Cell phones haven’t just become a glued-to-the-hip phenomena for nothing. How often have you left your cell phone at home and remarked to someone later in the day that you “just felt naked”? It’s not by accident. The manufacturers of these little pieces of “clothing” try hard to keep things cool and hip, drawing younger and younger customers who want the tiniest phone with the wildest face cover. Now, I think they’ve gone too far.
Not too long ago, I was in the barbershop, and one of the hairstylists was talking on the phone to her niece who was in the fifth grade. She kept calling back because her cell phone was breaking up. Her cell phone? This girl is 11 years old! Why does she need a cell phone?
Granted, my parents weren’t the ones to let me rove the malls when I was younger, so perhaps I didn’t need anything like that. But somehow I think this girl’s motives for wanting a phone weren’t focused on safety. My suspicions were deepened when the girl finally arrived carrying a tiny hot pink phone with a feathery carrying case.
Cell phones have become so prevalent that my parents are thinking about cutting off their hard line to the house. No one ever calls it; I doubt anyone remembers the number. The cell phone has taken over its domain.
I remember the first flip phones. We had one from Motorola. It must’ve weighed a pound. It was analog signal and had horrible reception. Then we went to the “car phone,” those huge contraptions that you bolted to the floor of your car with a speaker hooked on the sun visor and the antenna curling out the back of the windshield. We kept it for a number of years before we “went digital” with the monstrosity of a phone from Nokia. Finally, we upgraded a few years back to the newer “free” phone, and this time we each got one because we travel so much.
So by no means am I saying I am a stranger to cell phones. However, at some point it has to stop! The newest addition to the line of cell phones, and my newest complaint, is the camera phone. In fact, why call it a cell phone? It’s mostly a camera that happens to make calls as a bonus, at a hefty “bonus” price. Many come in at over $400. Somehow I can’t get excited over how, with these phones, we will not only have to listen to rambling 10-minute long voicemails, but we’ll also have a strange-looking picture accompanying it for our viewing pleasure.
I’m not quite sure how well these phones will go over. I keep imagining standing in line at the burger joint when I suddenly become aware of little flashing LED lights out of the corner of my eye. Great. Now that horrible hair day I was having has been sent to all the little buddies of the 13-year-old standing behind me.
Many may question how this is different than a standard digital camera. This phone is smaller, lighter, and more portable than a camera. It is also easier to surprise an unsuspecting victim with it. It is deceptive, as it looks like the newer phones do now. These phones have e-mail capabilities, infrared capabilities, a “picture wallet” for offline viewing of pictures and slideshows, picture caller-ID, games, voice-recognition, and all of the other normal bells and whistles of the phones of today, including personalized rings and a huge phone book. Some even have the resolution to take pictures clear enough for wallpaper use on a computer. They can record video of varying time limits, depending on the model.
My question is, who in the world needs this phone, ah camera, ah phone-whatever it is! This appears to be a marketing ploy to make the American consumers think they need something more than they already have. What more do they need? A “normal” phone today barely fits in your hand it is so small, and it has phone books, text messaging, automatic answering, voice mail, personalized rings, voice recognition and so on.
Lastly, imagine all the safety hoopla this is going to create. We’ll not only have people dialing and talking while driving, now we’ll have people trying to look at a picture of Aunt Mae or their new baby nephew while driving. This is not a good idea!
From another angle entirely, think of the possible and likely loss of privacy if these phones were to become the norm. Nothing would be kept secret! Everyone would always be in the view of these tiny, discreet phones. In a society where video surveillance cameras are already in every corner, these phones will make it a hundred times worse. Women who wear short skirts outside may have boys getting a little too much of an eyeful from their phones. The worst part is that these women would never know they were being photographed or filmed.
On so many levels, this camera is useless and even dangerous if used while driving. I, for one, will not give in to this temptation. I have a phone, I have a video camera, and I have a digital camera. I do not need to pay an arm and a leg to get a second one of each. Besides, I’d break it within a week.
JanaZ Hatcher is a junior political science and psychology major.