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Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by woko on Monday August 02, 2021 @05:45PM (#28043095)
I'd argue that I've been watching this play out in real time among other... parents. It is actually sad when you go outside and start noticing that people are glued to their phone screens, including parents who would rather look at their smartphones rather than their kids. I can tell you that little kids notice that they lost the attention war to their parents' smartphones.
Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by deckard1 on Monday August 02, 2021 @06:11PM (#28043340)
I've made this argument before, but in relation to dating.

You'll never be more interesting than a smartphone. It's virtually impossible. You're a single human, and that device contains the entire world. If you meet a woman, she has her friends on there. She has her instagram account. Snapchat, TikTok, whatever. You are instantly contrasted against the entire world (against only the highlight reel) and you don't match up. And you never will. You're dull and uninteresting. Just wait until you find yourself swiping on Tinder while your date is in the restroom. No one is immune.

The same is true for children. I'll never be as interesting at a Twitch stream or a flashy YouTube channel. Because no one is "on" at all times. Even at my most interesting, I'm not edited down.

I'm glad to have experienced life before the internet and cell phones. We'll never be back to that point and we may not be fully aware of what was lost for some time yet.

Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by hobs on Monday August 02, 2021 @06:33PM (#28043528)
I met my girlfriend of one year on bumble, she seems to think I am more interesting than TikTok (which she enjoys) or Youtube or Instagram (where she has a decent size following.)

Honestly I think if you are feeling this way then you might want to traverse deeper into your relationships, if someone is looking for an entirely shallow relationship than this could certainly apply.

Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by newsyyswen on Tuesday August 03, 2021 @07:23AM (#28047913)
This does not jive with my experience at all.

Maybe it's because my age bracket still remembers flip phones. Maybe it's because I'm upfront about my own tech habits. Maybe it's because I swipe left on profiles that have linked IG accounts.

Whatever the reason(s), you don't need to be as interesting as an app, because you are not an app. Plenty of people just want to connect and relate with someone else, and there's nothing more relatable than not being able to live up to the standards of a glossy influencer ad campaign.

Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by hattmall on Monday August 02, 2021 @08:40PM (#28044497)
I really don't know about that. I struggle to find something interesting online most of the time and when I'm actively hanging out with friend I only use my phone to communicate or check on things occasionally. I'm not gonna sit around and just browser social media while hanging out. Now if there's dead time and nothings going on we may all be looking at our phones for a bit. But even then I'm increasingly less and less enticed by social media where as years ago this was much less true.
Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by irrational on Tuesday August 03, 2021 @01:45AM (#28046031)
I am so thankful I met my wife before smartphones came out. Heck, I met her the year before the WWW came out. I’d so hate to be in the dating market today.
Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by travisr on Monday August 02, 2021 @06:58PM (#28043741)
I agree this is sad. However, as a child of the 90s, I lost the attention war to my parents' TV. Maybe I just had absent parents, but I feel like most parents haven't been interested in their children for a while now.
Re:Life before smartphones (2020) by redisman on Tuesday August 03, 2021 @01:40AM (#28046010)
Probably never were. It’s only lately that parents are expected to watch their kids every step until they turn 18. Back in the day you’d just tell them to go throw rocks in the well with the other village kids and come back at sundown