In 2010, Yale University computer scientist David Gelernter called for an anti-internet movement, a “group of intellectual dissent that asks us to slow down”. Others predict a broader anti-tech backlash.
We’ll just say this: at Esquire we love a gadget. But sometimes (when we’re balancing a tablet on our arm to check Instagram on our Apple Watch, for instance) even we have sympathy for this kind of talk. After all, isn’t technology supposed to make life simpler? Maybe it’s time to declutter?
Enter the MP 01, a mobile phone from Swiss brand Punkt. The Jasper Morrison-designed device strips functionality back to phone calls and text messages, plus a diary and clock function. The MP 01 also boasts a monochromatic surface, punchy buttons, a 2in LCD display and a huge battery life. You can’t go online or tweet. It hasn’t got a camera. It’s just a well-designed product intended to do one thing – be a phone – and do it well.
“We hope it will offer a bit of a digital detox,” Punkt founder Petter Neby says. “Or you can carry two phones: one for work, one for pleasure.” Hang on, doesn’t that sound like more clutter?
Either way, it’s a lovely phone.
£230; punkt.ch
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