As Ed and I walked out of the cinema with Munchausen by Proxy playing over the end credits, we started talking about how good the soundtrack was. Without much of a thought, I pulled my iPhone from my pocket, searched the iTunes store and tapped to buy the album, before I had even left the cinema. By the time we reached the motorway, we were listening tithe first track off the album.
It’s strange to think that even just a week before, I wouldn’t have been able to do that so easily. Two years ago, we just had rumours of this iPhone thing Apple were doing. Five years ago, I was still having to use dial up at home. Ten years ago – I was only just making my first steps onto t’Internets. (Ah, the days of Angelfire and Lycos)
Its the same with most pieces of technology. I first got my first mobile phone about ten years ago, and it was a Nokia NK402 from Orange – one of the first Pay as You Go phones. It had a black and white screen, a cover that only the front could be changed (I used to save up my babysitting money to buy cheap cheap ones from the bloke outside the Carphone Warehouse) and the old school version of Snake (Its never been the same since) I upgraded when I reached Sixth Form to a Nokia 3210, which had a lilac cover on with big daisies all over. That phone was thrown about so much, even dropped 10 feet onto a concrete floor of the Sports Hall. And it still worked perfectly fine. Now we have phones that can do everything for you – I can blog, tweet and even check my eBay results from my iPhone, but it barely lasts a day of full usage, it seems bigger than my old phones and I’m scared to lose it because it holds so much information on me and my friends.
I love how technology keeps us so updated on everything, and connected with people, but sometimes I wish I still had my brick sized Nokia with the front cover that you could change because it could probably survive a nuclear blast.
Totally agree with you. I remember the original Orange mobiles (had one of the first on contract). Often remark on how amazing the iPhone is to friends/family… and compare the storage of it (16GB) to my first PC, an Amstrad with twin 5.25″ floppy drives (later to have one upgraded to a 3.5″ DD! – how geek am I!). Actually my uncle bought me a second-hand 20MB HD which slotted into the back – must’ve been the size of 8 iPhones!
I love the way technology is moving forward. I marvel at the wonderful apps people are dreaming up and releasing on the iPhone. But I worry at the throw-away nature of our society and all the must-have technology and the impact it is inevitably having on the environment and people.
Look forward to hearing more of your thoughts!
I remember the days of Geocities well. I had a website and email address there for many years until Yahoo came along and bought them out.