please empty your brain below

I've had a "CrackBerry" for two years and wouldn't be without it (sorry, DG - yes, it is addictive).
But the iPhone is a far greater scourge in our office now... What better way to get around the much-loathed (not by me!) company Internet use policy than by your personal iPhone? You're not using company-provided IT resources so it's okay, right?
And while you're at it, come to my staff meetings and tap away updating your Facebook profile... Hmmmm. *Not* impressed.

Regarding people who have their mobiles with Internet and e-mail access. If you are with them they seem to be often distracted by incoming e-mail, you mention a topic in conversation to them and they search for it on the internet for it, whilst they should be in discussion with you. For myself I have resisted having Internet on my mobile. I do not text very often. In fact I often switch my mobile telephone off! It is my servant, not my master.
People who browse most of the day on their telephones, perhaps should learn where the off switch is. Is it good for their eyes peering at a small screen all day?

Quarsan now spends journeys on the metro reading his Twitter feed. We barely talk since he received his hideous monster - and it's not even a Blackberry. Just a rather large wannabe.

Or, alternatively have a work Blackberry and a home Blackberry. 100\\% Blackberry addiction, but without 100\\% work interruptions

Blackberries. Facebook. Twitter.

All ways of avoiding communicating in the real world.

And if you're out with me, or in a meeting with me, and play on your phone, I *will* walk away. It's the height of rudeness.

Blackberry ! I can only just about tolerate a mobile phone. Almost redundant for me. I am at home and contactable on my landline or not at home and don't want to be contacted anyway.

I am currently awaiting delivery of a landline phone that accepts texts because there are is one awkward organisation that *must* be able to send a text to me whenever it needs to. I am bracing myself for the arguments as I try to explain they can send texts to a landline number and no they can't have my mobile number (which is probably switched off anyway).

PoP - can one not already send text to your landline? It just gets translated into electonically generated speech. Yes, you need an SMS enabled landline handset to send text messages from a landline, but I'm pretty sure all BT lines (and those non LLU lines with other providers - and maybe some LLU lines) now provide this service.

Yes, if you were more important you would have one. But if you were even more important than that you wouldn't. It's only the people in the middle who have them.

DG, you really hit the nail on the head with this article. I can't tell you how many times I've tried having a conversation with someone or run a presentation without the usual suspects tapping away on their blackberry!

I'm not a technophobe, so I have no problem with the technology per se but I find the breakdown in manners utterly detestable.

calandar - goosync will sync your phone calendar with your google calendar. Who needs a balckberry.

Blackberry = the last refuge of the self-important.

@Blue Witch,

Yes there are such services but I am scared of something being misread - be it by human or machine. There is also the security aspect for sensitive information. Besides, in general I like embracing new technology - but I make an exception for mobile phones and Blackberrys.

coincidentally I was given a Blackberry yesterday. I prefer it to my phone as I could not read the screen on my Nokia and I never got the hang of using the number pad to send text messages. (Text messages are the main means of communication with my 17 year old son, the alternative being grunts.).

Two other sexy features: I don't use GPS navigators, but its cool to be able to call up a satellite view of a place I am visiting - particularly on work trips; I have subscribed to Robert Elms podcast and The Archers podcast - a fine way to spend time on my 40 minute train journey home.

Next I want to work out how I can track my son in real time . . .

Blackberrys I am not even interested, but hands off my iPhone. My God is it addictive and SHINEY.

A (somewhat rude) way to attract the attention of the (somewhat rude) people who are constantly playing with their iPhone:
http://2lmc.org/iphone/
(nb. contains swearing)

Writing as someone who has spent the last decade in the industry working on getting mobile phones to do more and more and more, and having experienced the upsides and downsides (as I see them) first hand and at close range, my best advice would be this: the upsides can be great, and sometimes quite exhilerating; but don't forget that these things are just tools i.e. means to an end. If the "end" is about being a better person (more informed, more cool, more satisfied, more whatever, whether at work or at "play") then consider to what extent you substitute these for other aspects of yourself, and whether the things you do "less of" result in a better life in support of your goals. We all have different priorities. For example, for some it's all about career and promotion and money, for others it's quality time with friends and family. A huge and possibly infinite spectrum of priorities. In my experience I think such tools (like phones, Blackeberries, laptops etc.) tends naturally towards an equilibrium of usage that reflects the owner's priorities. So if that chap is tapping away under the table on his Blackberry during the meeting, it's because he has found such use as coducive to helping him achieve his goals. Because if it didn't he would surely find out such and change his usage accordingly? We all might not share his priorities though, and so we use our tools differently.

Where things start going wrong is if your life's priorities involve others you have made commitments to e.g. spouse, children, family etc. but it's not just mobile phones and Blackberries that these can be affected by ....

blackberries are great in pies and wine not as a substitute for holding intelligent conversations. I haven't got one and won't get one. My mobile phone is for emergencies only.

Blue Witch wrote "Blackberries. Facebook. Twitter.

All ways of avoiding communicating in the real world."

I couldn't agree more!!
Hubby and I are chalk and cheese. He has a Blackberry, facebook acoount and every latest gadget. I have a 4 year old mobile that gets a £10 top up once a year and is usually languishing with a dead battery under a pile of junk on my desk.

Great post DG. Who wants to be contactable 24/7 anyway!

Funily enough I handed my Blackberry back yesterday, I hated the thing and it did indeed feel like a digital ball and chain. A mobile and remote access to work emails (but only when I want to read them) is more than enough thankyouverymuch.

If it is any consolation DG, your blog is rather unreadable on my BlackBerry, so I always save your daily dit for the office PC.

I've been reading Pepys' diary daily since DG referred us to it on Sept 1st. Pepys worked long hours and got through massive amounts of work, but in the absence of a communications device he had little to distract him. He had to do a lot of walking too, if he wanted to speak to someone, so got out of the office regularly. 343 years later it's difficult to see any improvement in the administrator's working environment, in fact quite the opposite.

Can someone please translate Jag's badly spelt spiel into English please

Oh, that really was very badly spelt. I am ashamed and apologetic. And I'm not sure what I was trying to get across to be honest. I had certainly started the comment off with something in my mind, but by the time I got to the end of it I had changed my mind. And all that "wandering" made me forget to proof it before hitting the button. :-(

Blue Witch: Then why have blogs, or the Internet and mobile phones at all, if it just gets in the way of 'real communication'? These are probably the same people who, 10 years ago, said they would never get a mobile phone and thought it'd break down any real communication, but now do have one.

I've got a Blackberry, it doesn't rule my life. I've got Twitter, it doesn't rule my life either. Not one social networking site of device does that inherently; it's the people who use it and how they use it. The same thing exists with older forums of media such as tv addicts and video game addicts.

I might be a lone voice here, but I have found the blackberry liberating and a massive relief from stress. It means I can go in late, or leave early, and spend some time with the kids, without stressing that I really should be in the office.

I'm in almost total agreement with all the comments here except that just yesterday I held a faux Blackberry for the first time ever.

I won't bother again because my fingers are way to big to operate the buttons.

Do the Chinese have tiny digits?











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