The SmartPhone

                Smartphones have infiltrated our culture as being one of the most useful items around and embedding themselves into our lives to become essential tools of communication. Blackberries and iPhones in particular have become the most prominent and used hand phones around. Not only do smartphones enable the average user to make calls, but they also allow them to check their email, show the time, allow them to send messages instantaneously back and forth between the respective devices, take pictures and listen to music. The connectivity function in particular allows us to synchronize our lives with the world and stay in touch with everything that is happening that instant. In the Technology and Ideology reading, it mentions that daylight savings was only a recent invention. Before all the times were synchronized according to time zones, each town or city would adjust their times according to where they were positioned in the world and noon would be when the sun was highest in the sky and the shadow was the smallest on the sun dial. People did not seem to be in much hurry at all or too concerned about what was happening in the next town, or the next city, state or continent for that matter. As the technology improved, and people were traveling to different places and communicating across significant distances, the concept of synchronization became more important. As mentioned in our reading, once the railroads spread across the continent, there was enormous confusion with scheduling which made it difficult to run the trains. Technology progresses to satisfy people's needs, the progression in technology also creates a new culture, usually of getting things done faster, in a shorter time, and efficiency becomes more important. The emergence of smartphones has satisfied our need for increased efficiency in communication and being able to synchronize ourselves with the rest of the world even better.