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July 07, 2005
Just as you dress for success, you should manage your gadgets for success
Today's New York Times has an article about cell phone etiquette in the work place: stories about people interrupting business meetings to take calls from their children arranging meal choices; seminar leaders stopping their sessions to take calls; patients taking calls while the doctor is in the office waiting for them. We've all heard the stories, and witnessed them, and perhaps even participated in such calls.
I have long wondered when we made the transition to the seeming requirement that we must be personally and professionally available at all times. Are we so removed from personal interaction that we need our mobile phones to make others think that we are important? Thankfully, Case has not been infected by the Blackberry (aka "Crackberry" in some circles for its addictive qualities) mania that has infected many business and government offices, which allows meeting attendees to ignore the meeting and read and send emails, not to mention a host of other antisocial behavior. There are stories about government workers flirting in noisy bars via their Blackberries.
Just as loud personal phone calls in the office disturb colleagues, one wonders about the lack of courtesy that people exhibit with regard to their colleagues and fellow travelers. Do I really want to know the intimate details of someone's love life or divorce proceedings? (No, I don't, although I've heard--unsolicited--both.) Then there is the noisy doc in the locker room at 1-2-1 Fitness Center who talks about his patients' diagnoses for all to hear. (He's usually in another aisle of lockers, so maybe it's a case of "I can't see you, so you can't hear me.")
Many libraries have banned mobile phones altogether. (I visited the New York Public Library main reading room in January and at the entrance, there is a huge standing sign of a cellphone with the international red slash "forbidden" mark through it. It's a little hard to miss their point.) The Kelvin Smith Library has articulated a policy of allowing mobile phones only in the lobby area outside the security gates of the library. The policy is widely ignored, although it does seem to have lessened the noise of ringers. More to the point, the policy empowers library users to ask others to stop using their phones, if the users find such use disturbing. There is a second reason NOT to use your mobile in the atrium and main staircase area is that the atrium acts like a gigantic megaphone, and everything you say on the stairs can be heard on all of the landings throughout the building. (Likewise the advice applies to conversations as well.)
Posted by tdr at July 7, 2005 10:19 AM
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Comments
Hi Tim, I just came across your post about flirting on mobile phones in public places. It seems that these days that people really don't care about their privacy as we once did. While in days past people wouldn't talk about personal issues in public, today you can jump on a bus or train and you will be bound to hear someone divulging any number of personal issues over the phone without any care of people around them hearing them. Anyway, if you get a chance please come over and check my blog at flirting signs. All the best.
Shane.
Posted by: Shane at September 14, 2008 10:29 PM
This is true, and since the first mobile phone was first invented, it was already a sign that one's privacy is going to be breached all the time whilst using the phone.
Just because you have a mobile phone, it doesn't mean you can disturb someone else.
Posted by: Maxis Hotlink at December 30, 2008 12:06 PM
There are a few places where I find cell phones too much. Places where I wonder if the person is at all aware of those around them.
#1 - While driving. If you're driving but you're not driving well because you're on the phone... stop.
I don't mind if I can't tell by your driving but if it's obvious you're on the phone... get off.
#2 At Dinner. People seem to speak over the entire dining room... often for trivial or inconsequential matters.
#3 Library - Really? Someone better be in the hospital.
#4 Movies... I've told people to get off their phone numerous times. I have no qualms about dropping the bomb on someone talking on their phone in the theater or the theatre.
-D
Posted by: Dan @ Tips for Flirting at October 15, 2009 05:58 PM