(smooth music) – [Jack] Hello, this is
Jack from tofluency.com and welcome to this
English podcast episode where I'm good to talk about
phones and social media. So there are going to be lots of phrases that you can learn today
based on this topic. And I'm going to give you my opinion on social media and phone use in general because I think it's quite an
important topic to talk about and it's something that interests me too. Now I'm making this podcast episode because my other podcast episode which I produced about four years ago has had over a million
views now on YouTube. And I've also released this on SoundCloud but not on iTunes or any
of the podcast players.
If you would like me
to start a new podcast, probably producing it in
an episode once a week, let me know in the comment
section here on YouTube. And feel free to go back and
listen to that podcast episode where I talked about my daily routine. People seem to love it,
and over a million views. It's my most watched video
here on this channel, but yeah, today we're going
to talk about social media and phone use in general because this has become such
a big part of our lives now. And I want to talk about
some of the areas of this and by listening, you're going to get some
great listing practice but also learn some new words and phrases and I'll do my best to add
some of the key phrases from this podcast episode
in the description.
So something about
smartphones is this, okay, from my life anyway. My wife and I didn't get a smartphone until I think about 2014, 2015. And we held off getting
one for a long time because we we moved to the US in 2011 and everybody had an iPhone or the Google Samsung
equivalent back then. And we just held off for such a long time because I was working online and I didn't want to be
connected to the internet when I went out and about into the world, I just wanted to have a simple, what we call the dumb phone, dumb phone. I find that funny. We just wanted to have
one of those simple phones instead of getting something where you're constantly
connected to the internet, because we saw other people at the time and we noticed that they were
constantly on their phone.
They got them out in certain situations. We found it quite strange
because we didn't have this. But then we decided to get
one because we had a child and we wanted to be able to
take pictures of our child on the go. So that was our biggest reason
for getting a smartphone. And I remember getting it. It was in December, I think, 2014. And yeah, since then, obviously, we have gone into smartphone
use like everyone else. And obviously, you look around today and you think about the difference between when people were walking around on public transport, in
restaurants, at bars, in line for things, in their car, and nobody really used their phone.
They were a little bit hesitant
about doing it at first. This is about 10 years ago, I'd say, because it wasn't socially acceptable to use your phone in public in this way where you're
constantly scrolling. But now you look around and it just seems like everyone
is addicted to their phones. If you are waiting in
line to do something, to buy something, your phone comes out. When people stop at traffic
lights, their phone comes out. I see people when they drop
off their kids at school, they're waiting in line,
their phone comes out. You see people who are at restaurants, they're on a date together. They're both on their phones. And you know, this happens as well. And it just seems like it's
completely become the norm now.
It has become the norm where people don't even
think twice about doing it. They just get their phones
out and start scrolling. And I think a big reason for this is that people love the scrolling now. They live to go on a website, a social media platform on their phone and just constantly scroll down because there's always
something new happening. There's always some type of
new information, new post, something happening in the news. And I noticed myself
doing this, especially, and I do it now, but
especially during the election.
So when there was an election
here a couple of months ago, I was constantly looking at the results, trying to find new information. What was this person saying? What was that person saying? And just to find out that
latest information about it. And there's also something
called doom scrolling which I think is a new word where people are constantly scrolling on social media platforms
and seeing bad news. And everything is just
bad, bad, bad, bad, bad. And it's called doom scrolling. And obviously, this isn't
very good for your health. But my thought on social
media in general is this. You can create your own
experience based on who you follow and how much you use the platform. The issue is that if you
have notifications turned on, then you're going to get
interrupted all the time and you're going to
constantly pick up your phone, click the notification and take a look.
And I find as well, let's say if I'm going to
produce a new video on Instagram, follow me on Instagram @tofluency. Sometimes 10 minutes later, I'm just scrolling through the feed and I completely forgot
about making this new video. It can really just suck you in the feed, the never ending feed. But like I said, if you take
some time to think about, okay, which platforms have given
me the best experience and who am I following that I
don't need to follow anymore? Now taking this from an
English learning perspective because I want to talk about
this in a positive way, social media and the phone is the the most revolutionary
learning experience that I think has ever happened
that I can think about, where you suddenly have access to endless resources of English, whether this is English that
is just produced naturally like politics, podcasts, or sports videos and also English that has
been created and crafted for the English learner in
mind, like this podcast episode.
So when you think about it, it is just an incredible resource for you. And you can connect with
people from all over the world, people who are learning English
and also English teachers. You can connect with them online through your phone just effortlessly. At this stage, I just want to ask, what type of so you currently
using to help your English? And what tips do you
have for other learners when it comes to using a phone in general, for learning English? I would love to know
your thoughts on this.
So please leave a
comment below if you can, if you're on a platform
that allows you to do that. But again, that there are
many disadvantages to phones. And I think people at this
time stage, they are addicted, where they can't go an hour or two without picking up their phone. My wife and I have done
experiments in the past where we put them away for the evening, those experiments don't last long. And we know that we need to
do better with our phones and not pick them up so much and not rely on them so
much, but they are useful.
They are super useful. Just things like being able
to listen to music in the car through Apple Music and Spotify, being able to connect
with people and family in a very easy way, reading the news, watching videos that you like
to watch, watching sports, all these kinds of things. The phone can be such a useful tool but it's also important to think about what it's doing to our lives. And just thinking back,
a lot of people say, "I prefer the time before
smartphones came about. I prefer the time when people weren't on
their phones all the time," and it can be annoying. And it it's just a thing that happens now. People get distracted,
people get notifications, messages, phone calls. Well, fewer phone calls these days 'cause most people text or send a message. But I would love to know
your thoughts on this too. Like, do you think people are addicted? Do you think that the
time before smartphones was better in certain ways? And how do you use your
smartphone in a way so that you're not using it all the time? So that you're using it as
a tool to better your life rather than being addicted to it and just constantly being attached to it.
So please let me know again,
in the comment section below. Now, I want to share some stats with you from the website, Review42.com They have some fascinating
facts about smartphone use. Listen to this, okay. The average user will tap,
swipe, and click their phone 2,617 times a day. So think about all the times
you tap, swipe, or click, 2,617 times a day. 95% of adults in South
Korea own a smartphone. The average time spent on smartphones is about three hours a day.
I thought it would be more than that. Worldwide, more people
now own a cell phone than a toothbrush. Whoa, more people now own a
cell phone than a toothbrush? It's pretty incredible, isn't it? And then it says there are 5.1 billion unique mobile users worldwide in 2019 and 2.7 billion of them use smartphones. 81% of Americans own a smartphone. I thought it would be higher than that but I guess children as
well, maybe children.
Yeah, and also, I think it's
worth talking about children and smartphone use, children as well. They're using different types of apps. That's what always surprises me. So people of a younger generation, they aren't on sites such as Facebook, but I believe they're on sites such as TikTok and Snapchat. And this is something else interesting, that TikTok has taken
over the world this year. And this is a new app that… It was around for a little while before. I think it used to be called Musically, but now it's TikTok and
it's just taken over.
And what I find funny
is when you see people doing their TikTok videos out in public, and you can just see
them dancing into a phone and it just looks very strange,
but this is massive now. And I'm really intrigued to see what is gonna happen in the future when it comes to smartphones
and social media in general. So just to finish up, I would like to say, feel free to go back
and listen to this again and just get some of the
key words and phrases that we talked about. If you've enjoyed it, like the video, and then also share it with your friends and then go to the description if you are on YouTube or Facebook, or if that is a description
below and then get my book, "The Five-Step Plan for English Fluency." And yeah, thank you so much for listening. I will speak to you soon, bye-bye. (smooth music).