Keeping It Simple

A week ago, I was the victim of a pre-meditated crime. 

My smartphone died. It just died on the spot. Aged one year and three months, it left us. Just wouldn't turn on one fine day. The empty, black screen of death stared back at me no matter how hard I pressed the on/off button.

My trained reflexes kicked in immediately and I started to perform emergency CPR procedures on the device (you know, like taking the battery out, re-charging it endlessly, and giving it a thump with my hand). 

But nothing seemed to work. 

So in we went to phone A&E. The man at the phone-shop ran some tests, sold me a new battery, and then had to conduct further, advanced overnight tests. 

The next day he drew me aside with a look of grave concern. 

"Sir, there's something I need to explain." 

I appreciated his gentle, empathetic bedside manner. I could see he was finding it hard to come to terms with the situation and he was battling with his words.

"It's your phone, sir. It's dead."

I immediately passed through all the stages of bereavement: Anger, denial, bargaining, depression, acceptance.

There was, however, good news. The phone could be repaired. It would cost the price of a new phone. And unfortunately it would not be under warranty. His advice: Why didn't I just buy a new phone?

As a parting shot, the phone-man added: "Don't feel too bad, sir. It happens to a lot of phones as they pass the 1-year mark."

This pre-meditated crime goes by the name of "planned obsolescence". 

My phone was just over a year old. I got the impression that it was designed to break. And I was designed to instantly buy another one. 

This got me thinking.

Co-conspirators

Manufacturers trade off the fact that the consumer will all too readily buy another as soon as something becomes obsolete.

The manufacturers get away with it because modern people are co-conspirators in the plot. Modern people have a lust for whatever's new. The old and the un-shiny get scorned.

Even if the manufacturers don't do it, modern people make their own stuff obsolete all the time. 

Here are some examples.

Clothes become obsolete just because they are no longer new. In my father's day, a man would have five sets of clothes that he would wear until they were worn out. 

Now, we have so many clothes that we seldom wear many of them. Then we throw out clothes that are in good condition because we "don't really wear them anymore". And then we promptly hit the malls to replace the formerly new items with really new items.

Technology moves so fast because we are ever discontent with the status quo. It was fast enough, small enough, sexy enough yesterday; but today it's just too slow, too big and too uncool. 

The electronic consumer's avarice for faster, smaller, sexier is like the well-fed rich kid who quite simply just has to have a fifth helping of dessert.

The lust for new instantly ages what was new a short moment ago. The curse and myth of "new" has become an acceptable lust. 

I am mindful of what Richard Foster once wrote: 

We crave things we neither need nor enjoy. We buy things we do not want to impress people we do not like. Where planned obsolescence leaves off, psychological obsolescence takes over. We are made to feel ashamed to wear clothes or drive cars until they are worn out. The mass media have convinced us that to be out of step with fashion is to be out of step with reality. It is time we awaken to the fact that conformity to a sick society is to be sick.

The simplicity revolution has a big tide to fight against. But it is a worthy fight. Serenity and contentment are not necessarily found in the next, newest purchase. It might be closer to home than you previously thought.

O, and if anyone out there has an old, second-hand smartphone they are happy to sell, I can put you in touch with a willing buyer.