Machines of Entretainment

2025 September 24

A series of rambles on why the "smart-phone" or "cellphone" should not be named that anymore. A more apt name is either a machine for entertainment or the bronze screen.

I am starting with calling out Meta and Byte Dance. Both of them are clearly on the business of selling ads. But the mechanism from which we have gotten this ads is entertainment. Superfluous entertainment. Jennifer Grygiel called Instagram stories "reality TV starring your friends." But that feels outdated now. Both Instagram and Tik-Tok are only a barrage of short form videos that hook you up and in between sell you ads. This "short form" has killed all other forms of entertainment. Why? Because any and all forms of entertainment fight for the same attention and you have a limited amount of hours. So for a lot of people the easiest form of entertainment fills their mind. Leaving to what the kids like to call "brain rot" or for the adults in the room what we call a short attention span and an unwillingness to do anything.

By being relegated to a second plane, social media apps have lost their ground as the place where things happen. Twitter is not the place where the youth coordinates. There is a reason why Nepal had a literal new prime minister decided and it didn't happen in any of the Meta platforms. If I was Mark, I would be panicking right now, you missed out. If I was Elon, I would be worried because revolutions stopped happening on your public square.

But the culprits are not only Meta and Byte Dance. They took the opportunity. The real problem is the tiny machine of entertainment that you have in your pocket. One tap away from an unlimited amount of media to consume. This machines main point is not to be used for utilitarian purposes but to numb your brain. You are glued to the phone becaus it long ago stopped being a phone but its now a machine made to keep being on the machine. Be it through games, media and as an after thought communication. If you are failing the battle with your screen time is because you are not using it as a purposeful tool.

Re framing my device as the entertainment machine or the "skinny" Skinner box helps. Calling things what they are helps. I love that the bronze screen lets me watch whatever I want. But at the same time I have realized that in reality this machines are made to leave control on the table and this is a frustrating battle to fight.

As a coda, I also think that a reason why a lot of hardware in the era of AI failed because it doesn't address the entertainment. All phones are used to make phone calls but you can't doom scroll on an old cellphone. You can't replace an entertainment device with a utility. There is a reason bigger screens with more real state are a thing. You can't have tiny phones because nobody buys them. People say they want them but in reality they are lying (although I really want one).

That is why I don't call it a cellphone or smartphone call it a machine for entertainment or a bronze screen. Because it long ago stopped being a utility.