How the iPhone Ruins Walking

Likewise when someone writes a lot of long essays about how much he loves spending time in the woods and he can’t understand why no one goes hiking in the woods anymore I draw my conclusions from his actions, not words.

As for the rest of it, it sounds a little.. forced. As if there's some kind of conspiracy. Can't it be that people value control of their time/life over some amount of spontaniety? Tech provides them that, which makes all this a side effect of a choice people make.

I was reading a collection of articles written by Scottish-American mountaineer/naturalist John Muir in the 1870s. He was writing about wandering around various parts of California.

The thing that struck me is that he would describe picking a path towards a peak and just following it from the base of a mountain. That would be difficult these days because there is so much private land and fencing that you never know if you’re illegally trespassing or if a path goes through. In a city of course the land is nearly all private so you have to follow whatever paths have been laid out between public spaces.

I still enjoy walking around to the extent it’s possible but I do wonder what it would be like to be truly free to roam the countryside without fear of the law.

Nonsense. Unless I'm actively going somewhere for a specific time (interview, doctor, what not), almost every one of my walks will include a "I've not been down that road before" diversion. Or a "Oh, an SSVI[1] sign down that alley!" diversion. etc.etc.

(And I think 99.9% of those walks since 2011 has been with an iPhone in hand.)

> A device that forces us to look down and ignore changes in light.

Gibberish nonsense. People choose to look at their phones because their friends and family are in there, because they want to catch up on the news, or any one of a thousand other valid reasons that aren't "THE PHONE MAKES THEM LOOK!!!!"

[1] Sprinkler Stop Valve Inside

The storytelling demon is the phone. Always reminding me of the story. Periodically tapping me on the shoulder. "Hey hey look at this! This is important!"

> ears attuned to serendipity,

Ears attuned to.. the distant rumble of diesel engines. Maybe a few crows squawking. I don't think I'm missing out on much by tuning out city sounds.

My thought is that this is an interesting new human behavior to observe, probably won’t last forever if we consider past technology cycles. So this is particular to this point in history.

I do a 12 mile walk at least once a week and I'll encounter maybe 2 or 3 people on average who'll smile and say hello. It's worth it just for that reasurance that not every other person is an arshole.

You don't "need to wander". Wandering is something that you may or may not do, but you don't need specific tech companies and products to stop existing, other people to modify their behavior, or a cultural precedent to inform your behavior for that to happen. "Without surveillance" also includes self-surveillance

Also kind of creepy and even illegal in some parts of the world.

It’s ok to leave your phone at home and wonder around… be it an iPhone, an Android or a “dump phone” they are just tools that facilitate certain activities.

>This raises a critical point: the loss of random encounters that are the basis of being what the French call a flâneur.

Maybe this is just the Seattle resident in me, but if a bunch of random people are trying to talk to me on my walk I would become annoyed very fast. I am trying to walk here, I am thinking!

I love walking aimlessly to no specific destination, I do it often. But don't "randomly encounter" me if I appear to be thinking.

Every walk we take is random; the phone allows me to stay connect if I need to but doesn't control my path. My Apple Watch keeps track of my distance/time walking (I get an alert at 35 mins if I'm on an hour long walk => 25 mins to walk home). The AirPods are always in Transparency mode where I can fully hear what's going on in the city with some music I like playing as well.

If you want to wander; you will wander.

That the iPhone and ilk have demonstrated how few people wish to join you when not forced to do so sounds like a personal issue.

downside is no music... but I do find peace in being 100% disconnected.

To be clear, capitalism has nothing to do with the problem the author brings up in this article. The existence of the iPhone does not imply the overuse of the iPhone, or the misuse of the iPhone. People choose to look at their phones while walking, and I find it as frustrating and ridiculous as the author, but it's got nothing to do with economics.

I never see phones out, but I still have to walk around people taking up entire sidewalks and aisles gazing absent-minded at something I can't see. People manage to wander despite the phone in their pocket, and it's annoying.

What we have here is a writer trying desperately to sound deep and failing completely without substance to fill the space. Is "we need to wander" the new "we need to stop writing" (Plato)? I see more and more of these trend pieces, and each is more vapid than the last.

If anything, Google Maps gives back time.

> But capitalism cannot tolerate “free” time and space. And, so, at last, we have the iPhone. A device that forces us to look down and ignore changes in light.

Perhaps things are different in different cities, but having one's gaze fixated upon a screen while walking is more of an exception than a rule. Even going about life with earbuds firmly implanted within one's ears is far from universal. Yet that does not make people watching any more interesting. You can attribute that capitalism not tolerating free time and space if you like. Personally, I think it has more to do with our streets being conduits for transportation rather than being appreciated as public spaces. It is not as though capitalism forbids free time. Indeed, much of it depends upon free time. Yet we still live in a world where many people won't go out unless they have a purpose, may that be going from point A to B or going for a jog to get/stay fit. Appreciating one's surroundings appears to be reserved for tourists.

I go on walks or bike rides and listen to podcasts or music or sometimes nothing. All those options are very nice.

They had a script running that added new flickr users as contacts (who would then usually add them back), then he would remove them after a month or so.

This is why they have "138.2K Followers•385 Following"

That sort of behaviour really diminished the community on flickr. But at least Koen made it work for them.

Fast forward 20 years and I always have my phone in my pocket, and it feels like I’m on a leash.

Being able to communicate with anyone at any time is an amazing superpower. But not being able to be reached when you were out in the world was also really valuable. Especially as a young person exploring the world.

I know we can’t go back to that era, but it makes me sad that my kids won’t have the sensation of freedom that comes from bouncing around town with their friends, only searching for a pay phone when it was time to get a ride home.

Tl;dr: The lived experience of childhood seems to have gotten a lot shittier, and I think phones deserve some of the blame.

> Instead one chooses a destination and walks toward it. Along the way the route is commodified. Restaurants suggested instead of found. Parks digitally delineated instead of outlined by the contours of our promenades. >

In the UK increasingly one needs a credit/debit card, or a phone capable of NFC payments, to actually pay for things. The big-brand shops have most their self-checkouts as card-only & many shops are increasingly refusing cash. (There really ought to be a law mandating that all physical stores must accept legal tender as a condition of trade - else what is the point in cash?)

The parks and pavements here are increasingly blighted by bright digital advertising. Railway tickets are becoming harder to get in a non-digital form, for one example of the increasing dependence on phones.

Point is, the need for a phone, and a debit/credit card to go to a cafe, to take a train, etc, does remove the spontaneity and an element of joy from the experience. Being forced to carry a google or apple tracking device, or even 'just' a VISA/Mastercard makes me feel tethered to the 'capitalist' system - as this article puts it; but whatever you call it, capitalism or technocracy, the author is right.