Digital Dead on the Move

Pedestrians often complain about drivers, well, driving like lunatics. But the other side of the story (there’s always another side) is the dangers that pedestrians create on the road, thanks to the cellphone! It’s almost as if pedestrians think they have what Donald Evans called The App of Invulnerability:

“There was of old a myth or fairytale in which the hero acquired a magic cloak which, though light as gossamer, rendered its wearer invulnerable to weapons.  Is there an app we haven’t heard about that bestows invulnerability on its downloader?  With that app – surely an Apple product – you can walk through battlefields, and bullets will bend around you, arrows will be repelled, and spears will turn into flowers.  Lacking a battlefield, you can ignore all traffic signals as you cross even the busiest of highways.  Havoc may reign around you as cars pile up, swerve onto sidewalks, and crash into jersey walls, but no harm will come to you.”

That was way back in June, 2012, an eternity in tech time. Today, Wayne Curtis tells us America is the land of the digital dead:

“Walk down any city street and you’ll see armies of the digital dead shuffling slowly, their eyes affixed to a small screen in their hands.”

Curtis wonders:

“Can zombies be cured, short of blowing up all power stations worldwide?”

Sure, if apps like Serendipitor are any indicator. I love the problem it seeks to solve as explained by one of its developers:

“In the near future, finding our way from point A to point B will not be the problem. Maintaining consciousness of what happens along the way might be more difficult.”

Serendipitor tries to keep you conscious by taking you on small detours with interesting views on the way. Curtis, however, feels the problem calls for stronger medicine. Like the phone should track how fast you are walking, and if you are going too fast or your eyes don’t move from the screen for extended periods, then throw a question that would force you to stop or at least slow down. If you thought you could just ignore the question, think again. Because:

“Only after answering the questions would you be allowed to reenter the digital world.”

I guess it takes technology to solve the problem that technology creates!