11 December 2011
Years ago when I went to Orlando one thing I noticed was the amount of American people who happily carried a Palm Treo in belt cases. I still don't know anyone in England who carries their phone on their belt.
When the iPad was released one of my first thoughts was how are the British going to use such a thing in public? We just don't do things like that. And then along came Siri. Oh my God! How on earth can a British person possibly talk to their iPhone and tell it to do something in public?
When it comes to new technology, the British people take a lot of time to get comfortable enough with it to use it in front of other people. I'm now happily use my iPad anywhere and not a second thought passes through my mind as to what other people think of me. It did, however, take me a few months to feel that way.
Maybe some of you can enlighten me, but I am fairly sure that American people are now quite happily walking around talking into their iPhones. I still haven't seen a British person do that. It will take us a long, long time to get used to that.
We all know that the British are reserved, we all know that we don't always take to change in the same way some other nationalities do. And yet we just as eagerly buy the new technology as quickly as any other nation. It is a strange conundrum and one that I will never work out. But I still won't wear a phone on my belt.
The British reservation • Opuss № I