thank you this picture of mine was in
Dutch national newspaper
drough for one year ago on the front
page and it was in an article about
smartphone addiction and a few months
later I was invited by TEDx beta to give
a talk and right here I am very proud to
be here very happy and preparing my talk
my coach and I discovered that my talk
should not be about a guy standing over
here sending a message towards an
audience sitting in the dark but my talk
should be about connecting connecting
you all and inviting you all to talk to
each other about or smartphone use
because this smartphone problem is too
big and there’s no solution yet I’ve
read many books and I tried many things
myself but there is no solution yet so I
don’t have an idea worth spreading yet
but I do have an idea worth trying and
that’s what we’re going to do right now
so we’re going to do a sort of social
experiment and I guess you all like that
I hope so
and could you please all show me this
beauty of yours this smartphone I guess
you have it all with you it’s it they’re
already up in the air please I see some
lights yes thank you very much
how many smartphones are here I guess
everyone has a smartphone now Oh whoo
applause for you so you can put them
down and stay standing and right now I’m
going to invite you to make couples
because we need each other for this
exercise so please pair up from this end
to that end from this end to that end in
couples in sets of two just look at each
other and form couples do it right now
please look at each other and keep
all right thank you keep looking at each
can we do it in silence please
you really like connecting don’t you are
we all coupled all right great
then we’re going to do the next step
it’s very easy and it’s safe you won’t
get any harm of this listen very
carefully we are going to exchange our
so in a few seconds you vote yes without
any talk exchange your smartphones and
be sure you will get it back
are you ready all right you will get it
so thank you
thank you thank you so how does this
feel to be separated from your own phone
I know Keith Parker did it to me in 2008
but in 2016 I started taking pictures of
people using smartphones in public areas
and I took quite many of them more than
500 and as you can see I took them all
from very up close maybe 2 3 4 meters
and that’s why I could not escape from
talking to them and we had pretty good
conversations and in these conversations
I learned one big thing we are all
addicted or at least most of us and me
included and I took many pictures and I
went to many places
and everywhere where I went I saw the
same faces and after talking to all
these people and I’ve talking to lots of
experts and reading thousand books I
came to the core of worth smartphones
due to us
professor sherry Turkle of MIT calls it
multi living smartphones enabled us to
switch between lives they make it
possible to move from one life to
another from one world to another by
just one click and to another world into
another world by simply one click you
can move from a very boring meeting with
your boss to a very lively chat with
your soccer friends on whatsapp or with
just one swipe you can be together with
your future girlfriend and the next one
and of course it seems great to be
traveling with the speed of light yes
with your smartphone all over the world
but it also had downsides because if you
are there and there and there
what remains over here and since your
short-term memory or attention is only
able to be at one place at a time
nothing remains over here
and when I took this picture I realized
that it was causing bigger problems than
just a few traffic accidents we are
actually d socializing humanity we are
disconnecting a future and I did many
things to try to stop my addiction I
switch off all notifications I switch
off the colors of my screen and I
installed this app it’s called moment
and it measures your daily use and I
started with more than four hours a day
and right now you can see it’s about 44
minutes less than one hour a day which I
have to be honest with you I’m cheating
because I moved my addictive behavior
from my smartphone towards my laptop and
so I installed a side blocker but again
I found a workaround and just I’m
switching it off when I really need to
feed my addiction and I bought this one
a retro Nokia prepaid no functions but I
still need my iPhone to take a picture
of it and to share it
with the rest of the world and I even
sold my house in caronian and decided to
move to this phone free zone in the
middle of nature and even that didn’t
work no just joking but but the whole
problem is this problem is too big it is
to break if you are human you cannot
solve it by yourself it’s it’s a too big
addiction and this is why it is a bigger
addiction than alcohol and drugs it’s
everywhere it’s a sort of it has become
a sort of multi super tool we can use it
as a light bulb we can use it as agenda
to communicate to do our banking to find
our way to find a date we can do
everything with it second it’s free
after you got one you can use it
infinitely so you don’t have to pay any
money anymore no threshold just keep on
using it third there’s always more
there’s always more news there’s always
more pictures on reddit there’s always
more movies on YouTube or Netflix it’s
hyper social we keep pulling each other
in so if you decided to quit whatsapp
there’s always a friend who invite you
back to one of these silly groups and
fifth all the apps are addictive and
they are designed to be addictive
because all the big companies are
fighting a war for attention and they
are using the highest knowledge to gain
your attention and they’re using
artificial intelligence to reach that
and is there a solution now I started my
since sharing is half of the solution
sharing the problem is half the solution
that’s what I’m inviting you to do after
my talk there will be 20 minute break
and I’m inviting you to connect to each
other and not immediately get back to
your phone but first have a talk to the
person you exchange your smartphone with
and I have two questions prepared for
you to talk to you to talk about it’s
very simple just talk about your
personal relationship with your
smartphone because I think this is the
first step for solution so I thank you
for your attention I hope you will enjoy
your connection thank you for now [Applause]
Dutch national newspaper
drough for one year ago on the front
page and it was in an article about
smartphone addiction and a few months
later I was invited by TEDx beta to give
a talk and right here I am very proud to
be here very happy and preparing my talk
my coach and I discovered that my talk
should not be about a guy standing over
here sending a message towards an
audience sitting in the dark but my talk
should be about connecting connecting
you all and inviting you all to talk to
each other about or smartphone use
because this smartphone problem is too
big and there’s no solution yet I’ve
read many books and I tried many things
myself but there is no solution yet so I
don’t have an idea worth spreading yet
but I do have an idea worth trying and
that’s what we’re going to do right now
so we’re going to do a sort of social
experiment and I guess you all like that
I hope so
and could you please all show me this
beauty of yours this smartphone I guess
you have it all with you it’s it they’re
already up in the air please I see some
lights yes thank you very much
how many smartphones are here I guess
everyone has a smartphone now Oh whoo
applause for you so you can put them
down and stay standing and right now I’m
going to invite you to make couples
because we need each other for this
exercise so please pair up from this end
to that end from this end to that end in
couples in sets of two just look at each
other and form couples do it right now
please look at each other and keep
all right thank you keep looking at each
can we do it in silence please
you really like connecting don’t you are
we all coupled all right great
then we’re going to do the next step
it’s very easy and it’s safe you won’t
get any harm of this listen very
carefully we are going to exchange our
so in a few seconds you vote yes without
any talk exchange your smartphones and
be sure you will get it back
are you ready all right you will get it
so thank you
thank you thank you so how does this
feel to be separated from your own phone
I know Keith Parker did it to me in 2008
but in 2016 I started taking pictures of
people using smartphones in public areas
and I took quite many of them more than
500 and as you can see I took them all
from very up close maybe 2 3 4 meters
and that’s why I could not escape from
talking to them and we had pretty good
conversations and in these conversations
I learned one big thing we are all
addicted or at least most of us and me
included and I took many pictures and I
went to many places
and everywhere where I went I saw the
same faces and after talking to all
these people and I’ve talking to lots of
experts and reading thousand books I
came to the core of worth smartphones
due to us
professor sherry Turkle of MIT calls it
multi living smartphones enabled us to
switch between lives they make it
possible to move from one life to
another from one world to another by
just one click and to another world into
another world by simply one click you
can move from a very boring meeting with
your boss to a very lively chat with
your soccer friends on whatsapp or with
just one swipe you can be together with
your future girlfriend and the next one
and of course it seems great to be
traveling with the speed of light yes
with your smartphone all over the world
but it also had downsides because if you
are there and there and there
what remains over here and since your
short-term memory or attention is only
able to be at one place at a time
nothing remains over here
and when I took this picture I realized
that it was causing bigger problems than
just a few traffic accidents we are
actually d socializing humanity we are
disconnecting a future and I did many
things to try to stop my addiction I
switch off all notifications I switch
off the colors of my screen and I
installed this app it’s called moment
and it measures your daily use and I
started with more than four hours a day
and right now you can see it’s about 44
minutes less than one hour a day which I
have to be honest with you I’m cheating
because I moved my addictive behavior
from my smartphone towards my laptop and
so I installed a side blocker but again
I found a workaround and just I’m
switching it off when I really need to
feed my addiction and I bought this one
a retro Nokia prepaid no functions but I
still need my iPhone to take a picture
of it and to share it
with the rest of the world and I even
sold my house in caronian and decided to
move to this phone free zone in the
middle of nature and even that didn’t
work no just joking but but the whole
problem is this problem is too big it is
to break if you are human you cannot
solve it by yourself it’s it’s a too big
addiction and this is why it is a bigger
addiction than alcohol and drugs it’s
everywhere it’s a sort of it has become
a sort of multi super tool we can use it
as a light bulb we can use it as agenda
to communicate to do our banking to find
our way to find a date we can do
everything with it second it’s free
after you got one you can use it
infinitely so you don’t have to pay any
money anymore no threshold just keep on
using it third there’s always more
there’s always more news there’s always
more pictures on reddit there’s always
more movies on YouTube or Netflix it’s
hyper social we keep pulling each other
in so if you decided to quit whatsapp
there’s always a friend who invite you
back to one of these silly groups and
fifth all the apps are addictive and
they are designed to be addictive
because all the big companies are
fighting a war for attention and they
are using the highest knowledge to gain
your attention and they’re using
artificial intelligence to reach that
and is there a solution now I started my
since sharing is half of the solution
sharing the problem is half the solution
that’s what I’m inviting you to do after
my talk there will be 20 minute break
and I’m inviting you to connect to each
other and not immediately get back to
your phone but first have a talk to the
person you exchange your smartphone with
and I have two questions prepared for
you to talk to you to talk about it’s
very simple just talk about your
personal relationship with your
smartphone because I think this is the
first step for solution so I thank you
for your attention I hope you will enjoy
your connection thank you for now [Applause]
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