I like looking at my phone. So why are some tech companies trying to stop me?

• Bad reviews of the AI ​​Pin indicate that it cannot replace a phone.

• But I don’t want to change the phone. I love looking at my iPhone.

• I only regret not being able to look at my phone more hours of the day.

I was excited for AI Pin, I really was. When the wearable device to replace the phone was announced this fall, I was a little unsure how normal people might use it, but I was excited by the idea of ​​a weird new category of gadgets that was creative, ambitious, and something new.

Unfortunately, AI Pin’s reviews so far have been terrible. They note that it doesn’t work halfway, overheats, and generally fails at its ultimate goal of being a screen-free alternative to your phone.

Putting all the issues with the AI ​​Pin aside (I recommend this review from The Verge if you’re more curious), I keep coming back to the basic thesis of the device — you want a way to avoid looking at your phone and scratching your head. Who said I don’t want to look at my phone screen? I love looking at my phone!

There are two arguments here: practical and existential.

The practical argument for a non-phone device that can do phone-like things is that you can perform simple tasks without being distracted by other notifications and charms of the phone. I agree – it’s a good thing. Setting a timer, texting while driving, getting a quick morning weather report—these are all great use cases for not using a phone. Luckily, we have voice assistants like Alexa and Siri that have been doing this for over a decade.

There are also Meta Ray-Ban glasses that take videos and photos; Ideal for hands-free situations like riding a roller coaster, dancing or attending a concert. They’re objectively a nice tool, great for certain uses, and elements of AI will likely bring even more useful ways to use them. But I don’t think they are trying to replace your phone.

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Joanna Stern of The Wall Street Journal used the AI ​​Pin with Meta Ray-Bans on a recent family vacation and found that the wearable camera feature was great for capturing fleeting moments with her kids. He was glad he didn’t have to pull out his phone: “You know the dance. You pull out your phone, take a photo, then get distracted by a text or notification. It felt good to keep my phone in my backpack most of the time on these vacation trips,” he wrote.

This practical reason (that the phone can distract you when you just want to take a photo) makes a lot of sense and is relatable!

But there’s another, more existential argument against phones: We spend all our free moments with a screen shoved in our face, mindlessly scrolling for dopamine and ignoring the world around us. Time spent on your phone is bad; Time spent doing something else is good.

I don’t agree with this argument. I love mindless scrolling; I find this extremely enjoyable. I love scrolling through TikTok, checking out tweets, scrolling through Reddit. I’ll join the group chat. Maybe if I have a little more time, I’ll go to my happy place and watch some movie trailers on YouTube.

I strongly disagree with the idea that spending time away from your phone is somehow more virtuous. What am I going to do, go for a walk and look at the trees? Do you know how many articles I haven’t read?

I also resist the idea that as a parent I should neglect my phone in order to be more “present” with my family. I make sure to spend time during the day giving each child my undivided attention; I’m not a monster. But I don’t think it’s necessary to devote ALL your time entirely to young children; They should be somewhat overlooked; This creates independence.

Frankly, I’m not worried about not being there. I can multitask. I have the capacity to process many attentional inputs simultaneously; I run dozens of teraflops; My mother’s computer is so abundant that Sam Altman wants BAE to invest in it. Looking at my messages won’t be the thing to distract me from being “there.” I Never not available. And I bet that’s true for you too.

I agree that it is important what phone model parents use with their children; Trying to convince a child that they need to give up the iPad by holding the phone to your face all day is not ideal. There is a happy and healthy environment here. I’m not saying you should miss your child’s first steps because you’re tweeting, but I don’t feel any guilt about checking your email while watching “Frozen” for the 20th time.

There is a lot of concern right now about how phones may affect young people. The relationship between phones and young people’s mental health is controversial, but it’s fair for teens and children to want to limit social media and screen time.

But I’m not a teenager. I am an adult. Don’t confuse talk about phones being bad for 15-year-olds with talk about phones being bad for grown adults.

The simplest part of the argument that phones are bad for kids is that screen time is much better spent on other things, like face-to-face socializing or sleep. This is pretty true for teenagers, and maybe a little bit true for adults, too. (Of course, I’d probably be better off sleeping an extra 20 minutes.) But I’m a fully formed frontal lobe adult who’s already had my social skills shaped in my formative years.

The only advantage of being old now is that my phone can’t hurt me. I can handle looking at Instagram and seeing my friends having a good time and being happy for them. I can watch as much TikTok as I want and all that happens is I now know teenage slang and learn about the lives of people I would never meet in real life. Haha! Mindless scrolling only increases my powers.

I don’t want to be rude, so I try to follow reasonable phone etiquette. I don’t look at my phone at a restaurant, at the cinema, or while talking to someone. This is why I love my Apple Watch: It allows me to put my phone away in social situations without worrying about missing an important message or call. I appreciate that there are functions and situations where something other than a phone would be great.

But I don’t want to change my phone. I don’t want to switch to the stupid phone as an act of taking back my attention from greedy tech companies. I don’t think my consciousness would rise to a higher level if I could save myself from the 2,000 nits of light of my iPhone 14 Pro Max. In my opinion, the smartphone is the pinnacle of human achievement. I value him, I respect him, and I’m grateful for that. I don’t look at this magnificent gift of the sum total of human technology and think, “I’d be happier without it.”

If anything, I just wish I could look at my phone more.

Read the original article on Business Insider