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OPINION: Smart phones too smart for me [Times Record News, Wichita Falls, Texas]
[September 21, 2014]

OPINION: Smart phones too smart for me [Times Record News, Wichita Falls, Texas]


(Wichita Falls Times Record News (TX) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Sept. 20--WICHITA FALLS, Texas -- So now we have the iPhone 6. Amazon now also offers a phone, too -- along with just about everybody else.

It seems offering the latest and greatest in phones has become the modern equivalent of the new car models we all awaited with bated breath years ago. What's it going to look like? What's it going to do? Unveiling of the new automobile models was once one of the most anticipated events on television. Now, the unveiling of a new phone model is among the hottest events on the Internet. When the iPhone 6 was introduced, people in the newsroom gathered around monitors like sports editors around the ninth inning of the final game in the World Series.



Pulling myself away from the intentionally-generated hysteria, I ask -- why should I get excited about a new telephone? A quick look at my own (now outdated) phone shows me I can: make phone calls and text. On much rarer occasions I have taken pictures, read and sent email and accessed the Internet. I could do other things, too, as evident by the number of apps on the device. I could watch videos, shop Amazon, trace my ancestry back a few hundred years and check weather radar. It appears I could also play Minecraft, Minion Rush, Talking Cat and Superstar. I don't recall downloading those latter apps, but I do recall handing the phone to the grandkids on occasion. That probably explains it.

Then I asked myself, of all these feats my phone can perform, which do I actually use? Well, I make phone calls. I text. I get photos now and then. The rest? I apparently thought it was wise to get some apps when I did -- but then I discovered I never use them. I seldom get lost between home and work, so the compass app has not been as useful as I though it might. Reading The New York Times on a 4-by-2 inch screen is not as enjoyable as I anticipated. I am not really inclined to be a day trader on my phone and firing my phone like a Glock was fun about three times before the novelty wore off.


I must be the exception because everyone I see these days has his/her face stuck in the phone, so obviously I'm missing out on something. What? Did I not get the text alert on the Ultimate App that transcends all other form of human communications and endeavors? I looked in one of our conference rooms the other day and saw four people sitting around the table pecking at their phones. Is the use of vocal cords passe now? I use my phone to make phone calls. Quaint, I know.

Therefore I will not be among the hordes rushing out to get the iPhone 6 to do things I have no awareness I need to do.

When someone develops a phone and an app that will mow my backyard, text me.

I'll be all over that.

___ (c)2014 Times Record News (Wichita Fallas, Texas) Visit the Times Record News (Wichita Fallas, Texas) at www.timesrecordnews.com Distributed by MCT Information Services

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