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The Daily Tar Heel

How smart phones have changed our lives

Junior chemistry major Emily Janeira walks and texts in front of Bingham on Wednesday.
Junior chemistry major Emily Janeira walks and texts in front of Bingham on Wednesday.

With the constant advancements and easy accessibility of smartphones, it’s hard to think about the days before they existed.

Remember back in the day when you went to the mall to buy a bejeweled case for your Motorola RAZR? Good times. 

Disclaimer — if you don’t know what those are, you may be too young for this article.

But it's midterm season, and we need to find something to be thankful for in this tough time. Here's how smartphones have changed our lives:

1. We can take pictures whenever we’d like to. How else did we document life around us before looking at it through our phones?

Sophomore Andrew Harvey said he really likes being able to have a camera on him at all times. 

“I can create my own photo albums and have a bunch of memories all in my pocket to show people when I’m telling them a story or just to enjoy for myself,” he said.

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2. We don’t have to read shampoo bottles anymore while we do our business. Now you can be on Facebook and pee at the same time — multitasking at its finest. 

3. We can send temporary pictures of our faces to our friends. Whatever would we do without Snapchat? 

4. Sophomore Anna Freeman said she loves having the internet on her phone.

“Being able to go on the internet and Google something whenever I need to is so convenient,” Freeman said. “Having all the information at my fingertips is really nice.”

5. We can be on social media any time we need/want to be. Back in the day, if you wanted to check Facebook, you had to whip out that clunky laptop or turn on your family desktop computer to see if you had any notifications. If you wanted to upload pictures, you had to actually take out the memory card from your handy-dandy digital camera and stick it in your computer to upload one at a time on Facebook. Oh, the humanity!

6. Timehop was not a thing. How else would we be reminded of what happened exactly three years ago to the day?! 

7. We can check the weather at all times of the day without having to ask our parents and then go back to our rooms and change. This is especially helpful when the weather goes from 30 to 80 degrees from one day to the next.

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8. We don’t need alarm clocks — just use your phone and hope you don’t accidentally set your wake up call for 7 p.m. instead of a.m.

9. Shazam. That is all. 

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10. We don’t have to search through all the CDs in our car to find the one that has that one song we like. Just plug in your phone and find it on YouTube or Spotify.

11. We don’t have to go on MapQuest or Google Maps and print out directions. If you made a wrong turn using those things, you were screwed. 

12. The flashlight application is an actual godsend. This feature especially came in handy back in the day when shopping at Hollister and Abercrombie. If only there was such thing as a gas mask app.

13. WhatsApp and other messaging applications allow us to call and message people for free who have international numbers.

Junior Alexandra Hehlen studied abroad in Milan last semester. Since returning to the U.S., she can use her phone to talk to the friends she made in Spain. 

“I love being able to call my friends all over the world via WhatsApp,” Hehlen said. “Back in the olden days we had to pay to make international calls from our landline.”

While you can't slam your flip phone shut to end your arguments anymore, the perks of owning a smartphone more than make up for it. Remember that the next time you almost run over a pedestrian on Franklin Street who's glued to his or her screen. #NoTextingWhileWalking

@alexablazeDTH

swerve@dailytarheel.com