Does anyone here NOT have a smartphone? Do you miss it?

[pedanticwench]

I'm seriously thinking about getting rid of my iPhone because we recently added MIL to our plan with an iPhone 4 and our bill tripled.

I would like to get rid of the $45 a month charge for having an iPhone/smartphone. Doing this would bring our bill down by $50 or thereabouts, so under $100 for the entire monthly bill.

So, if you've downsized, do you really miss having your smartphone? Would it be really all that terrible if I gave mine up?

[MadamePresident]

I don't have a smartphone. Occasionally I wish I did. It would be easier to upload pictures or to use GPS. Really though I have a camera and look up directions before I go somewhere. Its no big deal to have a borinf phone.

[soozy87]

My husband and I still don't have smart phones. It isn't a problem for us. Our bill is around $80 a month for the 2 phones.

[itsme]

I have considered this often.

[Susie]

Calvin had a regular phone until last month. I used to steal it to take running/cycling sometimes because it is way smaller/lighter than my iPhone.

[dexteroni]

If we had never gotten them, I probably wouldn't miss it. One of my friends who just upgraded this year was all "I don't really get what the fuss is" until he got one - now he's like "yeah ok I see."

But now that I've had one for years and rely on it so much, yeah, I would miss it a lot. I've changed quite a bit about my habits and what I carry in my bag and would have to change all that back - e.g. I don't carry a notepad or a camera or a calendar anymore because those are all on the phone now. And yes, I know non-smart phones have cameras, but in general I don't think they tend to be as good.

But I don't get why your bill tripled when you added one person to your account. And I don't get why you would give up your smartphone so your MIL can have one. If she's on your plan because of financial hardship, then she can have a non-smartphone for safety, but I don't see the need to make it a smartphone.

[Velvetshady]

I've never had a smartphone and don't want one. I've had a cell phone for ~16 years, I'm on my third phone and not pleased with the non-smartphone options available so hope this one will last a long time.

I sit in front of a computer 10-18 hours a day. The only time I don't really have Internet access via a computer is during my commute (when I need to be driving, not playing Candy Crush).

I want a cell phone I can make calls on, people can leave me messages on, and I can retrieve messages from. That is it.

[DirtySouth]

You'd have to pry my smartphone from my cold, dead hands. I'd give up cable and internet before my smartphone.

[gogreengowhite]

I would hate giving up my iPhone.

I use the GPS/maps, Facebook, proboards, camera, Internet to look up phone numbers/addresses/menus, etc so much.

Hell, my iPhone even has my yoga "classes" on it.

[SusanBAnthony]

I have had one for less than a year. I could easily give it up if I had a GPS. That is the thing that has changed my life- we moved here recently and I don't know where everything is, but the smart phone saves my life.

I probably wouldn't give it up for a 50$ savings unless I was not meeting other financial goals. I wold rather give up various other extra spending like eating out, etc.

[kershnic]

I think giving up my smartphone would feel like giving up my arm.

[pedanticwench]

Well, giving up my iPhone doesn't seem like it would be that hard for me.

I mean, other than using it for the phone capabilities and texting, I take pictures every now and then and I play Candy Crush and Solitaire.

So, I don't feel like I would be giving up much.

But, I don't want to make a huge mistake by getting rid of it. I dunno.

[raybanz]

I don't have a smart phone! I'm actually on my parents' plan still (as are most people I know that are my age it seems). Mine costs $10 a month and I always offer to pay them back, but they just tell me it's part of my Christmas gift. I really like not having a smartphone except when I need the GPS function. I do get made fun of often for my 'vintage' slide phone, though

[delawarejen]

I've never had a smartphone. I'm on a computer all day at work and a lot at home, and of course I can't use it when I'm driving, so about the only time I could see using it would be while traveling. Even cheap hotels have a computer center these days. Every once in a while I run into a situation where it would be useful, but not enough to pay that kind of money

[grover]

I don't have a smartphone, but I've never had one. I was fine without it, until H upgraded to one. Now I want one to play with. Do I need it? Probably not.

[ssmjlm]

Just kick MIL off your plan, problem solved!

DH can't have one b/c of work. He normally doesn't miss it, but when E was born and everyone around was snapping photos and posting on FB he was a bit disappointed.

[DirtySouth]

Sept 20, 2013 12:02:50 GMT -5 pedanticwench said:

Well, giving up my iPhone doesn't seem like it would be that hard for me.

I mean, other than using it for the phone capabilities and texting, I take pictures every now and then and I play Candy Crush and Solitaire.

So, I don't feel like I would be giving up much.

But, I don't want to make a huge mistake by getting rid of it. I dunno.

Maybe you wouldn't miss it.  I use mine for a lot more than that.  I take pictures regularly and share via text or facebook, I look up addresses and directions, check the weather, get on Yelp all the time to look up restaurants and bars and love that it will search for places near your current location, I let my toddler play Angry Birds at restaurants to keep him from screaming, and I am constantly checking my work email.

[sa]

I could have written the exact same thing minus the commute Velvetshady

Although I will admit, I'm starting to get kind of embarrassed to pull out my phone because I'm always being made fun of for it.

[karinothing]

I do not have a smart phone. I have debaring getting one since Tmobile eliminated uploading pictures to the internet/FB/computer for non smart phone users Basically I jsut want one for its picture taking qualities.

I won't get one if it raises my monthly costs though. On the t-mobile website it looked like my cost would be around the same (I think becuase I have had my current plan since like 2003).

[BeagleMama]

Sept 20, 2013 13:00:28 GMT -5 @bluesky said:

We have dumb phones. My biggest eat peeve is how rude our society has become with cells. Every day I see people having conversations while they are "multitasking" on Facebook, responding to emails, etc. I see how addicting they are with others that I've refused to upgrade. It nice DH and I can sit at dinner without an "emergency" that glues faces to their phones.

Same for us. Of course, I'm sure I'd enjoy having one but I'd rather spend my money elsewhere.

I was at an all day training yesterday and looked around the room - 75% of the people were skimming around on their phones while the speaker was talking. Rude. Rude. Rude. I wanted to yell, "None of you are that important!"

[keweenawlove]

H doesn't have one. He was okay without having one until I got mine and now he wants one.

[mushmouse]

We're getting ready to get them. I feel like I really want one now, when before I didn't. I'm a SAHM and we just have a desktop computer - no tablets or laptops. My mp3 player can't even load new music and we don't have unlimited talk or texting on our plan. EVERYONE texts now. We can get a family share plan with small data so we're going to go for that. My husband has wifi at work so can play when he has downtime and wifi on his commuter bus. I'll use mine mostly with free wifi and use the data when I need to look something up. I never felt like I needed it before but now I do. We have had our phones for years and years - husband's is a flip phone!

We also spend a lot of weekends in the mountains and don't have internet there. It's become impossible to get info without having computer access.

[mainelyfoolish]

I have a dumb smartphone -- I have an Android phone with no data plan, so I can only use wifi. DH has a smartphone but he gets almost no service at our new house and he can't have it with him at work (no camera phones allowed). We've been discussing having me get a data plan for my phone and getting DH a cheap old camera-less phone that he can take into work. Most of the times where it would be nice to have a smart phone just-in-case are when we would be together (like going on vacation). I don't think we could go back to having no smart phones between the two of us. Sometimes it's really handy to be able to look up directions or store hours or whatnot while on the go.

[Deleted]

I've had my smartphone for a year; it would take a major financial crisis for me to go back to a non-smartphone. I take public transit into work, so being able to read my current Kindle book or surf the web for that time is very nice. I can also check to see when the next bus is coming and I love my podcast app.

More importantly for me, my H and I can text through the day which is nice because we aren't getting a lot of quality time together lately. I hated texting on my old flip phone. My Android also helps keep me organized with the calendar and task manager apps. My job also requires me to respond to problems immediately at certain points during the year. Now I can run errands and not worry about missing emails.

Finally, I can't live without the traffic feature on Google maps. I hate sitting in traffic, and I've found that the traffic predictions are really accurate.

[SJ]

I could never go back. For a million personal/organization reasons, but having smartphones has also revolutionized the way we can work on the road, and given us much more freedom in a corporate setting. We can see the trades as they execute, look up market data, share documents with our admins in the office, email clients, check in to our flights and lounges, navigate around strange cities and on and on and on.

[bostonmichelle]

If I wasn't a real estate agent I would give it up in a heart beat. But I really need it for work to access my email and web from my phone if I'm on the road, at a showing, with a client out of the office, etc. I would love to have a cheap cell phone or pay as you go phone, but between about 1000 minutes a month and constant web/email checking it would never work.

[Deleted]

H and I had smart phones through Verizon and paid $145 per month with my employer discount. I wanted to save us some money so I dropped mine to save $25 per month. My line was $40 but I had to pay an extra $10 for unlimited texting which I needed so we now pay $120. Do I misss the phone for small things like getting email, yes but I am always around a computer so I survive. If I got a big salary increase would I got back to my blackberry? Yes, but for now we are trying to save for things so I can sacrifice for now. 

[roseflower]

Would I chop my head off nope. =p

I didn't have a smart phone until I had DD. She absolutely would not stop crying or sleep unless I was holding her so I would literally hold her whilr she napped for hours on end. I couldn't use my computer because I was holding her. DH finally said he was getting me a smart phone so I could have something to do one handed. I was going through PPD at the time so being able to get back on thebump to my birth month board and getting support was amazing. Thank you smart phone.

There are times I think about it...to make thibgs simpler. For a long time I didn't want DD to see me on the comp a lot so the smart phone was convenient for me to reply to something quickly etc.

I dunno. I do miss the days of not always being accessible and doing things other than checking email, text playing games etc.

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