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I've still never had a smartphone (technically my flip phone, a Kyocera Dura, is an android device, but it can't install apps so I'll consider it suitably "dumb

I've still never had a smartphone (technically my flip phone, a Kyocera Dura, is an android device, but it can't install apps so I'll consider it suitably "dumb") Occasionally I need to tote along a tablet because several places (some MLB venues, for one thing) will either require a smartphone, or impose a severe surcharge for the convenience of not using it. Anyway, I really regret that we didn't impose dumbphone protection laws back when we had a large enough bloc of seniors that didn't "upgrade" to a smartphone yet

senderista 24d ago
I tried to remove the browser from my smartphone and it was impossible because of all these stupid QR scanning requirements everywhere.
- stronglikedan 24d ago
  The word "requirements" is doing a lot of work there. I've never met a QR code where scanning it was required of me.
  - thesdev 24d ago
    So you'd leave the restaurant if it has a QR menu?
    - onetokeoverthe 24d ago
      yes
    - bigstrat2003 24d ago
      I certainly would, unless it was something I was doing for someone else's sake (like a birthday dinner for someone). Why would I do business with a restaurant that can't be bothered to provide a good experience for customers?
    - branon 24d ago
      Depending on what type of computer (if not smartphone) you have at hand, you can probably use a search engine to find the same menu. Or ask somebody at your table. Or ask the server. Or point at somebody else's food and say you want what they're having. Or eschew the menu entirely and ask to be surprised. Chef's choice can be fun. Or leave yeah, I think that's valid. TFA is predicated on the notion of pretty-much-lying to people by telling them you don't have a smartphone even if you do. Leaving a restaurant if you can't find a menu seems like it'd be on similar ideological footing.
      - creaturemachine 24d ago
        The idea is you shouldn't have to have any sort of computer on your person to participate in public life. If a proper eat-in restaurant can't maintain a paper menu then it's an indication of the level of service that's sure to follow.
        branon 24d ago
        Perhaps that's the grandparent commenter's idea but I don't think it's the point the article is making: > So, seriously, I do really like the smartphone idea. It’s just that I don’t have any browser or "social" app on it. And I don’t want anything else than what I have. > I wish I could say it is all I have, that I’m a true minimalist. He defines true minimalism as having an _ideologically conformant_ computer, not no computer at all.
    - francisofascii 24d ago
      This happened in an airport restaurant. I asked the server to get me the cheeseburger with fries.
    - inigyou 24d ago
      Restaurants have thin enough margins already. They aren't turning away a customer for not bringing a phone. There's one tiny burger place just around the corner from me that's delivery/pickup only, not even a QR code, but they have a sign outside saying 10€ combos and they're 15€ on the website... I just asked them. They have very good halloumi burgers and perfectly cooked fries. They were happy to accept my cash, too.
    - Kim_Bruning 24d ago
      Do you mean leave if they don't have an alternative? I'm not religiously opposed to QR-code linked menus myself, but it just so happens that the last restaurant I ate at, the QR menu was broken and I was forced to ask for a paper menu anyway. Now if a restaurant puts a lot of care and curation into a web based menu (and posibly ordering system!), and lovingly craft a complementary QR code to point to it, then why not? A lot of the time the caring is the important part.
    - coldtea 24d ago
      If they can't be bothered to bring a printed menu when asked, yes.
    - everdrive 24d ago
      If they wouldn't find another to help me? Absolutely. I can't imagine I couldn't just ask the server a question like "what's cheap and good?" or "I'll take the soup of the day."
    - buildsjets 24d ago
      Yes, I have left restaurants because they only offered a QR code menu, and I plan to continue to do that in the future.
    - slumberlust 24d ago
      Yea, ditto if they only take orders via tablets. Vote with your wallet.
    - cowboylowrez 24d ago
      I personally do not use QR codes. I suppose there could come a time where I could benefit from scanning one but I still have access to restaurants where you can order manually from humans and they cook the food themselves also.
  - ddj231 24d ago
    a bit off topic but the construction of the phrase: some word + "doing a lot of work" sounds so much like a claudism
    - atrus 24d ago
      Well, yeah, people have been using that phrase for years, if not decades. I'm not sure if you were aware, but they actually trained Claude on human text, so it naturally sounds like the human text it trained off of.
      - ddj231 23d ago
        the word “decades” is doing a lot of work here. Knowing that Claude is trained on human text is really the load bearing point. I can’t unsee this argument. Jokes aside, of course it’s trained on human text. The issue is that it has a specific tone which leads to formulaic sentence construction that is tiring. But the plus is that it’s easy to spot if you want to avoid AI generated text.
  - runjake 24d ago
    Anecdotal, but I've encountered a number of places where it's more or less required. - Restaurants: Menu is QR only. In one case, ordering food was QR only. - Queueing up at my local Costco optical department requires scanning a QR code. - Various other check-ins for various other government agencies and businesses. - Urgent care check-in paperwork requiring QR code. No paper, and typing the loooong URL in manually is horrific.
    - iamnothere 24d ago
      Have you tried saying “my phone is broken”? I doubt it’s as stringent as you think. I have never had an issue and I don’t carry a smartphone. Usually they just hand you a paper menu or a tablet depending on what you’re doing.
      - runjake 24d ago
        I didn't have my phone physically on me at the time. They did not have paper menus at all. They kind of rattled off a selection of items from memory. I ordered something.
      - account42 23d ago
        Often there technically are other options but this is still like saying you don't need to participate in society and can move to a cabin in the woods.
        iamnothere 23d ago
        What’s the problem? Are you saying that people who live in cabins are doing something wrong? I used to live in a cabin in the middle of nowhere. It has its downsides, but there were plenty of positives as well.
        huurtehoog 23d ago
        You can't see a difference between will and constrain? Force-feeding for example is torture, despite how much one may like eating.
arximboldi 24d ago
i bought my first smartphone this year. when traveling I was carrying the android tablet half of the time in my backpack, and even at home more and more you need apps for everything (e.g. lockersat club, gym entry, supermarket loyalty card, etc). i just gave up. grapheneos + olauncher give me a minimal and open source enough experience to make it somewhat tolerable, but it makes me sad that as a society we've come to expect that you are carrying a computer with you at all times to exist.
- hawaiianbrah 24d ago
  Supermarket loyalty card surprises me there. It isn’t just a physical card? Or a phone number? That’s all I ever use at any of our supermarkets.
  - als0 24d ago
    I thought supermarket loyalty cards were just a QR code of a simple serial number. Is it different where you are?
  - autoexec 24d ago
    I've seen supermarkets that offer targeted "in app only" deals. They're trying to condition people into accepting and being comfortable with discriminatory pricing, where different people pay different prices for the same product depending on who or what they are, or how much money they have.
    - aleph_minus_one 24d ago
      > I've seen supermarkets that offer targeted "in app only" deals. In Germany, the grocery discounter Aldi (both Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd) explicitly created advertising campaigns that they offer the same prices even if you don't use an app. The economic background is that Aldi's competitor Lidl nudges customers to use their app for discounts. An article: https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-ohne-app-so-verpasst-der-discounter-die-zukunft-des-einkaufens/ https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-ohne-app-so-verpasst-der-discou... Pictures of the billboards: https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/aldi-werbung-keine-app.jpg?ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07... https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/aldi-werbung-keine-app-2.jpg?ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07... Texts: German: GÜNSTIG OHNE BONUS-APP. EINFACH EINKAUFEN. ZUM ALDI PREIS. English: CHEAP WITHOUT BONUS APP. SIMPLY SHOP. AT ALDI PRICE. German: WARUM EWIG PUNKTE SAMMELN? GÜNSTIG OHNE BONUS-APP. EINFACH EINKAUFEN. ZUM ALDI PREIS. English: WHY COLLECT POINTS FOREVER ? CHEAP WITHOUT BONUS APP. SIMPLY SHOP. AT ALDI PRICE. Video by Aldi Süd (in German; try use YouTube's translation functionalities if you aren't fluent in German): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZF9wfg4XGfk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZF9wfg4XGfk Lidl was furious that this campaign was so well received by the population (for this keep in mind that the Schwarz Gruppe (Schwarz Group), the corporate group behind Lidl, has big plans for cloud business (Schwarz Digits [1])), and created its own rather ridiculed counter-campaign: https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-greift-an-lidl-kontert-jetzt-geht-es-um-das-preisversprechen-ohne-app/ https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-greift-an-lidl-kontert-jetzt-ge... Image: https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/lidl-aldi-konter.jpeg?ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07... German text: Hey, liebe Aldi Kollegen, erst Deutschland in Nord und Süd aufteilen und dann stolz von einem Preis für alle ohne App sprechen. Ihr habt Humor. Liebe Aldi Kunden, ihr seid natürlich ALLE herzlich eingeladen, von Hamburg bis München zu einheitlichen Preisen zu sparen – mit oder ohne Lidl Plus. English translation: Hey, dear Aldi colleagues, first divide Germany into North and South and then proudly talk about one price for everyone without an app. You have a sense of humor. Dear Aldi customers, you are of course ALL cordially invited to save at uniform prices from Hamburg to Munich – with or without Lidl Plus [the name of Lidl's app]. -- [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwarz_Digits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwarz_Digits
shevy-java 24d ago
I need it too for MFA, for instance one local university required it. On another university I can just use a yubikey. That is more convenient since it is small; the tablet is not so handy. I dislike the push towards forcing everyone to have a smartphone, or become a second class citizen in the country.
bgregs 24d ago
> technically my flip phone, a Kyocera Dura, is an android device, but it can't install apps so I'll consider it suitably "dumb" You can actually still sideload app stores (F-Droid, Aurora, etc.) on the Kyocera Dura. I bought mine specifically so I could still put my company-mandated pager app on it. Turns out I was able to get a physical pager instead, so I never had to go the sideloading route.
omoikane 24d ago
I also have been using a flip phone ever since I got a cell phone. I had to upgrade it once because the old phone only supports up to 3G network or whatever, and my carrier just silently dropped all calls on that network a few years back, so I had to upgrade to one with 4G. My current phone is Alcatel 4051S. But I also have an Android phone without any data plan attached, which I use only for recording GPS coordinates when I am taking pictures outdoors. I have mostly managed to avoid places that require scanning some code or installing some app.
SoftTalker 24d ago
The problem is not smartphones per se. They are very handy. They eliminate the need to carry a thick wallet full of physical ID cards, credit cards, membership/discount cards, etc. They help you if you are lost (who even gets lost anymore, with navigation and maps in your pocket). They let you access information and entertainment wherever you are. The problem is the tracking and invasion of privacy, and that all traces back to ads. Ads are at the root of all the problems with the modern internet and mobile tech.
- dev_dan_2 24d ago
  100% agree on the ad angle. Ads normalised using digital products/services by paying with data and attention. That is one of the reasons why I would love to see - reasonably priced - paid services, or even have governments offer them (as in: Source is open, hosting is being paid by the government). Given the role social media, the internet and so on plays today, it might make sense to treat this as a common good. But that side track aside; I think that privacy respecting, ad free products can be offered for cheap, if their goal is only to finance themselves, development and gain a small margin. And true, network effects / buyin is real, but I also think that the market for ad-free digital spaces/services will continue to grow, as hopefully people become more and more aware of how precious and limited their attention really is.
- iamnothere 24d ago
  I don’t carry a smartphone, and I also carry a minimalist wallet (extremely thin). I replaced my couple of “discount” cards, which have barcodes, with laminated photocopies. I don’t get lost because I am familiar with my city. I can access entertainment at home. Why do you need to distract yourself constantly? Smartphones just aren’t necessary if you live life intentionally. (We should get rid of targeted ads though.)
  - d3Xt3r 24d ago
    What you say works for me, but unfortunately it doesn't work for a lot of folks in countries which are hyper-dependent on certain apps like WhatsApp (Brasil, India etc). These places use WhatsApp for literally everything - like I heard about professers sharing lecture notes and assignments over WhatsApp, govt agencies accepting documents and applications only via WhatsApp, customer support for many companies is also done only via WhatsApp (with no option to call or email), many payments are done via WhatsApp, restaurants have reservations and booking confirmations done via WhatsApp and so on. For these folks, WhatsApp isn't just some messaging/calling app, it's an entire platform. I consider myself lucky I don't live in one of those places, but I can imagine it would be really hard to live a modern life in such places without WhatsApp. And it's also scary and concerning how a single foreign megacorporation like Meta has a stranglehold over everyday lives in so many nations.
Telaneo 24d ago
> Anyway, I really regret that we didn't impose dumbphone protection laws back when we had a large enough bloc of seniors that didn't "upgrade" to a smartphone yet I don't think the timeline ever really allowed for that. The time that smartphones started to be mandatory in any sense of that word feels to me to have been after every senior got one. And even if implemented, I'm unsure how useful and enforced they'd be if every senior then jumped on the smartphone ship 5 years later.
singleshot_ 24d ago
What does mlb require a smartphone for?
- bufordsharkley 24d ago
  Advance ticketing (at least, based upon my querying online, I was under the belief that Phillies don't have any sort of will-call in effect with the main MLB ticketing, so I took a tablet to be safe--I was visiting from out of town) Similar to many live music venues: maybe they have a functional will call, but often it's overlooked/nonoperational/etc, so just using the app is the safe call
memcg 24d ago
I still use two Kyocera Cadence LTE flip phones, but I bought a few smartphones for my children over the years. Also have an iPad that was a gift and I have used it to deposit bank checks. Instead of constantly checking my phone, I just watch people constantly checking their phones.
- KellyCriterion 23d ago
  ....and in fact it is really interesting to see, what other people are doing with their smartphones and what content they consume :-D
- Melatonic 23d ago
  Meanwhile the local security guard probably is watching you on a camera wondering why you don't have a smartphone Until they get distracted by theirs
t0bia_s 23d ago
Our constitution (Czech rep.) doesn't require to own or communicate with smartphone. Argument that you own dumb phone is weak. I have devices capable to use apps, I simply refuse.

senderista 24d ago

I tried to remove the browser from my smartphone and it was impossible because of all these stupid QR scanning requirements everywhere.

stronglikedan 24d ago
The word "requirements" is doing a lot of work there. I've never met a QR code where scanning it was required of me.
- thesdev 24d ago
  So you'd leave the restaurant if it has a QR menu?
  - onetokeoverthe 24d ago
    yes
  - bigstrat2003 24d ago
    I certainly would, unless it was something I was doing for someone else's sake (like a birthday dinner for someone). Why would I do business with a restaurant that can't be bothered to provide a good experience for customers?
  - branon 24d ago
    Depending on what type of computer (if not smartphone) you have at hand, you can probably use a search engine to find the same menu. Or ask somebody at your table. Or ask the server. Or point at somebody else's food and say you want what they're having. Or eschew the menu entirely and ask to be surprised. Chef's choice can be fun. Or leave yeah, I think that's valid. TFA is predicated on the notion of pretty-much-lying to people by telling them you don't have a smartphone even if you do. Leaving a restaurant if you can't find a menu seems like it'd be on similar ideological footing.
    - creaturemachine 24d ago
      The idea is you shouldn't have to have any sort of computer on your person to participate in public life. If a proper eat-in restaurant can't maintain a paper menu then it's an indication of the level of service that's sure to follow.
      - branon 24d ago
        Perhaps that's the grandparent commenter's idea but I don't think it's the point the article is making: > So, seriously, I do really like the smartphone idea. It’s just that I don’t have any browser or "social" app on it. And I don’t want anything else than what I have. > I wish I could say it is all I have, that I’m a true minimalist. He defines true minimalism as having an _ideologically conformant_ computer, not no computer at all.
  - francisofascii 24d ago
    This happened in an airport restaurant. I asked the server to get me the cheeseburger with fries.
  - inigyou 24d ago
    Restaurants have thin enough margins already. They aren't turning away a customer for not bringing a phone. There's one tiny burger place just around the corner from me that's delivery/pickup only, not even a QR code, but they have a sign outside saying 10€ combos and they're 15€ on the website... I just asked them. They have very good halloumi burgers and perfectly cooked fries. They were happy to accept my cash, too.
  - Kim_Bruning 24d ago
    Do you mean leave if they don't have an alternative? I'm not religiously opposed to QR-code linked menus myself, but it just so happens that the last restaurant I ate at, the QR menu was broken and I was forced to ask for a paper menu anyway. Now if a restaurant puts a lot of care and curation into a web based menu (and posibly ordering system!), and lovingly craft a complementary QR code to point to it, then why not? A lot of the time the caring is the important part.
  - coldtea 24d ago
    If they can't be bothered to bring a printed menu when asked, yes.
  - everdrive 24d ago
    If they wouldn't find another to help me? Absolutely. I can't imagine I couldn't just ask the server a question like "what's cheap and good?" or "I'll take the soup of the day."
  - buildsjets 24d ago
    Yes, I have left restaurants because they only offered a QR code menu, and I plan to continue to do that in the future.
  - slumberlust 24d ago
    Yea, ditto if they only take orders via tablets. Vote with your wallet.
  - cowboylowrez 24d ago
    I personally do not use QR codes. I suppose there could come a time where I could benefit from scanning one but I still have access to restaurants where you can order manually from humans and they cook the food themselves also.
- ddj231 24d ago
  a bit off topic but the construction of the phrase: some word + "doing a lot of work" sounds so much like a claudism
  - atrus 24d ago
    Well, yeah, people have been using that phrase for years, if not decades. I'm not sure if you were aware, but they actually trained Claude on human text, so it naturally sounds like the human text it trained off of.
    - ddj231 23d ago
      the word “decades” is doing a lot of work here. Knowing that Claude is trained on human text is really the load bearing point. I can’t unsee this argument. Jokes aside, of course it’s trained on human text. The issue is that it has a specific tone which leads to formulaic sentence construction that is tiring. But the plus is that it’s easy to spot if you want to avoid AI generated text.
- runjake 24d ago
  Anecdotal, but I've encountered a number of places where it's more or less required. - Restaurants: Menu is QR only. In one case, ordering food was QR only. - Queueing up at my local Costco optical department requires scanning a QR code. - Various other check-ins for various other government agencies and businesses. - Urgent care check-in paperwork requiring QR code. No paper, and typing the loooong URL in manually is horrific.
  - iamnothere 24d ago
    Have you tried saying “my phone is broken”? I doubt it’s as stringent as you think. I have never had an issue and I don’t carry a smartphone. Usually they just hand you a paper menu or a tablet depending on what you’re doing.
    - runjake 24d ago
      I didn't have my phone physically on me at the time. They did not have paper menus at all. They kind of rattled off a selection of items from memory. I ordered something.
    - account42 23d ago
      Often there technically are other options but this is still like saying you don't need to participate in society and can move to a cabin in the woods.
      - iamnothere 23d ago
        What’s the problem? Are you saying that people who live in cabins are doing something wrong? I used to live in a cabin in the middle of nowhere. It has its downsides, but there were plenty of positives as well.
        huurtehoog 23d ago
        You can't see a difference between will and constrain? Force-feeding for example is torture, despite how much one may like eating.

arximboldi 24d ago

i bought my first smartphone this year. when traveling I was carrying the android tablet half of the time in my backpack, and even at home more and more you need apps for everything (e.g. lockersat club, gym entry, supermarket loyalty card, etc). i just gave up. grapheneos + olauncher give me a minimal and open source enough experience to make it somewhat tolerable, but it makes me sad that as a society we've come to expect that you are carrying a computer with you at all times to exist.

hawaiianbrah 24d ago
Supermarket loyalty card surprises me there. It isn’t just a physical card? Or a phone number? That’s all I ever use at any of our supermarkets.
- als0 24d ago
  I thought supermarket loyalty cards were just a QR code of a simple serial number. Is it different where you are?
- autoexec 24d ago
  I've seen supermarkets that offer targeted "in app only" deals. They're trying to condition people into accepting and being comfortable with discriminatory pricing, where different people pay different prices for the same product depending on who or what they are, or how much money they have.
  - aleph_minus_one 24d ago
    > I've seen supermarkets that offer targeted "in app only" deals. In Germany, the grocery discounter Aldi (both Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd) explicitly created advertising campaigns that they offer the same prices even if you don't use an app. The economic background is that Aldi's competitor Lidl nudges customers to use their app for discounts. An article: https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-ohne-app-so-verpasst-der-discounter-die-zukunft-des-einkaufens/ https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-ohne-app-so-verpasst-der-discou... Pictures of the billboards: https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/aldi-werbung-keine-app.jpg?ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07... https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/aldi-werbung-keine-app-2.jpg?ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07... Texts: German: GÜNSTIG OHNE BONUS-APP. EINFACH EINKAUFEN. ZUM ALDI PREIS. English: CHEAP WITHOUT BONUS APP. SIMPLY SHOP. AT ALDI PRICE. German: WARUM EWIG PUNKTE SAMMELN? GÜNSTIG OHNE BONUS-APP. EINFACH EINKAUFEN. ZUM ALDI PREIS. English: WHY COLLECT POINTS FOREVER ? CHEAP WITHOUT BONUS APP. SIMPLY SHOP. AT ALDI PRICE. Video by Aldi Süd (in German; try use YouTube's translation functionalities if you aren't fluent in German): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZF9wfg4XGfk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZF9wfg4XGfk Lidl was furious that this campaign was so well received by the population (for this keep in mind that the Schwarz Gruppe (Schwarz Group), the corporate group behind Lidl, has big plans for cloud business (Schwarz Digits [1])), and created its own rather ridiculed counter-campaign: https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-greift-an-lidl-kontert-jetzt-geht-es-um-das-preisversprechen-ohne-app/ https://www.mobiflip.de/aldi-greift-an-lidl-kontert-jetzt-ge... Image: https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/lidl-aldi-konter.jpeg?ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/www.mobiflip.de/wp-content/uploads/2026/07... German text: Hey, liebe Aldi Kollegen, erst Deutschland in Nord und Süd aufteilen und dann stolz von einem Preis für alle ohne App sprechen. Ihr habt Humor. Liebe Aldi Kunden, ihr seid natürlich ALLE herzlich eingeladen, von Hamburg bis München zu einheitlichen Preisen zu sparen – mit oder ohne Lidl Plus. English translation: Hey, dear Aldi colleagues, first divide Germany into North and South and then proudly talk about one price for everyone without an app. You have a sense of humor. Dear Aldi customers, you are of course ALL cordially invited to save at uniform prices from Hamburg to Munich – with or without Lidl Plus [the name of Lidl's app]. -- [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwarz_Digits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwarz_Digits

shevy-java 24d ago

I need it too for MFA, for instance one local university required it. On another university I can just use a yubikey. That is more convenient since it is small; the tablet is not so handy. I dislike the push towards forcing everyone to have a smartphone, or become a second class citizen in the country.

bgregs 24d ago

> technically my flip phone, a Kyocera Dura, is an android device, but it can't install apps so I'll consider it suitably "dumb" You can actually still sideload app stores (F-Droid, Aurora, etc.) on the Kyocera Dura. I bought mine specifically so I could still put my company-mandated pager app on it. Turns out I was able to get a physical pager instead, so I never had to go the sideloading route.

omoikane 24d ago

I also have been using a flip phone ever since I got a cell phone. I had to upgrade it once because the old phone only supports up to 3G network or whatever, and my carrier just silently dropped all calls on that network a few years back, so I had to upgrade to one with 4G. My current phone is Alcatel 4051S. But I also have an Android phone without any data plan attached, which I use only for recording GPS coordinates when I am taking pictures outdoors. I have mostly managed to avoid places that require scanning some code or installing some app.

SoftTalker 24d ago

The problem is not smartphones per se. They are very handy. They eliminate the need to carry a thick wallet full of physical ID cards, credit cards, membership/discount cards, etc. They help you if you are lost (who even gets lost anymore, with navigation and maps in your pocket). They let you access information and entertainment wherever you are. The problem is the tracking and invasion of privacy, and that all traces back to ads. Ads are at the root of all the problems with the modern internet and mobile tech.

dev_dan_2 24d ago
100% agree on the ad angle. Ads normalised using digital products/services by paying with data and attention. That is one of the reasons why I would love to see - reasonably priced - paid services, or even have governments offer them (as in: Source is open, hosting is being paid by the government). Given the role social media, the internet and so on plays today, it might make sense to treat this as a common good. But that side track aside; I think that privacy respecting, ad free products can be offered for cheap, if their goal is only to finance themselves, development and gain a small margin. And true, network effects / buyin is real, but I also think that the market for ad-free digital spaces/services will continue to grow, as hopefully people become more and more aware of how precious and limited their attention really is.
iamnothere 24d ago
I don’t carry a smartphone, and I also carry a minimalist wallet (extremely thin). I replaced my couple of “discount” cards, which have barcodes, with laminated photocopies. I don’t get lost because I am familiar with my city. I can access entertainment at home. Why do you need to distract yourself constantly? Smartphones just aren’t necessary if you live life intentionally. (We should get rid of targeted ads though.)
- d3Xt3r 24d ago
  What you say works for me, but unfortunately it doesn't work for a lot of folks in countries which are hyper-dependent on certain apps like WhatsApp (Brasil, India etc). These places use WhatsApp for literally everything - like I heard about professers sharing lecture notes and assignments over WhatsApp, govt agencies accepting documents and applications only via WhatsApp, customer support for many companies is also done only via WhatsApp (with no option to call or email), many payments are done via WhatsApp, restaurants have reservations and booking confirmations done via WhatsApp and so on. For these folks, WhatsApp isn't just some messaging/calling app, it's an entire platform. I consider myself lucky I don't live in one of those places, but I can imagine it would be really hard to live a modern life in such places without WhatsApp. And it's also scary and concerning how a single foreign megacorporation like Meta has a stranglehold over everyday lives in so many nations.

Telaneo 24d ago

> Anyway, I really regret that we didn't impose dumbphone protection laws back when we had a large enough bloc of seniors that didn't "upgrade" to a smartphone yet I don't think the timeline ever really allowed for that. The time that smartphones started to be mandatory in any sense of that word feels to me to have been after every senior got one. And even if implemented, I'm unsure how useful and enforced they'd be if every senior then jumped on the smartphone ship 5 years later.

singleshot_ 24d ago

What does mlb require a smartphone for?

bufordsharkley 24d ago
Advance ticketing (at least, based upon my querying online, I was under the belief that Phillies don't have any sort of will-call in effect with the main MLB ticketing, so I took a tablet to be safe--I was visiting from out of town) Similar to many live music venues: maybe they have a functional will call, but often it's overlooked/nonoperational/etc, so just using the app is the safe call

memcg 24d ago

I still use two Kyocera Cadence LTE flip phones, but I bought a few smartphones for my children over the years. Also have an iPad that was a gift and I have used it to deposit bank checks. Instead of constantly checking my phone, I just watch people constantly checking their phones.

KellyCriterion 23d ago
....and in fact it is really interesting to see, what other people are doing with their smartphones and what content they consume :-D
Melatonic 23d ago
Meanwhile the local security guard probably is watching you on a camera wondering why you don't have a smartphone Until they get distracted by theirs

t0bia_s 23d ago

Our constitution (Czech rep.) doesn't require to own or communicate with smartphone. Argument that you own dumb phone is weak. I have devices capable to use apps, I simply refuse.