Eton. Being offline is the new posh.
Prince George has started at Eton for 65 grand a year, and every new boy has his smartphone swapped for a Nokia brick. The privilege used to be having one. Now it's not needing one.
THE GIST ON ETON: "Eton and Smartphones"
What does Eton do with smartphones?
This month, Prince George started at Eton for £65,000 a year. Every new boy has his smartphone taken off him and replaced with a Nokia brick. You can call and you can text, and that is it.
It isn't just Eton. Brighton College and others have followed suit.
What is the government doing?
Since the pandemic, the government has given out 1.35 million laptops and tablets specifically to disadvantaged children. One system is paid to take the screens away, and another is giving them out for free, because status runs on scarcity.
Has this happened before?
It's happened before. Television used to be a luxury, and an aerial on your roof was a status symbol. Then everyone got one and owning it stopped proving anything. So you hear it in Waitrose: "We don't actually own a television."
Children in households where the parents went to university do about a quarter less screen time than those where they didn't, and the gap is there by the age of six, before they can properly read.
What is the new divide?
Twenty years ago, the worry was that poor kids couldn't get online. It was called the digital divide and it meant being left out. Now it means the opposite. Being offline is the new thin.
When food was hard to get, eating loads of it showed you were affluent. Once it was cheap and everywhere, gorging stopped meaning anything and refusing it became valuable. Screens have run that course in the last decade.
The only way to take a screen away is to put a person there instead. So what's really being bought is someone's time, which is the most valuable thing money can buy anyway.
Should schools ban smartphones outright?
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Quick answers
What does Eton do about smartphones?
Every new boy has his smartphone taken away and replaced with a Nokia brick that can call and text.
How many devices has the government given out?
1.35 million laptops and tablets since the pandemic, specifically to disadvantaged children.
What is the new status symbol?
Being offline. Once screens were everywhere, going without one became the valuable thing, as with television and food before it.
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