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Comment by karaterobot | Hacker News Reader

> But capitalism cannot tolerate “free” time and space. And, so, at last, we have the iPhone.

To be clear, capitalism has nothing to do with the problem the author brings up in this article. The existence of the iPhone does not imply the overuse of the iPhone, or the misuse of the iPhone. People choose to look at their phones while walking, and I find it as frustrating and ridiculous as the author, but it's got nothing to do with economics.

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No, don't you understand? It can't possibly be they're fault, there must be something to blame.

I don't find these anti-capitalist arguments very compelling, because the downsides of capitalism aren't nearly as bad as the downsides of other economic systems. However, mobile apps are generally trying to occupy as much of your time as possible in order to increase ad revenue, so it's no surprise that people are so glued to their phones. You can imagine, in capitalism's stead, some hypothetical authoritarian economic system where technology and mobile apps are optimized for "living a spiritually rich and diverse human life".

But those are apps, which use the hardware as a distribution mechanism, not the hardware itself. And it's still a matter of choice whether you use, misuse, or abuse those apps. I'll be frank: I think the author is saying that capitalism invented the iPhone to addict otherwise well-adjusted people, whereas I think the truth is probably closer to opposite: users shaped the platform into the most convenient delivery device for the dopamine hits they actually wanted.

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