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The Guardian - UK

Technology

Zoe Wood

Liberating and a huge pain: my week with a Nokia ‘dumbphone’

She sits looking at the device in her left hand — Zoe Wood with the Nokia 3210, first issued in 1999. Photograph: Linda Nylind/The Guardian

After about 10 minutes of furious tapping on the tiny buttons to write a still unfinished text the anger I’m feeling towards the “retro” Nokia 3210 I’m toiling over is mounting.

It is one of a new wave of “detox” or “dumb” phones aimed at techno-stressed individuals who want to escape the thrall of apps and notifications but, in this moment, I really want to smash it.

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