Geoff Duncan

So, as part of the preparation for the Palm Springs gig, I finally succumbed to social forces I'd been resisting for years.

I now have a cell phone.

My objection to cell phones has always been more social and cultural than technological. I like the idea of associating a phone number with a person rather than, say, a 30-foot radius in a building, and do not deny the utility of a mobile phone in the event of an emergency, automobile breakdown, or even some everyday thing like last-minute directions. In these instances, mobile phones are undeniably beneficial.

But in general, I think the widespread usage of cell phones has generally made people ruder, reduced user's privacy, and led folks to do all sorts of silly and outright dangerous things. I'm sure by now we've all had near-misses (or actual accidents) caused by drivers using cell phones. I also can't tell you the number of private conversations which have been forced upon me by cell phone users who casually discuss the most intimate things in public. (Case in point: in a parking lot last week I became privy to someone's recent criminal history as they took a smoke break.) And I don't even want to think about the number of meetings, recording sessions, meals, movies, and other activities which are constantly interrupted by phone calls, text messages, or devices vibrating their way off tabletops.

Then there are the maddening, unintelligible calls I receive from cell phone users, where the bulk of the sound is road noise, wind, radio interference, beeping, or simple silence.

In general, I plan to participate in none of that. My phone will spend 90 to 95 percent of its lifetime on a shelf in my office, turned off. When it's on, it will be silent: I will check it for messages, rather than have it prompt me about a call.

For me, the main purpose for this nefarious item is to enable me to do brute-force server management from afar. With appropriate text messages and phone calls, I can either gently rejigger and restart most of my Internet servers from a large portion of the United States. In a worst-case scenario, I can power-cycle most of my systems. (Power-cycling means turning something off and on again after about 30 seconds: not the gentlest thing to do to software, but sometimes the only option.) My monitoring software can now send me text messages if critical functions fail, complete with diagnostic information. The new setup doesn't completely eliminate the possibility I'll have to call someone and ask them to physically access my servers, but it makes that scenario far less likely.

Although these capabilities are by no means ground-breaking (I knew folks doing similar things over a decade ago), they're new to me, and in some ways they're pretty cool. While I was out of town, status messages informed me that one of my Web servers had successfully beaten off a badly-behaved Web robot, and one of my mail servers had managed to extricate itself from a mail loop with a remote system at a large telecom provider. I didn't actually have to intervene with anything, but it was good to have some assurance my little boxes were doing what they're supposed to do.

And I confess to having placed a frivolous call or two, just to get the hang of the thing. But I'm over that now. Really.

(Oh, and if you know me: no, you can't have my cell number. Just use my normal phone. If you don't have that, use email or this contact form.)

Mainly, I'm puzzled how people keep track of these devices. During the brief periods I've taken the phone with me, it's distinctly awkward, always finding its way into (and out of) available pockets, flopping around loose, and generally getting in the way. Women usually keep cell phones in their purses, I guess: men, it seems, either keep them loose with their keys, in available bags (briefcases, messenger bags, laptop cases) or resort to those silly belt-clip things. Can't say any of those solutions appeal to me.