Thoughts on the Technology Video

In class we watched a video showing how the world was being changed by technology. The video posed the question of whether it is harmful or beneficial to us to experience this change. One day after watching the video and with these questions in my head, I saw this iphone commercial on T.V:

This commercial is, honestly quite disheartening. I do not deny the benefits that smart-phones and related modern devices bring to us. They make it easier to share ideas and contact each other. But at the same time we seem to be losing something. In this commercial the people are all asking the iphone to do something for them. But most of these things would not require much effort for them to do themselves and could be accomplished by other means.  Take for instance when the man says "Tell my wife I'm coming home." I would think that he could just call her himself, and I would assume that most wives would rather have their husband tell them he was almost home, than a droning computer voice. But what disturbed me more was the scene where the girl asks, "what a weasel looks like." This is why we have books. I know that when I was her age I had a small little book about mammals and I remember looking at a weasel in that. Moreover the way she seems to be content just to sit there and with no effort have her whims answered is almost sickening. This idea of dependence on our devices, rather than our own memory, effort, and perfectly capable other means such as the seemingly archaic book, is not something I believe should be glorified. Something just seems to be missing.