Online privacy has become such a big deal, especially with data leaks and all sorts of shenanigans that they do with our data. You have a mobile device with an AI assistant always listening to you, and it knows where you are at any point in time. Websites are always offering you cookies and such.
Our phones have become such a huge part of our existence that they literally function as an extension of ourselves than simply just a communication device. You wake up, take your phone from under your pillow or wherever you keep it and the first thing you do is check notifications and messages, you haven’t even checked if everything is still real or if outside even exists. And yet, here we are….
I wonder if Alexander Graham Bell had any idea of the path his innovation would lead us…
Sometimes, I can’t help but reminisce on the good old days, how life used to be a couple of decades back. I grew up in an era where someone’s name, phone number and address could be found listed in a publicly available phone book (unless they specifically applied to be unlisted). No one ever got up to any seriously dodgy business.
I mean I may or may not have even looked up someone’s address by doing a reverse search of their telephone number in the directory so I could surprise them with a Christmas card. You dint worry about your details being harvested and sold to corporations with sophisticated algorithms that slowly manipulate your reality.
When the telephone rang and you answered; you put on your best voice and answered the call by informing them on whose Residence they had called upon. We used to race to the telephone to have the honour of answering it. Then as we grew older the calls were even for us, the only privacy you could would be in as long as the phone cable would allow you to go.
On one hand, I love how far we have come, on the other hand, I wonder, along the way, what the part of brains that used to remember and store phone numbers is up to these days…. and what happens to all those cookies?
Week 5 Stories Of Innovation
Becoming The Muse 
I do remember running to answer the phone, having no idea who it was but being so excited just to answer it before anyone else did. Oh yes and the good ole phone book. So much has changed. I do miss the simpler times.
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The times before technologie took over were some of my happiest memories 😁
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The good old days of answering phones, the phone book, listening to the answering machine for all those messages! Haha, great post!!
The other day my daughter sent me a text with a link to Ronald Reagan’s Library and said we should take Dad there as they are having a WWII exhibit. The next day on my FB and insta feeds they were showing me this exact link, so creepy!! I told my family and my son asked me if I clicked on the link in my text. Yes, I told him I did. Everything is linked up and like you said everything is listening!! 😲🤪🤠
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My husband was just saying how he misses the phone book!
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When I was in Junior school I was banned from answering the telephone because I always said something silly.
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This is exactly why I keep my phone use separate from my internet use. I have a dedicated gps unit if I need that and my emails can wait until I’m home on my laptop.
Of course, trying to MAKE a call on my phone feels like I’m sitting at the NASA space center trying to get a shuttle into space, sigh…
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