Hacker News Reader

Comment by sourcecodeplz | Hacker News Reader

That's just an exercise though really. You NEED a smartphone nowadays for everyday life: banking, gym access, maps, etc.

View on HN

Not had a smartphone or even a cell phone plan in years. I live in silicon valley and run a b2b company.

I manage bank accounts, travel a lot, keep up with friends, clients, and peers, etc etc, and get by fine with looking up directions before I leave with a paper map as a backup.

Turns out you actually do not NEED a phone. I have a very digitally connected lifestyle which makes it that much more important I be -disconnected- whenever a workstation screen is not in front of me so I can be -present- in whatever I am doing or with whomever I am doing it with.

>gym access

Where do you live that gyms don't work without a smartphone? Must be some hipster SV place with Juiceros and Keurigs I imagine.

All the gyms I've been to in Europe give you either a physical RFID card or armband for access when you sign up, no smartphone required. Then again I've only been to the most budget gyms, not the uber-fancy ones of tech-bros, lawyers and corporate elites, so maybe those gyms have "smarter" access systems too but I couldn't care less.

I know at least Puregym in the UK eschews physical passes, and while 80% of people check in by scanning the QR code on the app, they also just give you a number which you can put in the keypad on the door instead

The epitome of cheap gyms in the US, Planet Fitness, uses QR code check in. They used to give out keychain barcode tags, but stopped during COVID.

Fwiw, I have smartphone (iPhone 12 work mandated / provided, and a samsung note for myself), but I don't use it for banking, gym, shopping, payments, etc. Guess I'm old school but Financial stuff I like to do on computer, for access I like physical tokens. Yes I print my air tickets! :-) I like to reduce my failure modes and I view my phone as disposable, even though tech companies want to equate it with my life / identity.

This must be a generational thing as I'm older and don't need apps for banking or gym, but yeah maps is definitely a requirement.

You can have a non-ios non-android device for maps, visit a non-requiring a smartphone gym, use a plastic card instead of NFC and a website instead of bank app. Also use phone/email for voice/text conversations instead of 14 apps every one of which are full of ads.

Yes to all of that except for banking. I have to confirm login and every operation with either an OTP generated by the app of the bank or with a fingerprint in the app of the bank. In the best case they could run on am emulator on my laptop but I never checked if it works.

> You NEED a smartphone nowadays for everyday life: banking, gym access, maps

It is bizarre to me that anyone would state the few minutes saved per month on these as NEEDS.

I really don't. I exercise at home. I can just go to the bank, or if I have a balance inquiry, call them. They also have a desktop web application that I can use. The only one I really need on that list is maps, which my dumpy trash-heap will have.

Perhaps I'm out of the loop, but why do you need a smartphone for gym access?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com