Keeping the knowledge in your pocket

“Anyone seen using a phone, will be disqualified from the quiz!”…. “I’m serious, put your phone away as you won’t win if you’re seen using it!”

The Irish quizmaster at yesterday’s Pub Quiz had to repeat this in various forms, with an increased swearing-frequency as his annoyance grew significantly in between, music and picture rounds. Just shows how Smartphones have really managed to seep into the smallest and most simple pleasures of life. No doubt they have changed social interactions, the way business people do what they do and the frequency at which we check our e-mail, but this? Really? A good old pub quiz, where people get to shine because for some reason they stored some random piece of knowledge some while back that, besides a pub quiz, they were never going to put to good use.

Looks like general knowledge stored in the deepest darkest corners of our brain has been replaced with the all-knowing Internet stored in our pocket. Though this might not be all that bad, in this particular case it spoils the fun. There’ll be time to prove your friend wrong about who won the 1998 World Cup or settle the argument with your dad about when Elvis died, by looking it up online. But just for this bit of simple social interaction just come down to the pub and do everyone there and yourself a favour: “Turn your f+&*”’=% phone off!!!”