Have we become slaves to our mobile phones?
As much as I hate to say it my mobile phone is an extremely integral part of my daily routine. 10 years ago, I did not have the same relationship with my phone as I do now. I use my phone for everything texting, phone calls, emails, entertainment, photos, productivity etc but because our phones can do almost everything that we need it to do, it has become a distraction and can be a huge waste of time. My mornings usually begin with me turning off my alarm on my phone and checking my notifications first thing which isn’t the most ideal thing and my nights end with setting my alarms, which means my day begins and ends with my phone on most days. It’s almost like we are slaves to our phones now and I do not like the control they have over our lives.
The top five mobile applications I use every day (in no particular order) are: WhatsApp/iMessage, Instagram, Email, Spotify and Google Maps. I believe these apps provide immense value to me as WhatsApp/iMessage keeps me connected with friends and family, I need my email for school/work, Spotify is for Music (something I can not live without), Instagram for entertainment and Maps is the utility app which I use to check for transit schedules and directions.
When I think to my self – I want to listen to some music or a podcast I pull up the Spotify app. When I want to connect with a friend or family member, I open up WhatsApp. When I need to respond or write an important email to a faculty member, I open my email app and when I need to get to the gym or the Waterfront campus, I open up Google Maps. For me all of these applications serve a major purpose and there are hundreds of micro-moments everyday that make me come back to these apps over and over again.
To be completely honest as a daily user of these applications I don’t really have many or in-fact any “bad” or “friction” experiences with these applications in particular; if I did, I would not be using them so much every single day, I would simply find a better alternative to that application. If I have to be really nit-picky – WhatsApp decreasing the quality of photos & videos when you send it to someone but again it’s a free service with no ads (at least not while using the app, we know META still uses are data to target ads to us on other platforms) so I can not complain. Our lives are very comfortable and none of these apps should cause ‘pain’ to us.
Out of all the applications I mentioned the only one I pay a subscription fee for is Spotify. I pay a yearly subscription fee to Spotify simply because I love music, I listen to music all the time and Spotify does an excellent job and giving me exactly what I want. As long as Spotify keeps doing what they are doing they will continue to improve and grow. If an application actually adds value and does such a good job at it all that the company needs to do is know what the consumer wants and stick to that. It’s important to take feedback from the customers and act on it.
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