Mobile Phones; Necessity or Nuisance
Here in my hands lay the revolutionary device, a
notion pushed into actuality by a Motorola employee named Martin ‘Marty’ Cooper
(Doesn’t he just put you in the mind of Doc from the back to the future
franchise, it’s the lush grey beard I’m almost sure). So after Mr. Alexander
Graham Bell made the telephone somebody out there, maybe a fretful husband
moaned about how he wished he could call his wife because he forgot what was on
the grocery list and boom the idea was released into the universe all that was
left was to deliver. The first public
telephone call placed on a portable cellular phone was in April 3, 1973 by Mr.
Cooper himself. (Let me go on Instagram real quick I’m posting it for throwback
Tuesday).My inner fretful
husband just wants to thank Mr. Cooper for upping my survival state. To you and
your team of engineers much thanks. Millennials I’m sure you share the same
sentiment.
Fast forward to the future and the talk of the town
now is whether it is needed or not. The battle between swift and efficient
communication versus imposed physical isolation, GPS versus lack of privacy,
the power of knowledge at our finger tips versus the lackadaisical attitude nurtured,
attention to details on the screen of our phones versus conversations at dinner
and family time. Oooh and if my mother ever starts up on radiation we might as
well call this discussion a wrap. Haruki Murakami a popular
contemporary Japanese writer and translator said “Cell phones are so convenient
that they're an inconvenience.” But this is the guarantee
with all technology. They all have drawbacks. Every year, from rudimentary
telephones such as the candlestick and the rotary phone, to the first coin
operated telephone, to push button phones and now to touch screen phones, engineers
and inventors have tried to perfect it all but soon realized that with every improvement
there was a new negative to fight.
And that is simply what mobile phones are, an
advantage with a disadvantage all in a slim package with sleek designs and
powerful cameras, the opportunity to reply to my emails in real time, study my
slides for my assignments on the go, shop and pay my bills online with the experience
of dry
or irritable eyes, blurred vision, eye fatigue, or head, neck and back pain.With this in mind and our inventors hard at work on
how to go green for the next release or how to get rid of said itchy eyes
whilst battling the accelerating change in technology, our mission should you
choose to accept it (judge away just know that there is a mission impossible
soundtrack playing in the background) is to find means and methods to negate
the thought and proof that mobile phones are a nuisance. So we make sure that
we are not on our phones all day, we do eye exercises once we slip them in our
pockets and bags, we schedule time for our friends and family and live in the
moment. We stave of those high levels of anxiety, stress and dissatisfaction
with our lives by realizing that our mobile phones with all its wonders are not
the ‘be -all end- all’. It is simply a device we use within our lives so eat,
sleep, exercise and laugh when your mom calls you on your phone to meet her in
the living room for quality time. For mobile phones are what you make them.
signed: Chicky xoxo