Shoe by Gary Brookins and Susie MacNelly for December 19, 2010

I still wouldn’t have one if I didn’t need it. Unfortunately, I do.

What did we do without cell phones? Anyone remember?

LOWERS your blood pressure? I have yet to meet an electronic gadget that doesn’t raise mine!!

The new has worn off on mine. Went over the 300 minute limit once or twice when I first signed up a few years ago. Now I’m pushing it if I use over 5. I guess I don’t have many friends anymore. But I feel naked if I leave home without it. LOL

What i bought as a fad has now become a necessity.

The drawback of rapidly advancing technologies.

I have one, but I never turn it on unless I want to call somebody. I only wanted to call somebody once – a nursery to find out how to get there. ( Yes, I stopped the car and parked it to make the call! ) I got their answering machine which said they’d call me back within the hour. So the one time I wanted to use it in its life, it turned out to be useless! By now, it’s accumulated about 2800 minutes – which I never use!

I bought mine 5years ago as a pay as you go phone. prepaid it with £15 still have £13:79 left and have forgotten how to operate the dang thing

It even pays money out of your accounts that you don’t have.

Never really cared for them until mine saved my bacon! I had a baler accident in 2004 during a “senior moment” that nearly took off my right arm. Did I call 9-1-1? Nope, called my wife to tell her where I was, figuring she could lead them to me if I passed out. I was in a “hidden” field not far from the road, but if had tried to explain where I was to the first responders, they would have found me by looking for the buzzards!

My cell does two things: makes calls and receives calls. That is more than sufficient for my needs.

I’ve had the same one for the last five years, a pay-as-you-go type. It’s so no thrills that it doesn’t even ring! So call me all you like, but I ain’t gonna answer!

Fewer APPS and more coverage would be nice. You can never get a signal when you really need it, out in the sticks.

The current “Smart Phone” is an excellent example of the cusp between the capability and the practicality! While modern technology is indeed capable of putting more computation power and technology into the cell phone than the Apollo Moon mission vehicles, the problem is now to make that ability usable!

Adults have relatively large hands & fingers and minds full of things that they have already learned over the years. This is why we now find children at the “early adopter” edge of tech, they have less to forget and are flexible in learning both in mind and dexterity.

The best hope may be our most flexible human instrument of communication, our voice. I remember back to the original Star Trek where the computer(s) was frequently commanded by voice. I think that this is coming but until it arrives, every adult needs to cultivate a teenager as a technical resource or else realize that a good book is still a good read!!!

Yeah, I have pay-as-you-go, too! It’s great. $19.95 every three months for 200 minutes. I use about 20 minutes in three months. Most of the time it’s in the dresser drawer! I must admit, though, they are great for coordinating pick-ups at the airport and to inducing a sense of security when your on a road trip, beyond that, I think they are, at one and the same time, a pain in the a.s and a gift!

Only use it to call road service when needed.

“I have always wished that my computer would be as easy to use as my telephone. My wish has come true. I no longer know how to use my telephone.”

— Bjarne Stronstrup (originator of C++ programming language)

I only want one that makes calls- no “gizmos”, can’t find one any more. Now considering when I head east from town I’m quickly into millions of acres, where you can only find several small areas six feet in diameter where you can get “service”, they aren’t quite the “miracle in emergencies” people think they are. I CAN now be one of those irritating people who calls my wife from the the supermarket aisle to ask her what I forgot!

When I am KING, these things will be banned in my kingdom. Now, you libs, don’t get excited. It has nothing to do with 1st Amendment rights. However, it has everything to do with weaving and bobbing by morons who now think chatting with their grandkids or girlfriends or whoever is more important than indicating that they are getting ready to swerve their mobile homes or SUV’s into another lane usually mine. I may relax this edict in a coupla thousand years when the human body adapts to these useless things by growing a third arm. And don’t give me any bleeep how important they are. Fine, but pull the hell over to use the bleeep things and stop endangering me and my family.

Way back in the late ’70s, I played a small but not entirely insignificant role in turning cell phone technology from a laboratory curiosity into a real product. At the time, everybody working on the technology assumed people wouldn’t be so dumb as to yap while driving, and that they’d pull over to talk.

Well, we were better engineers than psychologists, I guess…

When there is truly universal coverage for use in emergencies (and useless blather just because it’s there), cell phones will be worthwhile. But that will be a long time coming, if ever, because it’s not profitable. In the meantime, the advice the carriers would give is, just don’t go into the sticks.

Steven S’

It’s here. I saw a commercial just yesterday about a computer you just speak to. It does almost everything by verbal command, or query. I don’t recall the name.

rshive,

May I have some of that money from accounts I don’t have?

Cosmo forgot to mention that it tells the world everything about him: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704368004576027751867039730.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Could this be why the government is so eager for everyone to have a cell phone? Are our ‘SafeLink’ phones spying on us?

When they get to be the size of those comm badges on Star Trek I’ll consider getting one.

I will admit I carry a prepaid myself. The main reason I carry it is I am so busy I sometimes lose track of things. (I set alarms so I remember things I need to do.) It also gives me the ability to make calls while I am going from place to place or to call people when I am away from home without needing to bug anyone to use their telephone. (I don’t drive - not comfortable behind the wheel.) I also use it to alert me to weather alerts (Severe Thunderstorms, tornadoes, winter storms, etc.) And like was mentioned earlier, most of the time I don’t feel dressed without it.

Heh, my phone not only is attached to the wall, it has a dial on it. It drives my son nuts but I like it.