You know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy™
Smart Phone Addiction.
A study commissioned by Nokia indicates that people check their cell phones every 6 minutes. That works out to 150 times per day. I am unclear if that includes sleep time, but I am sure that more people sleep with their iphones than sleep with warm milk or blow up dolls.
According to the study, people check their smart phones more than they use turn signals on a cross country trip. People check smart phones more than they say “excuse me” at a baked beans eating contest.
People are addicted to smart phones like Rosie O’Donnell is addicted to Broadway actresses.
If a smart phone is not in your hand, it’s by your night stand, it’s on your desk, it’s on the passenger seat in your Volvo. It’s the new alarm clock, night light, significant other who doesn’t file for divorce.
150 times a day?
Can you imagine doing anything 150 times a day?
While 150 seems like a lot, It might not be enough.
To get an average of 150, some people must check their cell phones 500 times a day while others only 10.
My college age son is on the high end of that spectrum.
If he isn’t texting, he is tweeting. If he’s not broadcasting his every unfiltered thought on Facebook, then he’s actually talking to someone.
My son is a multi tasker. He can talk, tweet, and surf the net all at once. He is the poster child for “distracted living”. I am sure he will be the boy who walks into a phone pole while texting only to have his video go viral on America’s Funniest Videos.
His iphone is constantly in his hand. It’s like a technological boil that should be lanced.
He uses the iphone reflection to comb his hair. He uses his iphone to listen to music, to take pictures, to stay connected to friends and the universe at large.
I watch him flips his iphone with the Otter protective case like a $500 tennis ball, flipping it, catching it, flipping it, catching it.
How many times have you dropped it? I will ask.
Plenty he will say like the moron college kid he is.
Well quit flipping it, I say. I get stuck with the bill when it breaks.
He smiles.
150 iphone checks a day? It’s easy to believe.
Have you ever been to a bar? It’s an iphone congested zone. Lonely people sit there, by themselves, drinks in front of them, staring at their iphones. I assume they are hoping to meet another human, to engage in conversation, perhaps make a new friend. But in actuality, these bar denizens appear to be carrying on a quasi romantic relationships with a transistor.
They stare at their screens, thumbing through pages and emails and web sites. They are so engrossed with their phones, they don’t seem to be cognizant of anyone or anything.
If every 6 minutes is the average, I would venture to say that every minute is the average when people are in a bar.
As a character in the Breakfast Club once spewed: “Sad and demented, but social.”
So the next time you look at your iphone to check email or update your facebook status, pause and think when you last did it. Was it 6 minutes ago? or was it 1 minute ago? Is your iphone your friend? your lover? or a crutch because you have no human interaction?
Perhaps someone will develop an app for iphone addiction. A download that shocks you when you over utilize your technology.
Maybe in a not too distant social media future, iphone 12 step programs will become all the rage.
Life’s Crazy™