Being around our Ian for any length of time, you realise how important his smartphone is to him. It is like an extension of his being.
Let me tell you some of the things I witnessed this past weekend. He used the smartphone as an oven timer. He used it to take and send photographs. He used it to listen to music. He used it to pay for the parking of my car - The Clintmobile. He used it for online banking purposes and to check the weather. He used it to book and pay for theatre tickets. He used it as a spirit level. He used it to order a taxi. And would you believe it - he even used it as a telephone!
As I said on Monday, he has an electric Mini Cooper and as it will only cover 120 miles on a single charge, he needs to locate and use charging points quite regularly. The smartphone points him to where there are available charging points - not just their locations but whether or not other people are currently using them. Of course, he also uses the smartphone to pay for these charging sessions.
He is so adept with the phone, so comfortable with it and the services it can provide to facilitate and lubricate a busy modern life. In contrast, I have never possessed any sort of mobile phone and for example I have never sent a single text message in my life. If I go out into the world, I am happily uncontactable - be it on a country walk or a car journey. If I go to the supermarket, Shirley cannot phone me up and tell me to get the soap powder or toilet rolls she forgot to mention.
In this sense, Ian and I are worlds apart. I have just never felt a pressing need for a smartphone and think to myself - well I have got this far in my life without one, why bother now? I notice how obsessed millions of other people are with them. They are checking them all the time - no doubt looking at Facebook, Instagram or other social media. To me it all seems so alien and I just wouldn't wish to be hooked like that.
Nonetheless I recognise that for Ian and millions of other users, the smartphone is a vital tool both socially and for work purposes. If I felt I needed one then I would get one though I would have a lot to learn and I rather fear that my frankfurter fingers would be too big for the slippery touchscreen.
Increasingly, I notice that businesses and even governmental organisations will often assume that everybody is in possession of a smartphone. That wrong assumption will sometimes hinder or obstruct those of us who don't have them. It's a kind of discrimination born out of ignorance and it can be pretty infuriating.
from Yorkshire Pudding https://ift.tt/3FMrMcj
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