Basic phones return: €30 vs half a salary for smartphones

Basic phones return: €30 vs half a salary for smartphones

Do we really need cutting-edge technology to live, or have we simply grown accustomed to paying for our own leash? This question permeates a conversation spanning nearly three years about what was left behind upon entering the smartphone era: the responsive keyboard, voice calls, shouting "see you at the square" from afar, and driving national roads without highway pressure. The starting diagnosis is harsh: in two decades, society has deteriorated on its own, with no external help.

The striking part isn't nostalgia. It's the math. A basic device costs between €10 and €30; a high-end one easily consumes half a salary. Moreover, the expensive one works for someone else: it absorbs attention, delivers data, geolocates, and turns the owner into a product. The cheap one just makes calls, sends SMS, and in some models, even includes FM radio. The recurring conclusion is uncomfortable: we pay more for the device that watches us than for the one that serves us.

When did digital degeneration begin?

There is no consensus on the date. One current places the break in the late nineties and early 2000s, when computers were still tools and modems made noise. Another pushes it back to the early nineties, because by the end of that decade there were already chats, instant messaging, and SMS generating bills of €100 —16,000 pesetas— based on messages costing 15 cents plus VAT. A third fixes the point of no return in 2004-2005, when instant messaging and early networks began colonizing daily life.

The most uncomfortable hypothesis circulating suggests that the system found in technology a substitute for substances previously used to regulate the population: stimulants when the economy was good, depressors when it was bad. According to this reading, the novelty was testing a new food for souls: permanent connection. There is no proof of such design, but the suspicion that "something didn't add up" was already on the table in 2003.

The primordial internet still exists if you know how to find it

One of the most cited findings from the exchange is technical and verifiable: if JavaScript, cookies, tracking, personalization protocols, sensors, augmented reality, location access, and payment methods are disabled, the old internet remains accessible. Simply disconnecting the computer's Wi-Fi and using an Ethernet cable proves that the connection not only doesn't degrade, but sometimes performs above contracted levels: a 300 Mbps symmetric fiber line measured 360 download and nearly 450 upload speeds.

The paradox is that this surveillance-free internet works. It exists. You just have to want to enter through the old door. And that detail dismantles the argument of inevitability: no one forces anyone to use a smartphone or a social network. Digital degeneration relies, according to this thesis, on the subject's selfishness, on the digital "mirror, mirror" of me, me, me. One enters alone and one can leave alone.

Can you abandon the smartphone without being cut off from the world?

You can, though not entirely. Turning off the phone frequently, removing the SIM card —which is like removing internet—, buying a camera and an MP3 player to separate functions: these are the steps described. The goal isn't total disconnection, which is impossible, but ceasing to be a remote-controlled, monitored, and parameterized terminal.

Resistance has a practical cost that no one hides. A mobile phone saved a person whose leg got trapped in a drain, at night, next to a poorly lit, low-traffic road: without it, they would have waited until dawn, at least. People resolved these situations until the nineties, although almost no one remembers how anymore. That is the real price of regression, and it should be put on the table before romanticizing the decade.

The trap of digital identity

The argument carrying the most weight in the final part of the conversation isn't nostalgic; it's about control. Without a smartphone, there is no agenda, QR codes, digital identity, electronic passport, or permanent geolocation. Campouts and demonstrations, it is argued, have already shown their limits. The phone isn't necessary: it's an addiction used for remote governance. The smarter the device, the dumber the owner.

The industry is already pushing the next layer: virtual and augmented reality glasses, metaverse, immersive environments. Those who look at these signals and don't see where the package is going, says this current, do so because they don't want to see it. The proposed alternative is simple and cheap: return to the antiestéticature phone, the terminal that is just a terminal, and stop being the product being sold.

The market is already noticing

There is a data point that breaks the narrative of irreversibility: in the United States, sales of basic phones are rising among the youngest users, according to one user. And truly ancient models, those with keypads and four-to-five-day batteries, are highly valued in the second-hand market. Messaging and social networks are increasingly perceived as a burden: 99% of messages are memes or nonsense.

It is not a mass movement nor a consolidated trend, and presenting it as such is an exaggeration. But it exists, it has buyers, and it has economic logic. The device that lasts days without charging and costs €30 needs no updates, subscriptions, or location permissions. It only needs someone to decide, for once, not to jump through the hoops.

The initial question remains unanswered by the masses. Almost no one feels the itch, and those already living in the nineties unknowingly are a silent minority. Meanwhile, the market inflates the price of the gadget that enslaves us and gives away the one that frees us. If that isn't a clue, let someone come down and take a look.