Dear Client, Thank you for expressing your existential concern about mobile phones and their impact more widely. I would like to point out that at least half of the responsibility for the situation falls upon you, as both the consumer and also the producer of data and services. Whether you suggest a phone is a perfect untiring assistant or a digital vampire is entirely subjective. For example, in the case of social media, you have both liked and been liked, or sinned and sinned against, as you may prefer. You may have obsessed about and held your idols in your hands, but they cannot be held to account for not loving you back in turn. It was you who sought to develop a thought by requesting comments. No point in blaming your telephone: it was you, after all, that took the naked picture of your lover that your child came across in your handset, showed to your partner, that exploded your marital crisis. You may have an immaculate collection of photos available in the electronic ether, and a perfect picture you paint of yourself and those close to you, but regrettably any blame for narcissism, vanity, hyperactivity, loneliness, mental illness and a descent into two dimensions is entirely yours. After, all in-person interactions full of friction have now become online and frictionless, and difficulties in translation are no more. In this age of technological promiscuity, everyone can have their own avatar, custom their perfect sex doll partner who whispers only sweet nothings, and live in magic fun space non-stop. Leisure and work can perfectly blur together. Indeed you can celebrate the lively interactions with your phone as it becomes your high-maintenance, attention-starved partner. Misunderstandings arising from badly typed, or ambiguous text and narrative, stem entirely from your fingers and lack of willingness to communicate by voice or even face-to-face. Indeed by you and yours gaining your own personal devices, you can relish the auditory shift from social to shared family to private earbud experience. So enjoy the tsunamis of the moment in this new bold electronic frontier, focusing on the increasingly pin-sharp images instead of the dull imperfect real events in the background. Be thankful for always being on, and being on the treadmill hunting a symbol of status. Taste the delicious novel and superficial ego candy. And relish in the collective, making perfectly orchestrated judgements, responding now to what everyone else is responding to now. Don't worry, enjoy being bathed in misinformation, swelled to righteous indignation, losing a sense of time and perspective so you can focus on the transient rather than the valuable. I am your humble servant. Yours faithfully, Mrs Progress Is Great, aka PIG PS C'est pas l'homme qui prend l'outil C'est l'outil qui prend l'homme, ta-ta-tin
Comments are disabled on this song