Tuesday Tech: The Phone Stack

This is from Get Kempt.com. I loved it. ..I am wondering if there is an opening for this in my trainings?

01/05/12

THE PHONE STACK

We usually take a pretty hard line against phones at dinner, but a new trick just popped up that gives us hope for the future.

It’s called a phone stack, and it’s a buzzing, flashing reminder of every phone-etiquette rule the world seems to have forgotten.

It works like this: as you arrive, each person places their phone facedown in the center of the table. (If you’re feeling theatrical, you can go for a stack like this one, but it’s not required.) As the meal goes on, you’ll hear various texts and emails arriving… and you’ll do absolutely nothing. You’ll face temptation—maybe even a few involuntary reaches toward the middle of the table—but you’ll be bound by the single, all-important rule of the phone stack.

Whoever picks up their phone is footing the bill.

It’s a brilliant piece of social engineering, masquerading as a bar game. It takes the phone out of the pocket—where you can sneak a glance and hope nobody notices—and places it in the center of attention at all times. Suddenly, picking up your phone is the big deal you always secretly knew it was. And more importantly, it comes with consequences.

But if, after the third ring, you decide your call is more important than your lunch tab, we’re sure your friends won’t object.

Update: A Few Problems with the Phone Stack, and a Few Solutions

—R.B.

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What do you sleep with?

I initially banned all electronics from my bedroom in my new house- no laptop, no phone, no TV, no computer, no digital alarm clock. Its a rule I have tried to keep in most of my houses.

Until my Iphone!

Because of its function as an alarm clock it now sleeps next to me when I sleep. This is the same phone I now check email on before I get out of bed, the same one that I use to pace me when I run, the same one I use to text, skype, check in to flights, buy things, do my banking, take photos and listen to music.

You get the picture.


Associated Press reports that "Psychologists and others are concerned about another equally troubling issue: the growing obsession among people who would much rather interact with their smartphones than with other human beings."


Have a look around you. On the subway/commuter train/bus/streetcar/ferry, in coffeeshops, offices, lectures and family dinner tables. I used to have another rule: "no phones on the table at a meal". Last week, I went out to dinner with five friends. We all had our phones out! We were comparing apps, showing each other photos

We also use phones to avoid others. There is even a Facebook page Pretending-To-Be-On-The-Phone-To-Avoid-Someone!

Associated Press refers to "Michelle Hackman, a recent high school graduate in Long Island, New York, won a $US75,000 prize in this year's Intel Science Talent Search with a research project investigating teens' attachment to their mobile phones. She found that students separated from their phones were under-stimulated — a low heart rate was an indicator — and lacked the ability to entertain themselves."


My third rule is an electronics Sabbath - no electronics one day a week. At times, even this gets stretched. Going to the footy and not getting the commentary and scores via the phone from friends and media outlets is too hard!

These phones are new.

What rules do you have/need to have to manage the ubiquitous nature of these phones:

•  for yourself? 
• your workplace (amazed at how many train drivers I have seen looking at their phones as they travel along)
• your home?