The Smartphone
Thinking Allowed
BBC
4.4 • 997 Ratings
🗓️ 15 September 2021
⏱️ 29 minutes
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Summary
The Smartphone: Nearly 90 per cent of British adults now own a smartphone and ownership among those aged 55 and over has soared from 55 per cent in 2019 to 70 per cent in 2020. Laurie Taylor explores the ways in which this ubiquitous object is transforming everyday life, from China to Ireland, & considers its impact on intimate relationships. He's joined by Daniel Miller, Professor of Anthropology at UCL and co-author of a new study involving 11 anthropologists who each spent 16 months living in communities in Africa, Asia, Europe and South America, focusing on the take up of smartphones by older people. They found that smartphones are technology for everyone, not just for the young, and are transformed by their users & national context. Also, Mark McCormack, Professor of Sociology at the University of Roehampton, considers the impact of smartphones on relationships in the UK. Are they keeping couples together when apart, and driving them apart when together?
Producer: Jayne Egerton
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Take some time for yourself with soothing classical music from the mindful mix, the Science of |
| 0:07.0 | Happiness Podcast. |
| 0:08.0 | For the last 20 years I've dedicated my career to exploring the science of living a happier more meaningful life and I want |
| 0:14.4 | to share that science with you. |
| 0:16.1 | And just one thing, deep calm with Michael Mosley. |
| 0:19.4 | I want to help you tap in to your hidden relaxation response system and open the door to that |
| 0:25.4 | calmer place within. Listen on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:30.3 | BBC Sounds, music, radio podcasts. |
| 0:36.0 | This is a Thinking Loud Podcasts, and for more details and much, much more about thinking aloud go to our website at BBC.co. UK. |
| 0:47.0 | Hello. |
| 0:50.0 | I put a nickel in the telephone, tell my baby's number got a busy line. |
| 1:00.0 | Each time I tried I got a busy tone not my baby's number just a busy line |
| 1:08.7 | Well, there's a sad little telephone story poor Rose Murphy can't get through to her boyfriend on the phone, and |
| 1:16.0 | when she finally hangs up and goes around to see him, she discovers the ugly truth. |
| 1:21.0 | And as I walked up to my baby then, I got my baby's number. |
| 1:27.0 | He was busy in the parlor doing fine. |
| 1:31.0 | Busy kissing someone else. I was keeping busy getting busy getting a busy busy busy |
| 1:37.0 | getting a busy busy line. |
| 1:41.0 | Yes, very sad, but an interesting reminder of how limited were our means of communication |
| 1:47.1 | before the advent of the smartphone. A reminder of the days of shared lines and button A's that didn't press and the engaged tone and |
| 1:56.4 | phones off the hook. Well, no such problems now. With the smartphone we can email and |
| 2:01.1 | text and use a single app as a platform where we can be in |
... |
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