On the jam packed peak hour train home, I’ve noticed an interesting trend that we all take part in. Everyone seemed to be in a meditative state, heads bowed and hand

Could help but think of these monks preying.

WHAT IS MY POINT: smart phones are great but….. In a way being in constant contact with the media through a device like a smart phone has become religious. A lot of us wake up in the morning and the first thing we do is check our phones. We do it while we eat, get ready to sleep and carry it with us almost everywhere. How else would we stay spiritually- I mean socially connected. I often find myself relentlessly scrolling through some sort of feed, passively taking in all the contact, occasionally snorting a cat gif. This happens so often that I had to place Facebook blocking apps on my computer to direct my attention to actual work. As a media practitioner now though I now consider my constant browsing to be field research.

What worries me is that I often check my phone and slip into a meditative state; I stop critiquing and analysing what I see. After reading 1984, I’m paranoid about becoming brainwashed by What I’ve noticed is that when we spend time with friends in person we think in “likes.” We would rather take a photo of an interesting coffee mug than taste it for ourselves. How many likes is this trip worth? I could get at least 100 if I manage to catch a good sunset. My old friend invited me over, and to our disbelief- but not really- we found her younger sister holding a DP (Display picture) photoshoot. Now there were apparently three parts to this photo shoot; discussion of poses, actual taking of photos, then an intensive group chat board meeting about which would gain the most likes. She is was 16 and already strategically marketing herself. I look at my own dp with my quirky face and lack of “like” hauling aspects and think well damn. Using a smart phone to shoot a film has become real.

In my family my younger sister and I used to have internet curfews, blockers and even got roasted for having our eyes glued to our phones but that won’t stop us.