Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with text stuff from how stuff?
Speaker 1: What's that? Hey, there, it's text stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland
Speaker 1: and I'm Lauren Boglebaum, and today we want to talk
Speaker 1: to you about social media. Do you use it? Do
Speaker 1: your kids use it? Are you worried? Could it possibly
Speaker 1: be turning you into an irritated hermit who likes to
Speaker 1: scream at people as they walk by your front door?
Speaker 1: Or is that just the natural progression of the way
Speaker 1: I'm aging? I might have share too much information just
Speaker 1: now there there is there's Jonathan's partially joking, but but
Speaker 1: there's a lot of I really do yell at people.
Speaker 1: But other than that, Yes, there's a lot of fear
Speaker 1: out there. I think in a lot of a lot
Speaker 1: of news stories that are kind of amping up that fear.
Speaker 1: And there's been several studies that that talk with this
Speaker 1: doom and gloom about like about like, oh, no, social
Speaker 1: media is so big that we're not going to talk
Speaker 1: to each other in person anymore. Um, total communication breakdown.
Speaker 1: Captain Donn's looking together that that kind of thing. Um,
Speaker 1: and uh, it's this is not pop stuff. But I
Speaker 1: like to just yes anyway, yeah, no, no, no, we
Speaker 1: quote documentaries all the time here on tech stuff. It's
Speaker 1: perfectly fine, and I agree entirely, Lauren. I mean from
Speaker 1: an armchair psychology perspective, if I were to just look
Speaker 1: at the whole idea of social media and human interaction
Speaker 1: in general, uh, part of me would think, hey, social
Speaker 1: media is replacing that face to face human interaction that
Speaker 1: we tend to think of as being really important as
Speaker 1: part of our development as a person, right, or that
Speaker 1: seems to be really important for a very long time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's it's part of socialization. And the worry
Speaker 1: is that without that face to face interaction with something
Speaker 1: else replacing it, we would be less capable of dealing
Speaker 1: with those interactions when they come up. And a lot
Speaker 1: of the the information about this tends to be anecdotal,
Speaker 1: which anyone who has done any science knows is not
Speaker 1: reliable when it comes to actually measuring it's not actually science. Um.
Speaker 1: There have been a few studies. There's a one one
Speaker 1: that you will hear quoted all the time was from
Speaker 1: the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society. UM.
Speaker 1: And uh this one said, this one is was in
Speaker 1: two thousand five, to be fair, so This was a
Speaker 1: few years ago, before Twitter and Facebook were really huge.
Speaker 1: But um, but it found that um, compared to people
Speaker 1: who do not use the internet frequently, those who do,
Speaker 1: um uh, spend seventy minutes less per day interacting with
Speaker 1: their family, twenty five minutes less per day sleeping, and
Speaker 1: thirty is less watching television. Although I'm not sure why
Speaker 1: that's necessarily a bad thing. Yeah, that could o but
Speaker 1: but but that but that family thing, that's seventy minutes
Speaker 1: less a day talking to your family, that sounds that
Speaker 1: sounds awful until of course you're interacting with your family
Speaker 1: online exactly. And that's and that's what we're I think
Speaker 1: it turns out that that is what we are doing
Speaker 1: right right. Yeah. Again, it's one of those things where
Speaker 1: I think the stereotype, the thing that we all imagine
Speaker 1: is the person sequestered in his or her room. Uh
Speaker 1: you know, it's dark. Its yeah, it's depressing, and yeah,
Speaker 1: the only interaction they get is never whomever is online.
Speaker 1: Is there a keyboard and never a microphone? Right, And
Speaker 1: that's it. And it could be a synchronous communication, meaning
Speaker 1: that you know, you leave a message, then later on
Speaker 1: the person reads it and then they leave a message.
Speaker 1: This is essentially the way email works. It's a synchronous
Speaker 1: as opposed to a face to face conversation, which is
Speaker 1: generally synchronous unless you're talking to me, in which case
Speaker 1: it is just a monologue. But uh, that's the way
Speaker 1: I work. But anyway, that's generally speaking, that tends to
Speaker 1: be the view is that it's a person who is
Speaker 1: withdrawing more and more. And it's this this idea that
Speaker 1: social media could ultimately be dehumanizing us, at least in
Speaker 1: the sense of how we define what a human is
Speaker 1: right now right, And to be fair, isolation is a
Speaker 1: very scary thing. Um. There's all kinds of studies about
Speaker 1: about how it can be as bad for you as
Speaker 1: smoking an obesity, how it increases cancers, tumors in mice. Um,
Speaker 1: I mean it's developmentally, it's a very big problem. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's there are actual cases of tragic cases of children
Speaker 1: who are deprived the ability to interact with other people
Speaker 1: and how that has impacted their ability to develop as
Speaker 1: a human, like like you know, they never really develop
Speaker 1: beyond a certain what would be equivalent to a certain age,
Speaker 1: like a younger age. That there are stories about kids
Speaker 1: who were in terrible conditions and you know, grow up
Speaker 1: and never really develop beyond say a seven or eight
Speaker 1: year old mission level. Lonely subjects have been found to
Speaker 1: have less brain activity than than people with a a
Speaker 1: healthy and diverse social network. Yes, whenever I get lonely,
Speaker 1: I'm not thinking of anything. It's just me and Supernatural,
Speaker 1: Natural Marathon. You had it, man, before I could even
Speaker 1: say it. Yes, it's just me and the next episode
Speaker 1: of Supernatural. Not that there's anything wrong with that. These
Speaker 1: brothers are dreaming. I wouldn't know. I don't want to
Speaker 1: show they are. I'm like, I believe you know. Okay, cool,
Speaker 1: So anyway, yes, that these are these are all perceptions. Now,
Speaker 1: when it comes down to science, there are a lot
Speaker 1: of different stays that look at this, and there's some
Speaker 1: conflicting results. And part of that is because the nature
Speaker 1: of the studies. Part of it is that you know,
Speaker 1: the studies are not necessarily looking at the exact same criteria, right,
Speaker 1: So it could be that one seems to contradict another,
Speaker 1: but it maybe then a broader perspective, they're not really contradictory.
Speaker 1: It's just that they're looking at they're looking at different
Speaker 1: aspects because when people are talking about social isolation, um,
Speaker 1: they're they're talking about the size, the intimacy, the diversity,
Speaker 1: and the location of your social network. Right. Yes, there's
Speaker 1: lots of different terms for this as well, about whether
Speaker 1: or not you have a certain number of confidence like
Speaker 1: people that you you really connect with. These are the
Speaker 1: people with whom you share those deep personal things that
Speaker 1: are not something you would talk about to just you
Speaker 1: your neighbor, unless they're your confident or or someone on
Speaker 1: the street or your coworker. Necessarily it's it's it's who
Speaker 1: you go to when you're upset or when you're happy.
Speaker 1: It's the first person that, if you're me, you text
Speaker 1: message when when something terrific happens to you haven't received
Speaker 1: text messages. Okay, so awkward, Uh, moving on, I'm dealing
Speaker 1: with a little heartbreak here. But it's okay, I I
Speaker 1: don't I don't have to be everyone's best friend. Well, well,
Speaker 1: the thing is that people that people really um, the
Speaker 1: average person has has one point eight ish and then
Speaker 1: that's that's you know, one point eight close contexts like that,
Speaker 1: depending upon depending on which survey, Because some of these
Speaker 1: one of the one of the surveys I really looked at,
Speaker 1: which is one that you you sent me the information to,
Speaker 1: So I thank you, Lauren, because without it I would
Speaker 1: have nothing to talk about. But it was a Pew
Speaker 1: Internet Personal Networks and Community survey. Now, before I even
Speaker 1: get into the data here, I should stress they surveyed
Speaker 1: two thousand, five twelve adults. Now that's a pretty small
Speaker 1: sample size, so any results we get you have to
Speaker 1: keep in mind this is this is a very small sample.
Speaker 1: But within that sample they drew some pretty big conclusions.
Speaker 1: One of those was that of American adults said they
Speaker 1: used the Internet, So wow, didn't but anyway said they
Speaker 1: used the Internet. And nearly half of adults, or of
Speaker 1: those who said they use the Internet, say they use
Speaker 1: at least one social networking service. So this is stuff
Speaker 1: like Facebook, Twitter, linked in, that kind of thing, and uh,
Speaker 1: this is sort of tangential to our community. Are our
Speaker 1: our conversation here, But I found it really interesting out
Speaker 1: of the ones they surveyed, of the those who used
Speaker 1: social networking services said they used Facebook, so them like
Speaker 1: Facebook is one of the ones I use, used my Space,
Speaker 1: LinkedIn and used Twitter, so that means more people are
Speaker 1: using my Space than Twitter, which to me says the
Speaker 1: of people who said that are all in the band.
Speaker 1: I mean, really, when was the last time use my space?
Speaker 1: I I deleted my my Space account about a year ago. Now,
Speaker 1: I granted it's it's coming back because brought sexy and
Speaker 1: my Spacebook. Those are the two things he brought back.
Speaker 1: I don't know where he went to find them, but
Speaker 1: he brought them back. Um. But yeah, I don't use
Speaker 1: my Space either. It just blows my mind that more
Speaker 1: people are using my Space that in the survey anyway
Speaker 1: than LinkedIn and Twitter. But um but but but that's
Speaker 1: I mean, that is indicative of the of the overall usage.
Speaker 1: I mean, Facebook as of October had um one billion
Speaker 1: monthly active users. Yeah, that's a huge, huge number and
Speaker 1: four million daily active users. That's a whole bunch of people.
Speaker 1: That's that's that's more people than there are even user
Speaker 1: accounts on Twitter. Um as as of December, Twitter had
Speaker 1: had more than December people when the far future are
Speaker 1: listening to back in the future, where's my jet pack?
Speaker 1: Is it on the way the time machine to bring
Speaker 1: it back to me? Right? There's no way they can
Speaker 1: tell me. This is the sad thing like you've been
Speaker 1: using it for three years. Time travel stinks, um because
Speaker 1: I only get to go one direction and it's really slow,
Speaker 1: second by second as it turns out. Anyway, the interesting
Speaker 1: thing about this this survey, I mean, we've been kind
Speaker 1: of talking about the things they found, but one of
Speaker 1: the things they were specifically looking for was this idea
Speaker 1: of social isolation and does the use of social media
Speaker 1: contribute to social isolation? Is it true that we are
Speaker 1: actually withdrawing from so I D in favor of the
Speaker 1: interactions that we have on social networking services? And according
Speaker 1: to the service spoiler alert, no, no it's not. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they said that, according to the surveying that social isolation
Speaker 1: has not really changed since which this is just for
Speaker 1: people who aren't paying really close attention. Not really a
Speaker 1: big year for the internet. Um five, If you were
Speaker 1: using the Internet, you were in a research facility or
Speaker 1: a university. Uh, you were not the average person. Because,
Speaker 1: of course, the Worldwide Web the main way we tend
Speaker 1: to think about interacting with the Internet, apart from apps
Speaker 1: and stuff. That's starting to really take control but soon
Speaker 1: wed web wasn't a thing until two so obviously is
Speaker 1: before social networking services are a thing like three people
Speaker 1: on Prodigy as of eight and that was just it.
Speaker 1: So if you're on a bulletin board system, maybe, but
Speaker 1: it's before social networking servi This is obviously uh, but
Speaker 1: these the extent of social isolation hasn't really changed the sense.
Speaker 1: So that tells us that it's very possible social networking
Speaker 1: services don't have a big impact. Now we can't say
Speaker 1: that for sure because there are a lot of different facts. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it could be that we are reducing social isolation at
Speaker 1: an exponential rate, but the social networking services are pulling
Speaker 1: that back. So it could be that there is an
Speaker 1: impact on social isolation. It's just that other factors are
Speaker 1: pushing it forward, so it ends up balancing. Yeah, this
Speaker 1: is the complex thing about science. This is why drawing
Speaker 1: conclusions is difficult. You have to do a lot of
Speaker 1: studies and really look at all the different factors and
Speaker 1: try and control for as many variables as possible because
Speaker 1: otherwise whatever you say could turn out to be not
Speaker 1: so true in the grand scheme of things. But based
Speaker 1: upon what this survey found, it looks like social networking
Speaker 1: services are not turning us all into hermits. This isn't
Speaker 1: from the same Pew Internet study. I think it's from
Speaker 1: a different one. I didn't write down which study it's
Speaker 1: from in my notes, but um, it's been found that
Speaker 1: mobile phone use has actually made our contact lists smaller
Speaker 1: but more intense. That makes sense. So, for instance, you know,
Speaker 1: it's not that it's not that the relationships are less meaningful.
Speaker 1: It just means that the ones that we contact, we're
Speaker 1: really depending upon them, and that we might be using
Speaker 1: a phone in order to make that connection as opposed
Speaker 1: to necessary you know, walking across the street or or
Speaker 1: driving to a friend's house or meeting up at a
Speaker 1: coffee shop or whatever. To me, you know, that just
Speaker 1: means that we're transferring that same need for interaction to
Speaker 1: a different medium. It doesn't mean that we're losing that interaction.
Speaker 1: It just means that it's a you know, we're taking
Speaker 1: advantage of technology in ways that we couldn't before, which
Speaker 1: is awesome because I mean, I'm sure you've known people
Speaker 1: who have moved away. You you yourself have moved a
Speaker 1: few times. Absolutely. I I play Halo every Wednesday nights
Speaker 1: that I get to hang out with my friends who
Speaker 1: don't live here anymore. Right, So this is technology giving
Speaker 1: us those social interactions that otherwise we might lose if
Speaker 1: if we were to relocate or our friends relocate. And
Speaker 1: in my view, that's a huge positive. It means that
Speaker 1: those those those relationships that have been formed over years
Speaker 1: sometimes decades of uh knowing one another don't fade away.
Speaker 1: They still remain relevant because technology allows us to continue
Speaker 1: to build those relationships. Now, those interactions, the nature of
Speaker 1: them might change event but it's still a very important
Speaker 1: part of who we are and how we interact. And
Speaker 1: for some people, um, you know, there there are mentally
Speaker 1: and physically disabled people, the elderly, um, new new mothers
Speaker 1: who can't get out of the house, um, all kinds
Speaker 1: of people who they've been doing medical studies with to
Speaker 1: see if use of the internet can actually give them
Speaker 1: better social interaction. Sure, it's it's it's been found to
Speaker 1: reduce depression and to those groups, um and and has
Speaker 1: really helped people out. So yeah, I've even seen that
Speaker 1: there have been studies done with people who have various
Speaker 1: mental health conditions who otherwise would find it very difficult
Speaker 1: to socialize. They they either not just awkward like me
Speaker 1: and Jonathan, right, No, no, no, people who really find
Speaker 1: it difficult to form any kind of social contact. It's
Speaker 1: just one of those things that it's a block for them,
Speaker 1: and uh, it can be very frustrating, especially if they
Speaker 1: observe that other people are capable of doing this. And
Speaker 1: there are so many factors involved here. There's a there's
Speaker 1: an entire taboo about mental health in our culture that
Speaker 1: is that's problematic and so awful. Yeah, and it feeds
Speaker 1: on itself, right, it betimes this thing where it just
Speaker 1: mounts on the person who's experiencing this. And some of
Speaker 1: the studies had people using social networks and and they
Speaker 1: were finding it much easier to interact with people and
Speaker 1: making suggestions on how to create a social network with
Speaker 1: two rules that would allow them to have greater interaction. Which, yeah,
Speaker 1: you think about that, like this is this is what
Speaker 1: technology should do. Technology should help people so that they
Speaker 1: can interact any way they want in though, you know,
Speaker 1: in a way that brings them the satisfaction that people
Speaker 1: can have, you know, people who don't have these conditions
Speaker 1: tend to find naturally. Um, I like this to me,
Speaker 1: it's to me, it's a great thing. And anything that
Speaker 1: decreases that sense of isolation and that sense that taboo
Speaker 1: is a good thing to and it's it's an added dimension.
Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be it doesn't have to be replacement.
Speaker 1: It can be. And things change. I mean, I mean,
Speaker 1: Socrates was terrified that writing was going to ruin people's brains. Oh,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about this, but we're gonna get
Speaker 1: into that all right. Now, hang on one second. Now,
Speaker 1: let's take a quick break to thank our sponsor, and
Speaker 1: now back to the show. So you were talking about Socrates,
Speaker 1: and right right, the idea that writing things down means
Speaker 1: that you're taking stuff out of your brain and putting
Speaker 1: it on paper or stone or clay or whatever. Right
Speaker 1: a tree, your buddy Bill who stands still for really
Speaker 1: long periods of time, whatever, you're taking it out of
Speaker 1: your brain, you're putting it on something else. And therefore
Speaker 1: you are no longer relying on your brain to process
Speaker 1: that information because you've offloaded it. Socrates thought this was
Speaker 1: a terrible idea. The interesting thing is that attitude has
Speaker 1: continued up to present day, which is, you know, I
Speaker 1: assume why you brought it up, because today we have
Speaker 1: computers and and uh smartphones and calculators. Calculators. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: could not do complex equations anymore without the use of
Speaker 1: a calculator, because frankly, I just don't use those skills
Speaker 1: as frequently as I as I used to. Well, you're
Speaker 1: a writer, you're not a mathematician. I'm not a good
Speaker 1: one either, um, and then mathematician that is, I'm an
Speaker 1: excellent writer. You should read some of my articles at
Speaker 1: houstufforce dot com. You know what I'm talking about. So anyway, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I know, that's the exactly I mean. Nicholas Carr wrote
Speaker 1: the famous article for The Atlantic. Is Google making a
Speaker 1: stupid this whole idea that because we've got so much
Speaker 1: information on the Internet, that we have access to information
Speaker 1: and therefore we're less intelligent? Right right? We don't. We
Speaker 1: don't have to remember stuff, we don't have to know stuff.
Speaker 1: We just because I'm DD knows it, right, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: why do we? Why do I need to even process
Speaker 1: this information? All I have to do is type in
Speaker 1: search query and Google pull up the first answer and
Speaker 1: then and then repeat it back. It doesn't even mean
Speaker 1: that I even process it on a level where I
Speaker 1: understand it. Social media or social networking services, some people
Speaker 1: were worried a similar thing is going on with the
Speaker 1: social aspect. As we're talking with the memory and processing
Speaker 1: of information on the internet. This idea that social networking
Speaker 1: services are creating a less meaningful way of connecting with people,
Speaker 1: But things like this Pew research survey suggest otherwise. It's
Speaker 1: suggests that we're getting just as much meaningful interaction online
Speaker 1: and through technology as we would face to face. The
Speaker 1: actual nature of that interaction may change somewhat somewhat, but
Speaker 1: it's still important and it's still helpful. Yeah, and and
Speaker 1: that's I mean, you know that that kind of fear
Speaker 1: of technology. To be fair, we hear tech stuff are
Speaker 1: probably biased towards technology and just maybe maybe a little
Speaker 1: bit please listen to all our episodes on your computer
Speaker 1: ours contact at Discovery dot com. But um, but but no,
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean fear of fear of technology isn't
Speaker 1: going to change the fact that technology is out there,
Speaker 1: and it's not going to change the fact that things
Speaker 1: are changing. Change happen, society changes, everything changes, you know.
Speaker 1: And people were also worried, um in the Industrial Revolution
Speaker 1: that because um, because these these machines we were starting
Speaker 1: to automate human processes, that that the the equality of
Speaker 1: workspace interaction was going to go down right, and and
Speaker 1: all kinds of other ripple effects out from that. And
Speaker 1: for sure that's where we get the whole sabotage thing,
Speaker 1: because people, you know, the whole idea, the sabo throwing
Speaker 1: the wooden shoe into the automated loom to destroy it.
Speaker 1: So any are old old listeners to not not old listeners,
Speaker 1: but people have listened to old episodes of tech stuff.
Speaker 1: Know that. We've talked about that many many times. And
Speaker 1: and it's not it's you know, the answer is, yes,
Speaker 1: things are changing, but no, that's not necessarily bad thing. Yeah.
Speaker 1: In fact that that Again, going back to that Pew survey,
Speaker 1: one of the other things I thought was really interesting
Speaker 1: was that they found that people who used web a lot. Again,
Speaker 1: another one of those those uh perceptions is that these
Speaker 1: are people who don't get out as much. They don't
Speaker 1: you know, they don't interact in other ways other than online.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't seem to be the case according to
Speaker 1: the people that they surveyed. According to the survey, the
Speaker 1: folks who used the web were actually more likely to
Speaker 1: interact with people in their immediate physical environment. They were
Speaker 1: more like need to do things like speak to a
Speaker 1: neighbor on a on a regular basis or uh yes,
Speaker 1: it's respondent said that they talked to a neighbor at
Speaker 1: least once per month, and they found that bloggers are
Speaker 1: seventy two percent more likely to belong to a local
Speaker 1: voluntary association than those who do not blog. So there
Speaker 1: you've got people who are very much invested in the
Speaker 1: online world, but not at the expense of the physical one,
Speaker 1: so directly contradicting that armchair psychology approach, which is why
Speaker 1: we always say, like, yeah, there's that whole idea of
Speaker 1: common sense dictates, which often means I am wrong, but
Speaker 1: it seems like I'm right. I do this all the time.
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, common sense talking up of my butt
Speaker 1: because I don't have any data in front of me.
Speaker 1: But yeah, they also found out they said web users
Speaker 1: are more likely to visit a cafe. I did not
Speaker 1: say if it was an Internet cafe, which obviously would
Speaker 1: increase the odds, but fifty two that more likely to
Speaker 1: visit a library. Didn't say if that was because of
Speaker 1: how they access the Internet, but hey, thirty four percent
Speaker 1: more likely to visit a fast food restaurant that I
Speaker 1: don't necessarily think it's a good thing. You know what,
Speaker 1: I haven't visit a fast food restaurant in a very
Speaker 1: long time, for I'm not a fast food fan. More
Speaker 1: likely to visit other restaurants now I'm in that category
Speaker 1: we might like food and oh gosh, I love food,
Speaker 1: and then more likely to visit a public park, which
Speaker 1: is awesome. That is awesome. So we're talking about people
Speaker 1: who have a real investment in their community and an
Speaker 1: interest in the world outside the realm of the computer.
Speaker 1: So that does contradict They aren't going outside, They're just
Speaker 1: taking pictures to upload when they get home. Right. Oh,
Speaker 1: that reminds me of something I wanted to talk about
Speaker 1: that wasn't on our on the notes, but it was.
Speaker 1: It's this idea. It's something that's interesting. So one of
Speaker 1: the one of the conflicts that people have with whole
Speaker 1: social networking services and everything is that it it is
Speaker 1: constantly interrupting our daily lives if we are connected in
Speaker 1: various ways, so that, uh, there are times where it's
Speaker 1: inappropriate for you to stop what you're doing and respond
Speaker 1: to someone on Facebook or Twitter, like like you're at work,
Speaker 1: or you are in a conversation with someone, or you're
Speaker 1: up on stage developing a keynote address to a bunch
Speaker 1: of people. But I was gonna say, like driving, but so,
Speaker 1: uh anyway, have you ever been to uh dinner with
Speaker 1: someone or a meal with someone when the very first
Speaker 1: thing that happens is smartphone hits the table? Yes, that
Speaker 1: drives me so crazy. Are you ever that person? Or
Speaker 1: do you leave your smartphone away? Okay, to be fair,
Speaker 1: I'm very occasionally that person, but usually it's revenge smartphone use.
Speaker 1: Usually it's it's after someone else has brought out their smartphone.
Speaker 1: I I I have on occasion gotten a little bit
Speaker 1: huffy and well, fine, I'm gonna I'm gonna check Facebook too. Well, Lauren,
Speaker 1: I hate to break this to you, but you're gonna
Speaker 1: get way worse because now you're a tech stuff co host.
Speaker 1: And uh, let me put it this way. When I
Speaker 1: hang out with other technology podcasts hosts and we all
Speaker 1: go out to eat, the table creaks under the weight
Speaker 1: of the electronics that hit it first thing, I am
Speaker 1: not kidding. I remember meals with people like and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna be dropping some names here, folks, because my back hurts.
Speaker 1: Get ready, so I gotta drop some weight. Get ready.
Speaker 1: But people like Sarah Lane I as actor, and tom
Speaker 1: Merritt uh This Weekend tech or or Molly Wood of
Speaker 1: c NET or um oh, Justin Robert Young and Brian
Speaker 1: Brushwood and and and Veronica Belmont. We've all I've been
Speaker 1: to dinner with these folks in various settings, and invariably,
Speaker 1: the first thing that happens is everyone's smartphone hits the
Speaker 1: table and anytime you're not looking at a menu or talking,
Speaker 1: you're and I include myself, I am not immune to this.
Speaker 1: This is something I've done too, and some people are
Speaker 1: better about than others. But it is one of those
Speaker 1: things that can be kind of distracting. And I will
Speaker 1: admit this is one of those behaviors that is socially
Speaker 1: It's becoming more and more socially acceptable in the sense
Speaker 1: that everyone's doing it, but but I still I am
Speaker 1: a little bit eked out by it. Yeah, it can be.
Speaker 1: It can be insulting if you're talking to someone and
Speaker 1: you just see them looking because you know. But the
Speaker 1: reason why I brought it up, there's a restaurant in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles called Eva Restaurant E v A. And I'm
Speaker 1: sure it's not the only restaurant that does this. But
Speaker 1: Eva restaurant has a policy which is if you come
Speaker 1: inside the restaurant and you surrender your cell phone to
Speaker 1: the waiter when you come in, you get a five
Speaker 1: percent discount on your bill. That's a delightful. So you
Speaker 1: come in. The waiter explains the policy, especially in l A. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you have the choice of yeah, especially yeah, no kidding
Speaker 1: all those actors waiting for the breakout call or those
Speaker 1: agents waiting for their actors to call them. But yeah,
Speaker 1: it means that you you just you hand it over
Speaker 1: and then you concentrate on the food and the experience.
Speaker 1: And you know, the restaurant's policy is that this way,
Speaker 1: you're really focusing on the meal and you're enjoying it
Speaker 1: for what it is, as opposed to distracting yourself and
Speaker 1: the meal is just something you're doing in between tweets. Right.
Speaker 1: It also means Instagram hates it because there's so few,
Speaker 1: so many fewer pictures of food flooding the Internet, which
Speaker 1: which we are in in dire lacking of food and cats. People,
Speaker 1: We need more food and cats on the Internet. Staff
Speaker 1: I'm i'm, I'm starting my my me and my Tumbler
Speaker 1: followers are starting a drive for more acute hedgehogs on
Speaker 1: the internet. I think that this is a thing that
Speaker 1: needs to happen. Had a good run, it did well.
Speaker 1: That bucket, that bucket, it was a bucket list. Oh no, oh,
Speaker 1: dear that one. That one that was such a stretch.
Speaker 1: That wasn't that joke? Wasn't that that was not sure?
Speaker 1: It was just words, That's what that was. But but
Speaker 1: but but no, but I mean, it is, it is.
Speaker 1: It can divide our attention, and I do um. I've
Speaker 1: seen a couple of news reports lately that that had
Speaker 1: this announcer being shocked shocked. Did you know that when
Speaker 1: young people wake up, they check their cell phone before
Speaker 1: getting out of bed, And I'm like, I'm like, people
Speaker 1: don't do that. First of all, my cell phone is
Speaker 1: my alarm. Of course my mind too, Yeah, because that
Speaker 1: means by turning off my alarm, I am checking my
Speaker 1: cell phone, right, And I don't get out of bed
Speaker 1: to throw off my alarm because that's just ridiculous. That
Speaker 1: would be that would help me wake up. Probably I
Speaker 1: should do that, but no, I do not. I'm a
Speaker 1: morning person anyway, So as soon as as soon as
Speaker 1: those eyes pop up and I'm ready to go. I'm
Speaker 1: not happy about it. I'm not a sureful morning person.
Speaker 1: I'll still be grouchy at you. I just I'm just alert,
Speaker 1: that's all. But but yeah, but but but that that
Speaker 1: in the kind of behavior where you see more people
Speaker 1: at a concert, for example, um, taking photos of the
Speaker 1: concert than you do watching the concert. Yeah. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: that's the thing, And that's you know, yeah, I get
Speaker 1: grouchy at concerts too. That It's that's why I reconcert
Speaker 1: needs to be a private show of just me and
Speaker 1: the and the musician when one of those get off
Speaker 1: my lawn kind of moments. Yeah, there's only a couple
Speaker 1: of musicians I know who would be willing to do that, oh,
Speaker 1: to to actually do like, okay, it's just me and you,
Speaker 1: I'll play my songs for you. Someone that we know together.
Speaker 1: But that's because she's nice and it would be you
Speaker 1: know she she'd essentially be doing a favor for me,
Speaker 1: So I like hear anything. But yeah, no, I think
Speaker 1: it's a good discussion. I mean it's I think ultimately
Speaker 1: the takeaway we have to have is that we do
Speaker 1: not have a full spectrum of data to really support
Speaker 1: this one way or the other. But it looks like
Speaker 1: it's not as damaging as we would first think perhaps,
Speaker 1: and it may in fact be helpful. Uh, since it's
Speaker 1: kind of a social science thing, it's what we call
Speaker 1: one of the soft sciences, and whenever you get people involved,
Speaker 1: it really messes with the variables. So because we're not
Speaker 1: all the same as it turns out crazy. Yeah, funky
Speaker 1: about that, right, So ultimately it may we may not
Speaker 1: be able to come down and say definitively whether it's
Speaker 1: good or bad. It just it looks like it's not. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: And and that's a good thing for me. I actually
Speaker 1: really depend on my social network networks to stay in
Speaker 1: touch with my friends because my schedule is so busy
Speaker 1: I don't get to spend as much time with them
Speaker 1: in meat space as I would like. So yeah, it's
Speaker 1: I think of it as a good thing, and I'm
Speaker 1: glad that it looks like it's not going to bring
Speaker 1: the world to its knees. So yeah, do you have
Speaker 1: anything else to say before we sign off? And that's
Speaker 1: about all I got. All right, Well, guys, if you
Speaker 1: have any suggestions for future episodes of tech Stuff, well
Speaker 1: here's what I would like you to do. Go and
Speaker 1: write us a little email. Our address is tech stuff
Speaker 1: at Discovery dot com. Or contact us on Facebook or
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Speaker 1: sides at this point. But if you're not our handle,
Speaker 1: there is tech Stuff hs W and Lauren and I
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