Strange opinion: I think Smartphones are a bad invention.

[SigSauerLover]

Yes, I know, this may confuse some people, but let me explain. First of all, I do love the internet, it's absolutely lovely in most regards, but here's the thing.....I think it should be a service used in the home. I invited my son to come over, and the whole time, I kid you not, he's got his fingers tapping away and his face buried in the screen of his android phone. Everywhere I go, I see kids, and adults, tapping away at these things. I think it's rude to be honest with you. Visiting a REAL PERSON than speaking to someone in the fantasy land. All the kids these days, tapping away at some screen. For pretty much the WHOLE DAY. I don't mind flip phones, or things like that. I understand the importance of receiving phone calls, but yeesh, can't your tweets wait until you get home? I've heard arguments like "It's a gateway of knowledge anywhere". Can't you just go to a freakin' library? And why do you need 900 different social media apps? Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Kik, come on, why the need for so many? To talk to more friends? Sorry, but I can't consider anyone met over the internet to be a friend, and it makes me CRINGE when I hear younger people, or worse yet, older people, refer to anyone as a friend. Or worse yet, date them without meeting them in person first. I don't know man, it just sounds ridiculous to me.

In closing, I think the internet should have STAYED HOME.

[Vexer6]

I don't think they're bad at all, my sister's old smartphone i'm using as an internet hotspot, which is extremely since I get unlimited bandwidth usage. It also comes in handy for looking up walkthroughs while i'm playing a game.

I don't get people who spend all their time tapping away on one though, mainly because I always find typing on those things to be incredibly awkward, and looking at internet sites on smartphones is definitely no substitute for looking at them on a regular PC. I don't necessarily think people using these things like that is "rude" though if say everyone else in the same room is using them, i'd say it's only rude if say you do it during a movie/play while everyone else is being quiet.

Not everyone lives near a library(and there are many libraries which just don't have the information people need, trying to find the right book is like looking for a needle in a haystack, so I don't blame people one bit for not wanting to deal with that mess) and smartphones are just far more convenient for doing research for say school projects and the like.

People like to stay connected, so i'm not all surprised by all those apps, I personally don't see the big deal. Sounds like you just need to get with the times

I don't think there's anything at all wrong with having online friends, all of my high school classmates live far away from where I am, so getting in touch with them isn't really possible, so yeah I call people I know online friends, and I wouldn't be so judgemental of others that do the same thing, I don't see anything cringe worthy about that at all.

Also it's not like people burying their face in electronics is a new trend, before smartphones, it was happening with Blackberry devices, and before that it was flip-phones. So I think it's silly to call smartphones a "bad" invention just cause you don't like how certain people behave with them.

Even before Smartphones the internet never "stayed home" as you still had portable laptops and internet cafes with Wi-Fi.

I think it's asinine to not consider someone a friend just cause you met them over the internet, that just makes no sense at all to me, and many people have met amazing people online and got married to them, not everyone wants to awkwardly try to talk to people in bars or other such places without knowing anything about them.

[Rev]

I can definitely understand some of your concerns. It seems like we're getting to a period where everyone has to be "connected" at all times or they feel lost. Smartphones have almost become more important than food and water to a lot of people and i don't think it is silly to necessarily be a bit worried/peeved about it. I was raised to always give my full attention to someone when we talked. If I was reading a book, I stopped. If I was playing a game, I paused. Smartphones have almost become an escape for a lot of people and it seems like proper manners have kind of fallen to the wayside. I really think changes in parenting style and the rise of parents too busy to take an active part in their families have been a bigger influence on bad manners more than actual smartphones. I think smartphones just make it easier to ignore what everyone else is doing. Depending on how someone is raised that person can still drop what they're doing and pay attention but it's becoming less and less.

Still, the internet allows people to connect in ways never really seen before. I don't think it's fair to say that online relationships can't work (however I would never really consider myself in a relationship with someone without actually meeting them first). I agree, that I never really consider people that don't have an active offline relationship with as "friends" though. Maybe acquaintances but not really friends.

[Hardcore Sadism]

As a whole the internet hasn't really matured to its fullest extent, so there's understandable doubt that it's counter-intuitive to socialization. Pop Culture will have you think we are 'truly connected', that's the media spouting the future instead of now. Think of outside the United States where in most countries, 80 Megabytes-Per-Second is still a pipe dream waiting to happen.

Smartphones weren't the only cause of doubt, cell phones or portable communications technologies in general had grafted some kind of doubt about our future of socialization. Ever since the Motorola StarTAC shifted the paradigm in portable phones, people have sorely underestimated *and* feared the ability to easily send text via T9. The advent of Bluetooth and Hands-Free brought misconceptions about ones ego or psychological state. Laptops implied that Desktops will no longer be relevant, and Tablets were (and still) thought to be the mere end of the basic folding laptops... That part is analyst doom and gloom though. The internet in general scares people for both valid and overblown reasons, therefor make these devices intimidating themselves.

You can actually own a basic phone with free messaging services, like Whatsapp. Try it with your kids.

Kids have self control issues, it's pretty much tempered out of them with incentive parenting. Even if you're twenty-five your attention span isn't entirely matured and you won't experience a true shift in emotional attachment until your thirties. Some would say our materialistic urges are part of a more 'genetic youth' rather than a complete fallout of negative influences.

[zetax]

Also it's not like people burying their face in electronics is a new trend, before smartphones, it was happening with Blackberry devices, and before that it was flip-phones.

Um...sorry to break it to you, but those are all relatively new. Just because you don't remember a world before them doesn't mean it didn't exist. It was a place gloriously free of chirps and bloops and rings and little water drop noises coming from everyone's pockets every 5 seconds. The tech isn't the problem, the way (far too many) people use it is.

[scotland]

Just because you don't remember a world before them doesn't mean it didn't exist. It was a place gloriously free of chirps and bloops and rings and little water drop noises coming from everyone's pockets every 5 seconds. The tech isn't the problem, the way (far too many) people use it is.

Millenials, meet Gen X, Gen Xers, meet the Millenials.

The issues are compounded by age (there are no young Gen Xers, and no old Millenials), but the differences in these two generations do seem pretty large. The 'Get off my lawn' of the aging baby boomers is being replaced by "put that d@#= cellphone away and talk with us" of the Gen Xers. Some day the Millenials will bemoan the next generation (Gen Z?) to take off the wearable virtual reality contact lenses and engage in this reality.

Every generation shakes their heads at 'kids these days'.

[Vexer6]

ZetaX- sorry to break it to you, but Blackberries have been around for a long time(since 1999) so I wouldn't call this sort of device "relatively new".

I don't think manners have fallen by the wayside necessarily and I don't think technology makes a person inherently more rude, I think if a person is ignoring you and using their phone, then smartphones not being invented wouldn't make a difference, that person would just find another way to ignore you.

[zetax]

ZetaX- sorry to break it to you, but Blackberries have been around for a long time(since 1999) so I wouldn't call this sort of device "relatively new".

Sixteen years wasn't that wasn't that long ago...unless you're a child.

I don't think manners have fallen by the wayside necessarily and I don't think technology makes a person inherently more rude...

No, quoting back part of post (sorry to break it to ME?) and dismissing, point-by-point, everything opinion that someone else posts...that proves that you are rude. But you've been called-out on that before, didn't seem to phase you.

I'm sure I'll get a rude response to this post as well. Parts of it will be in double-quotes, too. Just guessing.

[Tina]

I agree with the op and yes it is generational, my twenty something nieces are all addicted to the smartphone. They would rather pay what amounts to a car payment towards a phone plan than have a actual car, it blows my mind.
And manners have gone out the window completely, have you ever been in a public restroom and heard the person in the next stall talk, thinking are they talking to me, no of course not, they are talking on the phone while going to the bathroom, honestly it is pathetic.

[LoganRuckman]

I think the statement that people you meet online can not be friends is ridiculous. Some of the people I've met online through YouTube, forums, etc, I've known longer and consider closer than some of my IRL friends.