When is a phone not a phone? When it's really a mini-computer with a phone stuffed inside that you have to find the icon for and place in the right place even to make a phone call- and when doing this doesn't really matter for a lot of people, because they just want to use the internet connection part of the computer and don't really care about the "phone" at all.
And I discovered this recently when, as a late adopter I got and fell madly in love with my new "smart" phone--although its intelligence is at least debatable, it can certainly put me in touch with all the information, photos, music, movies and anything else our smart and stupid world produces in more places, times and ways than anything else I can think of. And despite my recently discovered addiction to Angry Birds (I swear this time it's uninstalled for good) and my vast new knowledge of more news about friends acquaintances and strangers, celebrity trivia and world events than could ever be useful, I am in awe of this tiny miracle.
Maybe it's the size- computers, netbooks, even ipads are too big to be cute and cuddly or to slip in your pocket and take wherever you go. Or maybe it's the sense that I am provided for, looked after and connected at all times through its many services and ministrations (I have a mirror and flashlight, an alarm and a phone, music and news even when I'm in bed at night). Or maybe, since I lived in France for 9 years and it feels like my second home, being able to listen to my favorite French radio stations on Paris time anywhere-as if transported back there by magic is what does it for me.
In fact, I think it's the magical aspect of the whole thing that gets to me.
Although you could make an argument that the addictive, connected at any cost, focus inhibiting ability to connect, scan, dissect everything and anything is destructive of attention spans, real human connections and serious work, I would say there's still something magical to it. As someone who grew up in the twentieth century, having access to people and things that are important to me, even at a distance, at the moment I am longing for them, being able to discover, even at a remove, people places and ideas I would not otherwise encounter, at least with such a sense of immediacy, is magical. And I am very happy to have that magic, even if, like all magic, it is in part based on illusion.
