I know what your thinking! No, I am not crazy. Just hear me out. Over the weekend I had a chance to watch the movie HER starring Joaquin Phoenix and Scarlett Johansson. In the latest from writer/director Spike Jonze, HER takes place in LA in the not so distant future where a depressed writer named Theodore (Phoenix) finds himself unhappy and in the midst of a divorce. Looking for companionship, Theodore purchases the newest operating system (OS1) on the market which is designed through artificial intelligence to learn, react and evolve just like a human.
The operating system portrays itself as a female named Samantha (Johansson). As Samantha continues to develop and grow over time, her conversations with Theodore become more and more meaningful. The two quickly form a strong bond as Theodore’s personal life improves. As the two grow closer, the bond grows stronger and they begin to develop an intimate relationship. At some point during the movie, the nerd in me came out as I shouted randomly, “DYOD!” My girlfriend immediately turned around and looked at me as if I was headed to the loony bin. I then explained to her the whole BYOD phenomenon, and how mobility is transforming the way we live (she still thinks I’m crazy but that’s a whole other story.) So are we on the verge of experiencing the Date Your Own Device trend? Well lets not get too ahead of ourselves here but just for fun, here is my top three ways that we are already dating or own devices. Oh and if your wondering how things ended up for Samantha and Theodore, you are just going to have to watch the movie!
1. GOOD MORNING YOU BEAUTIFUL SMARTPHONE – I admit it. How about you? The first thing I do when I wake up in the morning is check my phone starting with my emails and then social media updates. To prove I am not the only crazed info needy junkie out there it is stated in a recent research that 80% of smartphone users check their phones within 15 minutes of waking up!
2. THOSE LONG ROMANTIC WEEKENDS – Like many relationships, it can be difficult to spend quality time together during the week, with jobs, school, and other responsibilities so we try to make an effort to do something special on the weekends to make up for lost time. That can be going for a long drive, a secret weekend get away, or maybe curling on up on the couch to enjoy a marathon of your favorite TV series. Whatever it may be the important thing is that you are together. Well guess what! It looks like we like to spend more time on our smartphones during this period as well. 132 minutes is the average amount of time each day that smartphone users spend communicating and using social media on their phones. Over the weekend, Friday through Sunday, that number increases to 163 minutes. Monday through Thursday, it drops to 87 minutes.
As technology continues to advance, our dependency for staying connected also grows. I am not sure if I’m either more excited or terrified to see what the future has in store for us but I do know that whatever it may be, it should make for an interesting conversation.
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