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Comment by potatolicious | Hacker News Reader

Meh, alarmist tripe. People aren't that stupid, and as with any new technology there will be a period of adjustment.

When smartphones first hit the mainstream, people had them out everywhere, and yeah, you had a lot of cases where people checked their email during dinner with friends and whatnot.

But now that the technology has matured some, and we've gotten used to it, we've developed etiquette around its use. We can no openly frown when someone whips a phone out at dinner, we even play phone stacking games to make fun of the phenomenon.

So sure, when something like Glass comes out we will go through a brief period where we're abusing the uses and social acceptability of this device to no end. But that too will pass and will settle into a steady state that is nowhere near as dystopian as these alarmist videos would have us believe.

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You are suggesting that people picking up their phones and playing games or checking out the social networks during dinner or other social situations is a thing of the past. It is not.

Not only that, it is becoming more and more frequent. As people get used to this, it becomes more and more difficult to support awkward periods of silence and people resort more and more to their mobile devices to fill them. Which only worsens the problem.

This is one of the reasons why I don't get excited about anything related to smartphones. They are a tool of social disconnection, and that's not going to get any better in the future.

It still happens, but anecdotally it's dropping and fast. In the last couple of years we've seen people actually turn against such behavior, and that's the first step. Like another poster brought up, you don't hear phones ring in theaters any more - it took time, but the new etiquette is catching on.

> "They are a tool of social disconnection"

Balderdash. On the whole smartphones have been a net gain for socialization. Remember, certain people also lamented the loss of the hand-written letter, or the telegram, and predicted grave consequences for the nature of human interaction. None of which has come true. The need for social contact in humans transcends any technological imposition we can place upon it.

Look at Facebook, which is a favourite whipping boy of HN's, but they have changed the face of socialization. You are now capable of keeping up with many more people than ever before - and I call shenanigans on people who would claim this form of interaction is "cheating" (like a rolodex is cheating), or somehow less genuine (elitist bull).

To pre-empt an incredibly facile and common argument that relates to this: keeping up with more people is a good thing, and the whole notion that having fewer, tighter friends is unequivocally better is arrogance in the extreme, not to mention a huge case of false dichotomy.

So, back to smartphones. It has enabled a new, lower-barrier-threshold communication form (SMS/IM) that is not as intrusive, it has enabled incredible ability to keep in touch with a category of acquaintances which previously got no attention at all (Facebook/G+/etc), it has given us tools by which organizing large events is easier than ever before (GroupMe, Facebook), and finally realized the dream of vid-calling (FaceTime/Skype), as well as the tools by which we stay informed about important news of relevance to our daily lives (Twitter, Facebook), and hell, it's even helping us make friends and date (Meetup, OKCupid, Match, etc, all of which have deep mobile integration).

So what's that about smartphones been a net negative again?

Great arguments man! Like the way you think.

In support of your point, I remember a time not so long ago when phones ringing in movie theaters were not unheard of. That hasn't happened to me in recent memory, and I go to the movies a lot.

Unfortunately you just don't get it.

I and many others DON'T LIKE BEING RECORDED.

It is a gross invasion of our privacy, illegal without our permission and opens up innumerable issues should I do something that could be classed a crime. And absolutely no amount of "getting used to it" is going to change that.

> illegal without our permission

Unless you're in a public space, of course.

> absolutely no amount of "getting used to it" is going to change that.

The Amish believe something similar about phones in the house - the belief that a stranger being able to reach out and interrupt you at any point is detrimental. The rest of the world seems to have adjusted okay, though.

I keep Facebook chat turned off for a very similar reason.

If you're out on a date, you're probably being recorded already. There are very few businesses that don't have security cameras.

Security cameras are not immediately posted on YouTube. People have become nonchalant about recording others and disseminating the footage, it'll be even weirder if you can't see that they have a camera. How would you ever be able to drop your guard?

It would probably the same as posting to online forums like this one. Most of the time, the Secret Service doesn't show up at your house to investigate something you say, but it does happen, so you self-censor accordingly.

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