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Emergency Room Visits From Distracted Walking Skyrocket (cbsnews.com)
schwit1 writes: An estimated ten percent of pedestrian injuries that land people in emergency rooms are due to distracted walking, a recent study found. That's thousands of people injured — sometimes killed. In San Diego, investigators believe Joshua Burwell may have been trying to take a picture of the sunset when he took a fatal fall some 40 feet off Sunset Cliffs. "A lot of people don't admit that they do it," said Dr. Claudette Lajam, an orthopedic surgeon. "It's getting worse as we have more and more features on these devices that we carry around with us that can distract us."
Since most of these distractions are probably smartphone related, and contemporary smartphones tend to have pretty substantial activity-logging capabilities and sensor packages, it would be technically feasible to get an 'aircraft blackbox' style snapshot of what was going on at the time of the injury.
Anyone know if you could get away with an insurance policy that demands such data, in the event of a claim, and then attempts to deny coverage for any costs deemed to have been incurred because of negligent distraction? Just think of how many claims you could deny with the right data...
In all seriousness, texting while doing something else has become a conspicuous problem. Probably not worse than all of the other “problems” that have occurred throughout history whenever a new technology arose, but nevertheless something we’re going to have to adapt to. Texting while driving seems insane, and speech-to-text doesn’t help a whole hell of a lot. Then again, some people seem to have trouble adjusting their radio settings without crashing.
The interesting thing about texting while walking is that making a law about it also seems absurd. You’re not operating heavy equipment, just mostly putting yourself at risk of tripping. And if you injure someone else, then there are already laws that address the liability there. A huge factor here comes down to the individual’s talents at multitasking and using peripheral vision. I know that I can text while walking because long before cell phones, I’d already developed good use of both multitasking and peripheral vision, so like many others I have observed, I can walk and text and manage to not trip on unexpected obstacles, bump into other people, walk in front of cars, etc.
However, lots of people are not good at this yet insist on doing it anyway. That being said, this isn’t a lot different from many other risky activities people engage in that we can’t and shouldn’t try to regulate, like excessive alcohol, weed, unprotected sex, and driving while stupid. We can only address the after-effects when people harm others as a result of acting irresponsibly.
Lovely Japanese take on the curse of distracted walking:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Bump: 66% of people have run into others when using a smartphone while walking.
Fall: 3.6 % of people have fallen from a platform when texting while walking.
Trip: 18% of people have tripped when using a smartphone while walking.
99% of people think using a smartphone while walking is dangerous.
73% of people have used a smartphone while walking.
Please look forward when you are walking.
Using a smartphone while walking is dangerous.
Cryonics - Keep cool and carry on.