“To everything there is a season … a time to plant and a time to pluck up …[i]
It was time for pluck but had I known the level of frustration involved, I might have lived with the current state of affairs a little longer.
It wasn’t earth-shattering, mind you, but the annoyance level was high. I wouldn’t want to do it more than once every ten years.
It was increasingly hard to get through a conversation on the oldest phone. Our carrier dropped off the face of the earth in mid-sentence. Even with a personal cell tower in our house, service was intermittent. The second phone was serviceable enough. The tablet, almost an original, was nearly useless. By all indications, technology had passed us by. Kids and grandkids rolling their eyes were the norms.
Staying with our current carrier was an acceptable option only if we could be satisfied with updated equipment but poor service. It was time for a change. Off we went to the large competitive carrier looking for the simplest solution to our dilemma.
Phone number one was too old to work on their system or qualify for a rebate. The second phone wasn’t compatible with their system either but qualified for a modest rebate. The tablet engendered a broad smile or was it a sneer.
A simple opportunity to upgrade some equipment resulted in three hours of in-store discussion, and information exchange between one device to another, and further hours on the phone with the corporate “customer loyalty” department to erase the activation fee they charge customers for each phone and tablet. They want to charge new customers to do business with them. Really?
I bought my first mobile phone in 1991. That was back in the day when it was a phone. I could make calls on it and I could receive calls. I upgraded to something better every year or so.
In 1994, I installed a phone in the car. Very modern and up-to-date. It required a microphone above the sun visor, a speaker behind the seat, and a big flip phone in a cradle that was atop a flexible post between the front seats. We removed the antenna on the back window to go through the car wash.
Flying back and forth to the mid-west and east cost required making a phone call when you landed so that the phone knew where you were.
When traveling from The City to the East Bay, I would wait until I had gone through the Caldecott Tunnel before calling home because it saved on roaming charges and long distance charges.
When we started using our new phones we discovered that, yes, most of the data transferred, but not all of the passwords for the apps. Almost all of the apps needed updating and reinstallation. That wasn’t too hard.
I started with the Weather Channel, then Facebook, Starbucks, Google, Amazon, Wells Fargo, Translate, Solitaire, Cribbage, KDFC, Pandora, Linkedin, Uber, Kindle, Amazon Alexa, SacBee, MLB at Bat, Kaiser Permanente, Netflix, OpenTable, Park Mobile, Golfshot Plus, Sky Guide and of course, My Verizon.
It turned out that many of the apps could be downloaded from the cloud, which should have been easy since it was such a cloudy day, but as you might suspect, it wasn’t. Going from a joint account to separate accounts requires new usernames, new passwords, new processes, and who knows what.
When I went to high school, I used an Underwood typewriter that my mother’s father had used. It was simple. The basic keyboard was the same layout – asdfg hjkl; - it lasted for generations. The sales clerk told me that phones and tablets are really meant to be replaced every couple of years. Really? Why do phones require such frequent upgrading? Aren’t they constructed well? The answer is simple. They are not phones after all.
We walk around with computer platforms that have a phone app on them, along with the choice of a million other apps. The phones are well made I suspect, but the technology moves too fast for the platforms to keep up. I wonder if we could get along ok without all those apps?
Maybe we could. But if we didn’t have them, how would we reserve a space in the parking garage at the Kings game or get a 20-minute warning that the parking meter is running out of time without Park Mobile? How would we make a reservation at a restaurant without Open Table? How would I know the distance to the flag on the golf course without Golfshot Plus, or be able to identify the stars and planets at night without Sky Guide? How would I make appointments with doctors and get lab results without the Kaiser Permanente app? How would I get a ride without Uber, read a book without Kindle, or listen to music without Pandora? How would I deposit a check from home without my Wells Fargo app? How would I buy from Amazon without their app?
It was really an inconvenience to set up all those conveniences. Well, anyway, we should be good for another ten years, at least. Or, maybe two?
