Do You Own Your Electronic Device or Does It Own You?

[roberth]

I'd say I own it. My base plan is 2 gig a month. I use less than 1 gig. I don't text or talk in the car. Never on the table when I'm eating or talking to someone.

Don't approach me with a question while your yacking on your phone. You won't get a favorable response. I do like watching people drop everything to answer a call or text.

Does your phone make a noise and the person you're talking to look at you and say "aren't you going to get that"?

I tell the person I'm talking to that they are my priority, I can always look at my device later.

[davsel]

The quoted clip seems way overblown and needlessly dramatic to me. Yes people have control issues with respect to device usage and manners. That doesn't make anyone a robot or slave to the device by any means.

Post count > 35,000

[Irving]

Taken with no context, 10 points for you.

[Vic Tory]

... my son practically lives on his.
Knowing it does not work when visiting us, he still can't help but look at it ever few minutes.

This was funny.

I am a part-time high school coach. The kids on the team practically PANIC when I make them keep their phones in their bags and NOT check them 77 times during practices.

[Vic Tory]

I functioned without the crazy cell phone for 40 years. About ten years ago I realized something was wrong with me.

If I leave the office without my phone ... and discover the oversight within a few miles ... I turn around and go back for it. But I'm up and down the Front Range a lot on business. When I'm driving, I'm also working with clients.

As a coach of a bunch of teens, I'm regularly texting and receiving them. But I do this on my own schedule, not with the *immediacy* of most of the kids.

Only about 10% of them email. But if information isn't on their phone ... it doesn't exist for them.

I really fear for the millennials.

[Vic Tory]

One more and I"m done for a while....

A good friend is a restaurant operations whiz -- helping fix struggling restaurants. One thing he teaches the owners to do is insist on the job candidates leaving their phones OFF, or on the counter OUTSIDE the manger's office.

When he does interviews of millennials for the owners, they mostly last about two minutes. That's how long it takes the candidates to violate his rule, and they are gone!

[wctriumph]

I don't have a cell phone, smart of dumb. Left then behind in 2007 and never looked back.

[pickenup]

Main reason I don't have a phone is that I'm cheap, but $6/mo doesn't sound bad ... where you get that deal?

Like BushMasterBoy, mine is a Tracfone, except I got mine at King Soopers. They had some kind of special going on where the phone was really cheap, and the minutes were double what you bought - for life. I always get the smallest minutes that give you coverage for 90 days, because I don't use what minutes I have, and the higher minute cards still only give you the same 90 days until you have to add more minutes. So for $19.99 every 90 days it comes to $6 and change per month. I send it with the wife if she goes out by herself, just in case.

[Bailey Guns]

I use mine about 50/50 for personal use/work and pretty much always keep it near because I'm on call so much. But I don't take it everywhere. I do check for messages frequently. We no longer have a landline. Work provides an allowance that pays for the phone (and then some), I pay for the plan. Pretty fair deal. I use it for calls, texts and pictures. Occasionally an email or web surfing if I need to look for something. I've deleted or disabled about 95% of the apps.

[68Charger]

Because of oncall duties, it's referred to as "the virtual leash"

I use it a LOT for conference calls... it's on a separate carrier than the company I work for (since I live in a blank coverage area for my employer)
I'm a little obsessive about keeping it charged, so it works when I need it... other than that I don't dote on in.