Do smartphones need a dumbing down?

People who are really into smartphones — like many of the folks reading this, I suspect — were waiting for them nearly their entire lives. There’s a distinct type of person, the gadget addict, who simply can’t pack enough functionality into their possessions. From Swiss Army knives to Leatherman multitools to digital jacks-of-all-trade, these people delight in squeezing maximum utility into minimum space.

As a self-diagnosed member of this fraternity, I was more than a bit taken aback by a recent Financial Times editorial whose enticing headline suggested that we “Bring Back the Dumbphones.” This was not some Luddite manifesto, though, but rather a genuine argument that smartphones have made addicts of many of us (the author included). In her opinion, the craving to play with her phone was reminiscent of another activity fraught with downsides: smoking cigarettes.

The piece essentially argues that smart devices are both addictive and socially isolating, allowing us to get wrapped up in the on-screen content at the expense of healthier, meatspace interaction. It wants us to leave the computing at the computer, and to ditch the devices we spend so much time discussing, reading about, and staring at. The trouble is, simply swapping out smart phones for feature phones would not achieve the end result being sought.

This is not a new concept, of course. Ever since personal computers began pervading the home, there have been people who get lost in the digital world. Internet addiction was widely covered and studied in the early years of the online experience, and there’s always a new ailment to fear from engaging in technological excess (think carpal tunnel syndrome, texting thumb, monitor eye, etc.).

Despite the long line of tech-induced risks, smartphones are still arguably somewhat unique in the risk that they potentially hold, because they are literally within arm’s reach for the vast majority of our lives. Once you manage to leave the house, your addiction to the desktop is temporarily relieved as a practical matter; not so with our pocket-friendly communicators.

Assuming that the FT article is in fact addressing a genuine problem — and observed behavior suggests that it is — is the logical cure to just make our phones less appealing to use? It seems not only a bit foolish to me, but ultimately ineffectual as well. To use the smoking analogy woven throughout the editorial, it seems to be like trying to quit cigarettes by carrying around a tin of chewing tobacco.

Because, despite the fact that we dismissively refer to feature phones as “dumb,” many of them are really quite full-featured, with high distraction potentials. Even the most bare-bone models include a few games and the ability to text message, among other time wasters. Perhaps the senior-focused handsets from Jitterbug are basic enough to eliminate temptation.

Here’s what it comes down to: So-called dumb phones still have the capability of serving as distractions, which is FT‘s main knock against smartphones too. It’s kind of similar to the logic behind laws which force drivers to only make calls on headsets, in that it ignores the reality that it’s the conversation itself which is the distraction, not the simple act of holding a handset up to one’s head. But that leads us to an even more uncomfortable, potential solution: untethering ourselves from cell phones altogether.

To me, it seems like an overly broad and draconian solution to a problem that could effectively be solved by willpower alone — the same willpower required to ditch your cool power-packed smartphone in favor of one of the rapidly diminishing feature phones still available. (What’s the last branded feature phone whose name you can recollect? Thought so.)

I’ll tell you what, though: If thoroughly enjoying the mobile lifestyle is fraught with danger and negative consequences, it’s still a risk I’m willing to take. Smartphones are the pinnacle of converged devices, the very essence of the perfect gadget that so many of us spent years consciously or unconsciously searching for. Besides the amazing capabilities of the phones themselves, they tend to have the added benefit of engendering passionate and interesting communities of like-minded individuals.

What do you think? Are feature phones the answer to a society slowing turning inwards, tucking our heads into our shells as we eschew the tangible for the digital? Or is there some social value to these cyber interactions, even if the balance between actual and virtual continues to increasingly favor the latter?