Technology Today
I gain consciousness to the sound of careful vibration. I’m light-headed but quickly realise I’m awake. The vibration gets stronger and louder as the alarm sound Warm Breeze throws ascending tones of harp in my direction.
My iPhone lays screen down on my mattress, next to my pillow. Once I flip it over, it wishes me a good morning and lets me know I have slept for 8 hours and 24 minutes, with a sleep quality of 89%. Having only walked 3,453 steps and climbed seven floors the day before, a detailed graph tells me I’ve been steadily in and out of deep sleep since 5am.
This isn’t a futuristic scenario. It’s the app Sleep Cycle monitoring my movements in bed and analysing them to wake me up as gently as possible. Some fear this is feeding Big Brother with information on how you sleep, think and live - others will look at it as amusing statistics harmlessly improving life. Whatever it is, it’s how I begin my digital day.
Once Sleep Cycle has woken me up, my iPhone’s notifications page makes sure to keep me awake. Thanks to friendships across several time zones, a wall of messages has been built overnight across various apps and platforms: e-mails, Snapchats, Instagram pictures and Facebook messages.
I can almost hear Siri laughing at me: “Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life, allow us to drag you straight back into the world wide web.” After quickly updating myself on how my love life is doing, I exit Tinder and get out of bed.
There is a 15 second walk between my apartment door and the lift to the ground floor. In between here, the wi-fi disappears, 4G network becomes 3G and five bars of signal is reduced to one. Recent testing shows that if I open the Bus Times app right before exiting the door, I’ll have just enough time to check departures before losing all signal in the lift.
Timed to perfection, I catch the bus and pay for it wirelessly with an NFC-enabled VISA card. A woman attempting to pay with coins is rejected on-board; I opt to mute the following argument by putting on headphones and allowing Bob Dylan’s – The Times They Are A-Changin’ to be my morning commute soundtrack.
Almost everything a journalism student does in 2015 involves technology. We record interviews, shoot pictures, write, edit and publish digitally - even during lectures you see more laptops than notepads.
A notification tells me there is a bus strike but the Citymapper app calculates an alternate route home. I’m able to let my visiting friend know I’ll be late by preparing texts between tube stations and sending them once connected to the Virgin Media wi-fi on the platforms.
Once home, technology stops being a necessity for communication and goes back to being a tool for entertainment. We order dinner via the Just Eat app, stream a film wirelessly to an Apple TV with surround audio through a Bluetooth compatible speaker.
After finishing the night with some PlayStation 4, my friend orders an Uber cab to my address, tracks the car on a map as it arrives, gets his credit card charged automatically and a receipt sent directly to his email.
Most toys I have today didn’t even exist when I was a kid. Life may flow smoother with the perks of technology but the truth is, every day is now a digital day. I set the Sleep Cycle alarm clock for a digital night and remind myself not to get stuck in a Life Cycle instead.