COLUMN: Broken phones, broken dreams
In June I was lucky to score an expensive smartphone for free. Now I want to run it over with my car.
My texts don't send, I have to flick my touch screen to get it to work and Words with Friends isn't nearly as fun as everybody made it out to be.
The phone before the one I have now was a dumb phone. It had the computing power of a cat. It could make calls. It sent texts. I was happy.
The blazin' fast 4G internet that I pay extra for each month is so slow, I could walk to the library and use one of those computers faster than it takes a page to load on my phone. I thought it would be good to check my email on the go. It didn't take very long to realize that even if I really did want to check my email on the go, it would be quicker to build a time machine, travel to the past, and connect via dial up. Yes, I do understand that makes no sense.
I don't even know what half the settings on this thing do. I'm afraid that if I touch anything, the nuclear reactor inside will melt down. I don't want to be responsible for that.
It could just be my service provider, but I didn't have nearly as many problems with my old phone. I used to get great reception in my basement with my old phone. Now I have to catapult to space and touch the satellite with the tip of my phone if I want to be able to make out anything the person on the other line is saying.
That's why I think technology for technology's sake is bad. I got sucked in because I thought smartphones sounded great, and now I'm realizing I'd rather just have a phone with a cord.
The more I break it down, the more I realize I'm paying for nothing. I have the luxury of looking something up on Wikipedia while I'm in class instead of having to remember to do it when I get home. But if I get home and forget about it, it probably wasn't all that important anyway.
Some people are in love with their gadgets. I don't get that. I guess when you spend that much money on anything it's hard not to be in love with it, but it makes me wonder about the point of spending thousands of dollars on something so you can connect to the internet while you're kayaking.
