The iPhone is the New Cigarette | Hacker News Reader

The iPhone is the New Cigarette

bluvox.com

42 pointsabie26 comments

You could replace any mention of "iPhone" in this list with "Blackberry" or even "smartphone".

1. The Blackberry changes your brain chemistry. For better and for worse it makes you feel good and want more (mechanism of action be damned).

2. The Blackberry gives you an excuse to step outside and fiddle with something when you feel like not working for fifteen minutes.

3. The Blackberry gives you something to do in boring interstitial situations, like waiting in line at the store, or waiting for the bathroom, or waiting in line for the bathroom at the store.

4. The Blackberry gives you something to do with your hands in awkward situations.

5. In really awkward situations the Blackberry gives you a way to check out entirely (granted, that’s a slightly different type of cigarette).

6. When you’re using your Blackberry in public, some people will think you look sophisticated. Others will think you’re annoying.

This article seems like an annoying attempt to get some attention / linkbait.

This comment seems like an annoying attempt to get some attention / dickbait.

Replace the word Blackberry/iPhone with the word penis, I think it's just as accurate.

Do you often play with yourself while waiting in line at the store or having an awkward situation?

Insofar as everyone I know wishes they could quit using one (due to the well publicized problems), but very few can do it?

If only there was some patch, software or otherwise.

I'd much rather quit smoking than give up my iPhone. On second thought, I do want to quit smoking and have no desire to be rid of my iPhone.

>> "due to the well publicized problems"

Err. Which well publicized problems?

AT&T is a pretty well-publicized problem.

... In the US. Which is one country out of many.

I'm not sure if you're kidding, so I'll bite:

- Frequently dropped calls - 3G connection problems - Delayed SMS and voicemails (sometimes by days) - App store problems - Short battery life

Some of these are AT&T's fault, no doubt. But I've had AT&T for the better part of a decade, and I've never had so many "network" problems as when I bought an iPhone. When your phone has dropped an important phone call with the CEO of a public company three times in 5 minutes in Central Park in New York City, it makes you want to break the piece of junk into a million pieces.

But the promise of the phone, and the experience when it does work, is really quite good. It's just not a piece of equipment you can rely on. I struggle with the thought of getting rid of it quite often, yet just can't seem to pull the trigger.

All of those apart from app store/battery are AT&T. None of those are issues in the UK with O2 as the carrier.

Battery life sucks if you leave 3G on, the app store is meh.

You also see cigarettes used as props in movies. Will the iphone take its place?

I'm trying to replace that classic image of two lovers in a bed smoking, with two people twiddling with their iphones.

I can send you a picture ;-)

Hey, I can do all of these things with my Android G1, too. And even better as it's got a real keyboard.

Humans are pattern matching machines. We can always find some mapping from one thing to another thing. Not all such mappings are relevant or useful.

I wondered why I would see people outside the office here talking on their iPhones.

Took me a bit to realize they had AT&T and there was no signal in the building and barely any outside the building.

One reason why I stick with sprint is it works everywhere I go in this area.

Howard Rheingold used the phrase "lightweight digital refreshment" in 2001.

Thanks for the reference. I should have known that!

Great points, though the iPhone doesn't kill people like second hand smoke does.

I suppose you could make an argument about iPhoning while driving...

But time is still turning. It could be that multi-touch screens cause deadly "finger cancer".

Or you could make an argument about the debatable efficacy of secondhand smoke. (I have heard people claiming that secondhand smoke is not as bad as people make it out to be. I do not have sources for this, nor am I particularly arguing it.)

Also, what about all the E&M radiation? If you want to go out on a limb, it's a little less tenuous than finger-cancer...

Now you're just making Max Planck cry.

but they do explode on rare occasion.

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