In the 1980s dad bought a home video camera that weighed about 12 kilograms.It was made up of three different units tethered together with cables the girth of jumper leads. I have fond memories of dad using me as a pack horse on his home-movie missions. The actual camera was the size of a phone book (a gloriously antiquated analogy!), there was a second unit which housed the brick sized VHS tape which recorded the footage, and a power supply about the size and weight of a car battery. The image quality was terrible, and dad’s camera skills not much better. But I have lovely memories of sitting with the family around the tv in the living room watching his handiwork.Dad died just before the turn of the millennium, before technology put twenty different gadgets into one single magic device in your pocket.That was only a few decades ago. The sheer sorcery of what a phone can do now would’ve made dad’s eyes pop out of his tiny skull.I can picture the joy and delight on his face, if he were somehow magically be able to watch mum, his beloved wife, casually beaming a live two-way video to his adoring grandkids a whole city away. A live two-way video feed??? In your pocket??? INSANE.And yet… and yet. It’s come at a cost.I evolved to get along with my 50 fellow Neanderthals, not to cope with the angst of all humanity screaming for my attention.Dad would’ve marvelled at the existence of The Fink Tank, and been a huge fan of Col and my efforts. And he would also have called the whole enterprise, and us, “bloody hopeless”. Anyway, how are you going with your phone addiction?

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