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July 17, 2008
i, phone
"I want to have sex with this phone," I purred into my new iPhone.
"HANG UP! HANG UP FIRST!" said the person on the line.
What a marvelous, life-transforming piece of technology. This is not, as I would have thought, merely a phone with a couple of extra features. It's whatever I want it to be. Thanks to the App Store, I've easily installed free features that are already changing my life in ways both subtle and not so.
An app that uses GPS to determine the nearest bus stop (and route, from where I am to where I want to be) is perhaps the most practical, or it would be if I ever deigned to use Seattle's shitty public transportation system. By far the most amazing free app is Shazam, which listens to any song and correctly identifies its title and author within seconds. Useless? Yep. And irresistible. There are thousands of these apps.
The GPS and Web-browsing features combine to allow me to watch "me" drive across satellite photos in real time. While practical, especially when I plot my destination, too, this turns out to be dangerous. Sometimes virtual-me swerves off the road to the right, and real-me compensates by lunging left of center. Ah, progress.
posted by john at 5:36 AM • permalink