially being replaced there, to say nothing of paper. It occurred to me a couple years ago that smartphones made a lot of Father's Day presents obsolete.

[Socnorb11]

There are a number of tools, books and appliances "potentially" being replaced there ghost, but how many of those things have you ACTUALLY replaced?

[jim]

Ghost ... slooooowwwwwly put the phone down, and walk away. It's ok. You will survive.

[planet planet]

I don't have much to contribute and certainly not to add to ghost's list, but I wanted to come down on the side of the technophiles over the luddites.

[ghostrunner]

The point is - this is all stuff either I have to do or want to do, and I did it before using a lot of different things. Now I do it using one thing. I suppose it might look like people are tied to their phones, but it's just reducing the number of things they're tied to or places they have to go.

[Fat_Bulldog]

The point is - this is all stuff either I have to do or want to do, and I did it before using a lot of different things. Now I do it using one thing. I suppose it might look like people are tied to their phones, but it's just reducing the number of things they're tied to or places they have to go.

If you're in my walking path with your head buried in your phone, I'm going to take you out.

[ghostrunner]

The point is - this is all stuff either I have to do or want to do, and I did it before using a lot of different things. Now I do it using one thing. I suppose it might look like people are tied to their phones, but it's just reducing the number of things they're tied to or places they have to go.

If you're in my walking path with your head buried in your phone, I'm going to take you out.

Fair enough.

[jim]

I love the argument that "I can do X on my gizmo" when X is only really expected/required because of the gizmo. I remember the days when I wasn't expected to have seen some email that was sent out by my boss at 8pm before I ever opened up my email the next morning. Those days are gone. I regularly check my email at 9:30-10 just to avoid getting the evil look the next morning. But thank GOD I have my phone to be able to check that now! Now, if I'm out to dinner with my wife, I can check my email. Or even better, while I'm driving!

“Cell phones have changed us from a nation of self-reliant pioneer types into a bunch of men standing alone in supermarkets saying, ‘Okay, I’m in the tampon aisle, but I don’t see it.’”

[jim]

The point is - this is all stuff either I have to do or want to do, and I did it before using a lot of different things. Now I do it using one thing. I suppose it might look like people are tied to their phones, but it's just reducing the number of things they're tied to or places they have to go.

If you're in my walking path with your head buried in your phone, I'm going to take you out.

Also, if you are at a stoplight fooling with it and not paying attention when the light turns green, or if you stop 100 feet before the freaking line because you are distracted, you are going to get cut off. I am going to pass you aggressively and try to scare the [expletive] thing right out of your hand. It's about the only thing I road rage over. Man I hate people dicking around with those things in the car.