When the iPhone was first introduced in 2007, the notion of an “everything device” was universally celebrated. A single object that could serve as phone, camera, music player, web browser, and so much more promised unprecedented convenience and connectivity. It was, quite literally, the dream of the nineties. But the better part of twenty years later, we’ve gained enough perspective to recognize that this revolutionary vision came with costs we did not anticipate.

Distraction, of course, is the one we can all relate to first. An everything device has the problem of being useful nearly all the time, and when in use, all consuming. When you use it to do one thing, it pushes you toward others. In order to avoid this, you must disable functions. That’s an interesting turn of events, isn’t it? We have made a thing that does more than we need, more often than we desire. Because system-wide, duplicative notifications are enabled by default, the best thing you could say about the device’s design is that it lacks a point of view toward a prioritization of what it does. The worst thing you could say is that it is distracting by design.

(I find it fascinating how many people – myself included — attempt to reduce the features of their smartphone to the point of replicating a “dumbphone” experience in order to save ourselves from distraction, but don’t actually go so far as to use a lesser-featured phone because a few key features are just too good to give up. A dumbphone is less distracting, but a nightmare for text messaging and a lousy camera. It turns out I don’t want a phone at all, but a camera that texts — and ideally one smaller than anything on the market now. I know I’m not alone, and yet this product will not be made. )

This kind of distraction is direct distraction. It’s the kind we are increasingly aware of, and as its accumulating stress puts pressure on our inner and outer lives, we can combat it with various choices and optimizations. But there is another kind of distraction that is less direct, though just as cumulative and, I believe, just as toxic. I’ve come to think of it as the “digital echo.”

On a smartphone, every single thing it is used to do generates information that goes elsewhere. The vast majority of this is unseen — though not unfelt — by us. Everyone knows that there is no privacy within a digital device, nor within its “listening” range. We are all aware that as much information as smartphone provides to us, exponentially more is generated for someone else — someone watching, listening, measuring, and monetizing. The “digital echo” is more than just the awareness of this; it is the cognitive burden of knowing that our actions generate data elsewhere. The echo exists whenever we use connected technology, creating a subtle but persistent awareness that what we do isn’t just our own. A device like a smartphone has always generated a “digital echo”, but many others are as well.

Comparing two different motor vehicles illustrates this well. In a car like a Tesla, which we might think of as a “smartcar” since it’s a computer you can drive, every function produces a digital signal. Adjusting the air conditioning, making a turn, opening a door — the car knows and records it all, transmitting this information to distant servers. By contrast, my 15-year-old Honda performs all of its functions without creating these digital echoes. The operations remain private, existing only in the moment they occur. In our increasingly digital world, I have begun to feel the SCIF-like isolation of the cabin of my car, and I like it.

(The “smartcar”, of course, won’t remain simply a computer you can drive. The penultimate “smartcar” drives itself. The self-driving car represents perhaps the most acute expression of how digital culture values attention and convenience above all else, especially control and ownership. As a passenger of a self-driving car, you surrender control over the vehicle’s operation in exchange for the “freedom” to direct your attention elsewhere, most likely to some digital signal either on your own device or on screens within the vehicle. I can see the value in this; driving can be boring and most times I am behind the wheel I’d rather be doing something else. But currently, truly autonomous vehicles are service-enabling products like Waymo, meaning we also relinquish ownership. The benefits of that also seem obvious: no insurance premiums, no maintenance costs. But not every advantage is worth its cost. The economics of self-driving cars are not clear-cut. There’s a real debate to be had about attention, convenience, and ownership that I hope will play out before we have no choice but to be a passenger in someone else’s machine.)

When I find myself looking for new ways to throttle my smartphone’s functions, or when I sit in the untapped isolation of my car, I often wonder about the costs of the “digital echo.” What is the psychological cost of knowing that your actions aren’t just your own, but create information that can be observed and analyzed by others? As more aspects of our lives generate digital echoes, they force an ambient awareness of being perpetually witnessed rather than simply existing.

This transforms even solitary activities into implicit social interactions. It forces us to maintain awareness of our “observed self” alongside our “experiencing self,” creating a kind of persistent self-consciousness. We become performers in our own lives rather than merely participants.

I think this growing awareness contributes to a growing interest in returning to single-focus devices and analog technologies. Record players and film cameras aren’t experiencing resurgence merely from nostalgia, but because they offer fundamentally different relationships with media — relationships characterized by intention, presence, and focus.

In my own life, this recognition has led to deliberate choices about which technologies to embrace and which to avoid. Here are three off the top of my head:

• Replacing streaming services with owned media formats (CDs, Blu-rays) that remain accessible on my terms, not subject to platform changes or content disappearance
• Preferring printed books while using dedicated e-readers for digital texts — in this case, accepting certain digital echoes when the benefits (in particular, access to otherwise unavailable material) outweigh the costs
• Rejecting smart home devices entirely, recognizing that their convenience rarely justifies the added complexity and surveillance they introduce

You’ve probably made similarly-motivated decisions, perhaps in other areas of your life or in relation to other things entirely. What matters, I think, is that these choices aren’t about rejecting technology but about creating spaces for more intentional engagement. They represent a search for balance in a world that increasingly defaults to maximum connectivity.

I had a conversation recently with a friend who mused, “What are these the early days of?” What a wonderful question that is; we are, I hope, always living in the early days of something. Perhaps now, we’re witnessing the beginning of a new phase in our relationship with technology. The initial wave of digital transformation prioritized connecting everything possible; the next wave may be more discriminating about what should be connected and what’s better left direct and immediate. I hope to see operating systems truly designed around focus rather than multitasking, interfaces that respect attention rather than constantly competing for it, and devices that serve discrete purposes exceptionally well instead of performing multiple functions adequately.

The digital echoes of our actions will likely continue to multiply, but we can choose which echoes we’re willing to generate and which activities deserve to remain ephemeral — to exist only in the moment they occur and then in the memories of those present. What looks like revision or retreat may be the next wave of innovation, borne out of having learned the lessons of the last few decades and desiring better for the next.

March 28, 2025