For Tech's Sake

As I look around the sprawling city centre and casually observe those within there is a dawning realisation of just how far I have become detached from the everyday world in which we live but also that which until relatively recently I was a part.  Every direction I look there are people intently staring at phone and tablet screens, people making and receiving calls from wherever they happen to be.  I remember many years ago thinking that being contactable by phone anywhere and at any time by anyone who happened to have your phone number was both detestable as a lifestyle and a ludicrous expectation in society.  There was a time when a telephone was something which was connected by wires to the inside of a building.  It was generally accepted that if you did not answer the phone, you were probably not at home, and to be out was the same as being busy.

I see people happily handing over large sums of money to either be the same as everyone else or for some trinket or other which makes them feel somehow superior to their peers.  I really don’t want this to sound like a capitalist rant – I am after all clothed either from well-known high street outlets or in recognised “labels” which, whether we like it or not, occasionally attract comments or draw attention.  I am not motivated by the desire to have money; I am not a greedy person.  Generally I will not replace something until it has become defunct and I do not desire things that have no use or place in my life.  I am not an “iJunkie” – the type of person who feels the need to have the latest mobile phone just because it is the new model even though it does precious little different to the suddenly apparently obsolete model, which in turn was already capable of many things it really didn’t need to do to be a phone.  We have become mentally lazy, allowing technology to drive our lives instead of merely empowering us.  I wonder how many of the many thousands of people around me right now could even read a map, let alone navigate by one without declaring “I used to just press a button on my phone and it would do it all for me!”.

Maybe I am just old fashioned and of a generation that appreciates traditional skills in this throw-away society; I have read and enjoyed eBooks, and I can see how they could be advantageous given a very specific set of circumstances, but I prefer “analogue” books – old fashioned printed pages, and will gladly put up with the lack of built in technology.  It seems I am not alone in this thought as I note that a leading chain of bookshops will no longer be selling the most popular brand (or indeed any brand) of electronic reading devices.  It very much appears that they are not profitable or popular enough to justify the sales effort.  It speaks volumes (pun fully intended) that a device capable of electronically storing thousands of books is being removed from the shelves in favour of the thousands of printed books it was designed to replace.  I am sure there is a name for this phenomena, and if there isn’t then there certainly should be!