Welcome to the machine

I've just watched a programme about the progress of technology with Simon Armitage that was on BBC4 last night. At the start of the programme he went into a school and asked them to tip out all of their gadgets onto their desks. Isn't it easy being a kid these days? With mobile phone technology there's now no more need to pop down to the phone box at the end of the street with a stack of 5 pence pieces if you wanted to speak to the girl you wanted to ask to the school disco.That's not counting the limitless possibilities of internet instant messaging.

When I was at my last days at school the first 'brick' mobiles were appearing. How we laughed, who'd want one of those? That was an opinion I held up until as recently as 2000 when I finally relented and got a mobile, even that purchase was more out of necessity.

I've been toying with the idea of an iPhone recently, but then do I really need an iPhone? Yes, they look like fun, but there's a scores of features on the mobile I've got now that I never use like a radio, video calls, organisers, a calculator and video capture. I suppose the internet on the phone is handy for when I'm away but I very rarely use it because a) I'm on holiday and much as I love you I like to have a break, and b) it's bloody expensive on pay-as-you-go. Besides, knowing my luck, I'd buy the iPhone the very minute they were bringing one out that was better. Who was it who said they'd buy a new telly if they stopped inventing new ones?

When I was at school the only piece of technology I owned was a 14" colour portable telly and my sister's cast-off Walkman. She was a rather 'troubled' teenager who ended up under a shrink so my parents were a bit more generous with her when it came to dishing out presents. In fact, I don't recall owning my 'own' Walkman until I started earning my own money delivering papers.
I loved the Walkman and must have got through about half a dozen of them, including those with a fairly useless graphic equaliser on the side. Can you imagine my joy at the advent of the CD Walkman? Heavy on batteries but you could instantly go back to the beginning of Megadeth's Symphony of Destruction the minute it had finished without all that horrid rewinding killing your batteries.

Now with the iPod I can listen to my entire record collection wherever I go. I don't, of course, because I'm too lazy to rip CDs into the bloody thing. Most of the music on there is stuff I've downloaded, hence the weird look of that Top 25 Most Played post. The things I listen to most on the iPod are podcasts when I'm either doing my chores or out walking. I've got the second biggest iPod available, storage-wise, and I don't think it's a quarter full.

The most useless gadget I've got is a personal DAB radio. It's crap. Don't buy one.

I'm not buying any more technology, not until they give us those hover boots they've been promising us anyway. As the campaign slogan says in Muriel's Wedding "You can't stop progress!"