Cell phones can be wonderful things. You might even be reading this on a cell phone. And today is the 40th birthday of the first mobile phone. That phone—look at how cute the antenna is!—could call other people at a somewhat successful clip and not fit in your pocket, but that’s about it.
Over the last 40 years cell phones have developed the ability to do so many different non-phone-call things, making calling more of “feature” or, oh no, an “app,” rather than a vital method of communication upon which this device’s existence is based.
So, 40 years on, it’s time to take stock of and ask yourself—as others have already done—what Your Cell Phone can actually do.
Is your cell phone…
Making you into a terrible person?
Getting between you and your Valentine?
Not actually a cell phone and actually a cook book?
Fueling rape and murder in the Congo?
In short: carrier pigeons.
