Not bad, getting famed novelist Jonathan Franzen to write your book review! Sherry does noble work and it deserves wide recognition and readership.
I can't say I am hopeful, but I do hope that society's current preoccupation with mobile devices will start to get old, and after a few years people will begin to realize how negatively they're affecting everyday life and interpersonal interactions. Perhaps it will become "cool" to not have a device, or, it will be societally uncool to use it during meals or at restaurants, like cigarettes have become. I kind of hope that the smartphone market splits soon into two camps, one the same old machines that Apple/Samsung etc pump out, and another camp of slightly less smart, less feature-rich phones, fewer apps, designed to be used occasionally not every damn second of the day... phones that are more about infrequent checks on status and more about making calls and occasional text conversations. Devices that start giving your life back to you. I know, dream on. But as the smartphone owner population gets demographically older, I suspect you will start seeing something like this happen.
It would be interesting to design a user interface that was easy to use, but was designed in such a way to dissuade you from constant use. Perhaps it might reward you the less you used it.
I doubt it will happen, if human beings were such rational creatures, we would have all quit watching TV and playing video games (I have, but I'm sure I'm the minority, and I think the ratio of people who end up using those vintage phones you mention will be much lower than those who don't watch TV, because of network effect). I have seen plenty of super addictive technologies die off if the value it provides is pure entertainment, but I have never seen any technology that provides clear benefit go away just because it has side effects--people who realize the side effect and want to do something about it will find a way to discipline themselves, but most people are not disciplined enough to be able to do that.
> Matthew Crawford, in “The World Beyond Your Head,” contrasts the world of a “peon” airport lounge — saturated in advertising, filled with mesmerizing screens — with the quiet, ad-free world of a business lounge: “To engage in playful, inventive thinking, and possibly create wealth for oneself during those idle hours spent at an airport, requires silence. But other people’s minds, over in the peon lounge (or at the bus stop), can be treated as a resource — a standing reserve of purchasing power.”
This is a perfect example of the problem with advertising. It's not that people don't want to know about products, it's that people need to be able to learn about products on their own terms. When you're constantly shoving products in people's faces, you're detracting from all kinds of other pursuits. Advertising is possibly the greatest sink of time and energy in our generation. And what's worse it that the people who are perpetrating this crime on us know that it's a waste of time and energy, which is why they avoid it in their airport lounges.
I just had 4 flights over 2 days, and noticed something odd. I've noticed it before, but it really bugged me these trips. Someone reads off 'friendly' announcements trying to get us to sign up for credit card offers - get free skymiles, free bag checks, etc. Sign up today! The sales pitch went on for almost 4 minutes on one flight. It was a 30 minute flight, so > 10% of the flight was advertising. What bugged me most was that this was, AFAICT, the CAPTAIN - the person flying the plane - pitching credit cards WHILE WE ARE FLYING. I have to take my shoes and belt off (sometimes), can't bring liquids in, have to turn off electronic devices - all for purported safety reasons - but someone who is FLYING A PLANE can take several minutes to pitch a credit card. It's sickening. I do think that the first class passengers aren't excluded from these pitches tho - they're going to hear some of it anyway, regardless of where you sit.
I'd really like an airline which didn't constantly pitch stuff at me while I'm flying. I guess it's called "buy your own plane and fly yourself"...
Once the plane is in the air a lot of the controls are automated. Also, even if it was the captain of the flight, they have a co-pilot.
Still annoying, I vaguely recall something similar on my last Delta flights, but I'm pretty sure those were by the flight crew and a follow-up to the safety briefing.
It has been a while since I flew SouthWest, but I seem to remember them not having in-flight ads. They also have the best in-flight beer selection of anyone I've flown with. Sadly they're domestic only and most of my flights these days are international.
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[ 4.7 ms ] story [ 29.3 ms ] threadI can't say I am hopeful, but I do hope that society's current preoccupation with mobile devices will start to get old, and after a few years people will begin to realize how negatively they're affecting everyday life and interpersonal interactions. Perhaps it will become "cool" to not have a device, or, it will be societally uncool to use it during meals or at restaurants, like cigarettes have become. I kind of hope that the smartphone market splits soon into two camps, one the same old machines that Apple/Samsung etc pump out, and another camp of slightly less smart, less feature-rich phones, fewer apps, designed to be used occasionally not every damn second of the day... phones that are more about infrequent checks on status and more about making calls and occasional text conversations. Devices that start giving your life back to you. I know, dream on. But as the smartphone owner population gets demographically older, I suspect you will start seeing something like this happen.
It would be interesting to design a user interface that was easy to use, but was designed in such a way to dissuade you from constant use. Perhaps it might reward you the less you used it.
This is a perfect example of the problem with advertising. It's not that people don't want to know about products, it's that people need to be able to learn about products on their own terms. When you're constantly shoving products in people's faces, you're detracting from all kinds of other pursuits. Advertising is possibly the greatest sink of time and energy in our generation. And what's worse it that the people who are perpetrating this crime on us know that it's a waste of time and energy, which is why they avoid it in their airport lounges.
I'd really like an airline which didn't constantly pitch stuff at me while I'm flying. I guess it's called "buy your own plane and fly yourself"...
Still annoying, I vaguely recall something similar on my last Delta flights, but I'm pretty sure those were by the flight crew and a follow-up to the safety briefing.
Forget Turkle, what on earth is the Belrusian perspective?