Are smartphones making us anti-social?

B00Mer

Keep Calm and Carry On
Sep 6, 2008
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Rent Free in Your Head
www.getafteritmedia.com
Are smartphones making us anti-social?



Are you guilty of phubbing? It's the habit of snubbing those around you and staring at your smartphone instead of listening to them. CBC’s The Current explores whether smartphones are ruining social interaction or bringing us closer together.

Jason Perlow, a columnist and senior editor for the technology news site ZDNet.com, observes that nowadays, people are often inappropriately fiddling with their phones during business meetings, while out to dinner with other people, or in various social family situations. He notes that teenagers are particularly prone.

“I think that we are learning to essentially disregard life around us,” Perlow told Anna Maria Tremonti, host of The Current. Perlow wrote in a recent column that smartphones are turning society into a “sea of stupid.”

But not everyone agrees. Music and technology writer Bob Lefsetz believes that smartphones are helping us connect with other people. He acknowledged that rude smartphone use is a problem, but he says the pluses of smartphone use far outweigh the minuses.

Meanwhile, David Engber, a columnist with Slate.com, says that while it is natural for parents to worry that smartphones are destroying kids’ social skills, “it’s also something that parents have worried about with every new technology,” from comic books to Walkmans.

source: Are smartphones making us anti-social? - Technology & Science - CBC News

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Smartphones are making us anti-social and stupid..

Renny Gleeson: Our antisocial phone tricks | Video on TED.com
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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Vernon, B.C.
Are smartphones making us anti-social?



Are you guilty of phubbing? It's the habit of snubbing those around you and staring at your smartphone instead of listening to them. CBC’s The Current explores whether smartphones are ruining social interaction or bringing us closer together.

Jason Perlow, a columnist and senior editor for the technology news site ZDNet.com, observes that nowadays, people are often inappropriately fiddling with their phones during business meetings, while out to dinner with other people, or in various social family situations. He notes that teenagers are particularly prone.

“I think that we are learning to essentially disregard life around us,” Perlow told Anna Maria Tremonti, host of The Current. Perlow wrote in a recent column that smartphones are turning society into a “sea of stupid.”

But not everyone agrees. Music and technology writer Bob Lefsetz believes that smartphones are helping us connect with other people. He acknowledged that rude smartphone use is a problem, but he says the pluses of smartphone use far outweigh the minuses.

Meanwhile, David Engber, a columnist with Slate.com, says that while it is natural for parents to worry that smartphones are destroying kids’ social skills, “it’s also something that parents have worried about with every new technology,” from comic books to Walkmans.

source: Are smartphones making us anti-social? - Technology & Science - CBC News

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Smartphones are making us anti-social and stupid..

Renny Gleeson: Our antisocial phone tricks | Video on TED.com

No doubt it can be a sickness just like T.V. or computer or video games. You're living on the fringes of life, instead of DOING. Are people so addicted to talking?
 

IdRatherBeSkiing

Satelitte Radio Addict
May 28, 2007
14,617
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Smartphones now give me something to look at when I no longer desire to listen to the person speaking to me. Before I just had to stare at a potted plant and pretend to listen. Now I have an excuse.
 

MHz

Time Out
Mar 16, 2007
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Red Deer AB
If I have the choice of talking to a friend or talking to the stranger I would choose the friend. Being out of cell range means I would be willing to talk to a stranger more than I would like to not talk to anybody. When I start texting somebody in the same room then it is out of control unless you say something like, 'We should get together for a drink next time we run into each other.'

Perhaps but I still think I can take my iPhone in a fight, so it all evens out.
So bigger is better??
How would you make out if it was who pushes who's buttons more? You probably lose points if yoy talk to your phone like it was a person.
 

petros

The Central Scrutinizer
Nov 21, 2008
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Low Earth Orbit
"You've reached 306 569 xxxx. there is no-one available to take your call at this time, please leave your name and number and maybe I'll get back to you."
 

DaSleeper

Trolling Hypocrites
May 27, 2007
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Northern Ontario,
I now consider my IPhone a need, not a luxury or a toy.
Besides using it as a phone...In the last month.....I have used it

To receive and pay bills......Most of my bills are emailed to me in PDF format...and I pay them from my phone or PC

Balance my check-book .....There is an app for that

Use the "Level" app to hang a couple of picture frames on the wall

Monitor security cameras in my house when I was away a few weeks ago

Find different stores in Mississauga while I was there

Find my car In different mall and store parking lots while I was there

Several more thing if I took the time to think about it, but one thing that could have saved me a fine, if I had been stopped by the police on my trip to Toronto was......
My car/House Insurance renewal was last month, and as I was driving through Sudbury, I realised that I had forgotten to put my Insurance certificate in my car before leaving....so in order to have a worry free week down south, I just called my Insurance agent and she emailed me a pdf copy of the certificate, which I printed out when I got to my daughter's place in Mississauga.....
I'm still wondering if the police would have accepted the copy on my IPhone if I had been stopped along the way?.............
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
75,301
547
113
Vernon, B.C.
I now consider my IPhone a need, not a luxury or a toy.
Besides using it as a phone...In the last month.....I have used it

To receive and pay bills......Most of my bills are emailed to me in PDF format...and I pay them from my phone or PC

Balance my check-book .....There is an app for that

Use the "Level" app to hang a couple of picture frames on the wall

Monitor security cameras in my house when I was away a few weeks ago

Find different stores in Mississauga while I was there

Find my car In different mall and store parking lots while I was there

Several more thing if I took the time to think about it, but one thing that could have saved me a fine, if I had been stopped by the police on my trip to Toronto was......
My car/House Insurance renewal was last month, and as I was driving through Sudbury, I realised that I had forgotten to put my Insurance certificate in my car before leaving....so in order to have a worry free week down south, I just called my Insurance agent and she emailed me a pdf copy of the certificate, which I printed out when I got to my daughter's place in Mississauga.....
I'm still wondering if the police would have accepted the copy on my IPhone if I had been stopped along the way?.............

In another couple of generations man will be born without brain cells..................what you don't use you lose! -:)
 

DaSleeper

Trolling Hypocrites
May 27, 2007
33,676
1,665
113
Northern Ontario,
In another couple of generations man will be born without brain cells..................what you don't use you lose! -:)
That phone to me is a tool, like any other tool..
Do tell me that you never use Email, calculator or any electronic device huh?
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
75,301
547
113
Vernon, B.C.
That phone to me is a tool, like any other tool..
Do tell me that you never use Email, calculator or any electronic device huh?

Just a little "tongue in cheek" there DaSleeper, but all kidding aside we are all getting a little less dependent on our brain cells and over time it will take it's toll.
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
75,301
547
113
Vernon, B.C.
That phone to me is a tool, like any other tool..
Do tell me that you never use Email, calculator or any electronic device huh?

Of course we are all using "tools" that save us both physical and mental labour, speaking for myself I try to do things to offset some of this. But at the rate we are going we are going to be 97 lb. weaklings with no brains! -:) We will possibly end up being a monstrosity of fingers and thumbs.
 

DaSleeper

Trolling Hypocrites
May 27, 2007
33,676
1,665
113
Northern Ontario,
Use the Abacus. Old ways =best ways....
The clerk in the Paper mill where I worked used one, and until 1990 when he retired, you couldn't beat him with a simple calculator.

Of course we are all using "tools" that save us both physical and mental labour, speaking for myself I try to do things to offset some of this. But at the rate we are going we are going to be 97 lb. weaklings with no brains! -:) We will possibly end up being a monstrosity of fingers and thumbs.
You can come and shovel my driveway anytime this winter and save me using the snowblower-:smile: