Mobile Me & You | Global
For this course of Mobile Reputations Collaborative Consumption in Sharing Economy, we were challenged by our coordinator Betty Tsakarestou to find out what are some significant insights concerning the relationship between Millennials and their mobile phones.
In our attempt to better understand mobile interaction and consumption among its users, we had to look way beyond our scope and our local point of view. Mobiles, smartphones, and its applications require an international approach to the said matter since its widespread use allow a global conversation which can bring fruitful insights and knowledge to our research.
In order to achieve such universal understanding, we tried to locate friends, relatives, and acquaintances so we can share our thoughts and practices regarding the matter.
One such example is a dear person of mine, Micky, with whom we go years back when we met in an Eramsus+ Program in Denmark.
As a team, we approached Micky to interview him for the Mobile Reputations Collaborative Consumption in Sharing Economy course and our scope in depicting the Creative Output that Mobile Use offers.
Micky works between Denmark and China as a Business Development Manager and Brand Manager respectively, while he has a true talent and passion for Photography and Design.
We were truly intrigued to get to know him and his practices regarding the matter at hand better and therefore we conducted an interview to accomplish that.
Micky uses his phone around 5 hours and, while he describes it as his personal assistant and uses it 70% of the time for his work. Instagram and WeChat are the main apps he works with for his businesses.
When asked if he uses his smartphone for shopping, Micky argued that online shopping is already a habit and that he even shops groceries online that will be delivered to him within 2 hours. He shops also clothes, electronics and basically 90% of the things he needs for his life.
“I know it sounds crazy, but it is true in China.”
Do you favor your mobile phone over other devices?
Are there any other devices you need except for your phone?
Micky, not surprisingly jokes that if we took his phone away for a day he would “point at a butterfly and ask what kind of birth is that”, while he doesn’t feel a part of a community when using his smartphone. As he describes, he uses his phone a lot for work and personal life, but that never makes him a part of a community, he believes a community is a group of real people, mobile is only a channel but never can become the community itself.
Nevertheless, when he was asked whether he feels connected or disconnected by the use of his phone, he answered that he feels both or neither. He feels more connected with real people, but when you can’t talk to your family or friends, your phone allows you to feel more connected. Sometimes, phones become a distraction. People mostly text when they can rather call someone, and that is a practice that disconnects people from one another.
Last but not least, we asked Micky whether he believes that he shares the same habits with his friends regarding the usage of their phone, and he answered:
It depends, I think mostly we use phones for similar purposes, at the end of the day we are 97% the same genetically.
Talking to Micky was really insightful and strengthened our research. As a team, we want to have holistic perspectives that go beyond our local “bubble”.
Our team: Christos Daniilidis Danai Lyratzi Frossini Drakouli Maria Kall
Our coordinator: Betty Tsakarestou
