Rather Than Punishing Moviegoing Texters, Why Not Provide Incentives For Them To Put Down Their Phones?

from the positive-reinforcement,-rather-than-negative-reinforcement dept

One of the areas of economics I'm most interested in is focused on incentives. While it's a simplification of things, there are so many areas where people seem to naturally gravitate towards negative reinforcement as an incentive system -- that is, punishing people for things they believe are wrong. While that does work in some cases, it's amazing just how frequently positive reinforcement to nudge behavior in a better direction works much, much, much more effectively. Aaron DeOliveira points us to an interesting example of a company focusing on positive reinforcement in an area where most people have long-assumed that punishment was the only possible option: dealing with the annoyance of people texting during a movie. The first response that many theaters (and theater goers!) have, is to "punish" this behavior by outlawing it. They set up rules and put up signs. They have silly commercials before the show about how annoying it is. But it's all based on the idea of negative reinforcement: punishing or shaming those who engage in the behavior. But, quite frequently, that does little to actually get people to stop.

So, it appears that the Cinemark chain of theaters is trying a system of positive reinforcement. Within its normal movie app for iOS and Android is a separate "mini-app" allowing users to put their phones into "CineMode." It automatically makes the screens on the phones dim, and puts them into vibrate mode -- sort of like an equivalent to airplane mode. But here's the kicker: since the app knows what you're doing, it can keep track of whether or not you actually follow through and leave CineMode enabled throughout the entire flick. For the users who do that, they get rewarded:

When the movie ends and the guest exits CineMode, Cinemark will automatically send a reward (digital coupon) through the app and store it in the Rewards section.

Who knows how well it will work in practice, but it's great to see people realizing that technology can help enable this kind of positive reinforcement, rather than always doubling down on the negative reinforcement/punishment.

Filed Under: incentives, movies, texting

California Legalizes Some Texting While Driving, Sort Of

from the will-it-reduce-accidents? dept

A few years ago, California outlawed texting while driving. On the whole, this is one of those things that certainly seems like a good idea. I'm still amazed that anyone -- law or no law -- thinks that texting while driving is a reasonable thing to do. It's a clear death wish. That said, like many laws, there appear to be unintended consequences. A few studies have suggested that states that put in place anti-texting while driving laws actually saw an increase in accidents compared to nearby states that had no such ban. How does that make sense? Well, it's because the law doesn't seem to actually get everyone to stop texting while driving. Instead, what it does is make them hide what they're doing, which generally means putting it down in their lap. Before that, they could hold it up and still see the road, even if they weren't paying close enough attention to it.

None of this is defending the ridiculously dangerous practice of texting while driving, but merely acknowledging that the law intended to make the roads safer could actually do the opposite.

With all that said, it's interesting to see that California quietly legalized some forms of texting while driving last week with very little fanfare. Basically, it allows totally hands-free texting -- such as dictating messages via a bluetooth headset or a car service like OnStar. Of course, unsurprisingly when dealing with lawmakers and lawmaking, there's a lot of confusion over the new rules -- with some wondering if it meant that something like Siri was now legal while driving. That resulted in the following amusing passage in the SJ Merc article about this, in which the staff of the sponsor of the bill is left to admit that no one there has an iPhone, so they didn't even really think about Siri:

On Friday, after much head-scratching and acknowledging nobody in Miller's office owns a Siri-equipped iPhone 4S, the assemblyman's aides concluded it will still be illegal to use your actual phone to text behind the wheel -- even by speaking the message directly into Siri.

The California Highway Patrol confirms that just the act of turning on the phone or selecting the phone's hands-free text app, like pushing the Siri button or Google apps on Android phones, is enough to warrant flashing lights in your rearview mirror and a $100-plus ticket. The same thing goes for using your phone to read texts.

"The phone can't be in your hands," said CHP spokeswoman Jaime Coffee. "Hands-free is the key."

Either way, this seems to suggest, once again, the difficulty in regulating any particular technology in a rapidly changing technology market. I still don't understand why we don't just do the simple thing: make dangerous and distracted driving illegal, and just teach people the human consequences of doing something moronic like texting while driving.

Filed Under: california, driving, sms, texting, texting while driving

Woman Texting Boyfriend Not Liable For The Car Crash He Was In While Texting Back

from the common-sense-prevails dept

A few years ago, we noted the slight trend of people suing mobile operators over car crashes with drivers who were on their phones. Those lawsuits haven't gone very far, but with the rise of "texting while driving" as a big issue these days, someone apparently tried to blame a woman who texted her boyfriend for a car accident, because as he attempted to reply, he plowed into a couple on a motorcycle. The lawyer for the couple argued that the woman should have known that her boyfriend was driving at the time they were texting. Even if that was true, that hardly means she's to blame for the accident in any legal sense. Thankfully, the judge readily agreed, dismissing the case against her, and noting that the responsibility is on the recipient. Otherwise there would be some perverse results:

Rand said it's reasonable for text message senders to assume the recipients will behave responsibly, and he also noted drivers are bombarded with many forms of distraction, whether they be text messages, notifications from smartphones, GPS devices or signs along the road.

"Were I to extend this duty to this case, in my judgment, any form of distraction could potentially serve as the basis of a liability case," Rand said.

Filed Under: driving, liability, texting

May The Dolphin Be Unflogged: Paskistani Government Censors Texting

from the ignorant-sh*t dept

The Pakistan Telecommunications Authority has taken a bold new step in the censorship arena, compiling a list of words and phrases deemed "inappropriate" for texting. This list has been forwarded to the nation's mobile operators, making a brief appearance as a publicly-available Google doc. Although the public permission has been rescinded, a version of the list appears here (very probably NSFW, especially if someone is reading over your shoulder or if you tend to read everything aloud).

According to a mobile operator representative:

"There are more than 1,600 words in the list including indecent language, expletives, swear words, slang etc, which have to be filtered. The filtering is not good for the system and may degrade the quality of network services-plus it would be a great inconvenience to our subscribers if their SMS was not delivered due to the wrong choice of words"

To give you the gist of the forbidden texts, imagine George Carlin's "Seven Words You Can Never Say on TV," attach nearly any other imaginable word to those seven, add a couple hundred euphemisms for masturbation, some drug slang and a slew of misspellings and you'll be in the general neighborhood. It's what's lying on the outskirts of this neighborhood where things get weird.

Athletes Foot. Defecate. Deposit. (Yes, I know, but I would imagine some Pakistanis still use a banking system.) Do Me is thwarted by removing a space, leaving Pakistanis with no word for "enclosed arena." G Unit. God Damed Motha Fucka. I'm saddened to see "sexwhore" is no longer permissible, as it has become my go-to texting phrase, especially when contacting immediate family members.

Famous STD gonorrhea narrowly avoids the ban, thanks to an apparent lack of reference material ("gonorrehea"). Of course, infection tends to lead to a burning sensation that also makes the "no-go" list: "smagma."

Got Jesus. (It's cool, though. "Satan" is banned as well.) Hobo. Hoser. Idiot and "idoit." Juggalo. Kmart. Kotex. Lotion.

Inveterate masturbators will be thrilled to learn that many variations have been banned (mastabater, masterbate, mastrabator) but the original, correctly spelled version lives on. Sadly, inveterate jokesters will have to make do without their precious, um, "pun tang."

Neon Deon. Rae Carruth. (Apparently, the Pakistani government has something against flashy/homicidal football players, not to mention the defunct XFL ("he hate me/hehateme")).

"Tongue" gets twisted as well, appearing on the list as "tonge," "toung" and "tounge." #1072-1074 are apparently intentionally left blank.

All in all, a very dirty and plentiful list. One can almost imagine the censoring group giggling childishly long into the night while coming (I KNOW) up with this list.

Many Pakistanis have taken to the internet to express their displeasure with having their constitutional free speech rights violated. Of course, officials are quick to point out that this censorship is "for the children."

Mohammad Younis, a PTA spokesman claims the ban was a "result of numerous meetings and consultations with stakeholders," and went on to point out that "nobody would like this happening to their young boy or girl."

(Oddly enough, "Wuutang Clan" is forbidden, despite the fact that they are sporting an additional "u" and are distinctly "for the children.")

The spokesman also points out that they never thought they'd get caught:

Mr. Younis also added that the list was never intended to be distributed publicly and was only intended to be used for testing purposes.

Supposedly the final version will be much shorter, leaving Pakistani texters only "partially censored" which is better than "completely censored" but still much, much worse than enjoying their right to free speech. Citing Pakistani court precedent, the Pakistani government representative helpfully pointed out that, like many "unlimited" data plans, constitutionally-protected free speech isn't "without restrictions."

All in all, this move sounds like a nanny-state circle****, presided over by officious ***hats with too much free time and way too much power.

Filed Under: censorship, pakistan, texting
Companies: pakistan telecommunications authority

DOJ Document Shows How Long Telcos Hold Onto Your Data

from the a-long,-long-time dept

With the Justice Department believing that it can get all sorts of data from telcos without any oversight or without a warrant, it seems rather important to know what kind of info your mobile operator is keeping -- and for how long. The ACLU, via a Freedom of Information Act request, was able to get a "for law enforcement use only" document that shows how long the carriers hold on to what data (Wired also notes that the document could already be found online if you knew the title). The document itself is a pretty weak scan: Thankfully, however, now that the data is out there, we can show it friendlier formats. Michael Robertson was kind enough to take the data (minus the "for law enforcement use only" part, and put it into a Google docs spreadsheet: Additionally, the folks at Wired put together a nice infographic from the data: What it seems to show is that Verizon holds onto your texting data for the least amount of time, but also retains the actual text of your text messages -- something no one else, outside of Virgin Mobile, does. How long until we see a push for a mobile data retention law to "standardize" what these companies have to hang onto and for how long?

Filed Under: data, data retention, justice department, telcos, text messages, texting
Companies: at&t, sprint, t-mobile, verizon wireless

Chicago Politicians Say Mobile Phones Should Block Kids From Texting While Driving

from the technological-realities dept

A few years back, there were some reports of tools that would "block" people from texting while driving by simply disabling the feature if the phone was moving over a certain speed. It was targeted at parents to put on their kids' phones, but we haven't seen much of an indication that it's gained any traction. No worries, politicians to the rescue. Gregil10 points us to the news that "an influential group of Chicago aldermen," are pushing for a law that would require such software be placed on any mobile phone sold in Chicago, which could then be enabled by the parents (or, I guess, by the user themselves).

Of course, the same problems that we discussed a few years back apply (and haven't been solved). If you think kids won't figure out how to get around such things, you haven't seen kids and their mobile phones lately. They understand the devices better than parents. Even if a parent can figure out how to enable the software, you can bet kids will figure out how to disable it.

An even bigger issue is that blocking texting based on the speed of travel is a really broad brush for trying to stop texting while driving. Speed of travel isn't a very good proxy for whether or not someone is driving. It may be a good indication that someone is travelling in a vehicle, but that hardly means they're controlling the vehicle. And, it really doesn't make sense to block texting for passengers. In fact, allowing passengers to communicate in this way often serves as a good way to stop drivers from texting, because they can ask a passenger to handle the texting instead. Or if someone's on a bus or a train, should they really be stopped from texting? Often, that's when people use such functionality the most, letting others (such as parents!) know that they got on the bus or train and would be arriving on time/late/early/etc.

I certainly recognize the risks of texting and driving. And it's no secret that many, many kids do engage in this incredibly risky and stupid behavior. But laws like this don't solve the real problem. Instead, they just create even more problems.

Filed Under: blocks, chicago, driving, kids, mobile phones, texting

Woman Threatening To Sue Mall Because Mall Video Captured Her Text-And-Walking Into A Fountain

from the rethink-your-targets dept

Mr. LemurBoy was the first of a whole bunch of you to send in this story of a woman who was trying to walk and text in the mall where she works... and paid so little attention to what was going on around her that she fell face first into a big fountain. As with all such things like that, it's difficult not to at least chuckle a bit when you see that kind of thing, and, indeed the mall security folks found it funny enough to put the clip online, where it went viral. And even though the woman was fine and even though it's impossible to identify her in the video, she's now come forward and is threatening to sue the security guards for both releasing the video and not coming to help her fast enough. I can't see her having much success with any such lawsuit. She was the one who did the embarrassing thing, and it was done in public, where lots of people could have seen/filmed it. And it's not clear what legal statute she's relying on where security has a requirement to help her after her own mistake. But, even more amazing is that she complains about how embarrassed she was about the whole thing... but doesn't seem to realize that no one knew who she was before. By coming forward, she's now identified who she is so that people will know. Wouldn't that be even more embarrassing?

Filed Under: mall, texting

UK Police Told To Text Instead Of Using Radios In Order To Save Money

from the but-no-texting-while-driving dept

Apparently, the wireless radio system that police use in the UK is quite expensive. This isn't all that surprising, since such networks need much greater reliability that traditional mobile networks, but with UK police forces having a capped deal where prices go up even higher after a certain amount is used, apparently police are instructing cops to make use of text messaging as an alternative to keep their radio usage down. While I definitely understand why the police network would be more expensive, and can see some benefits to police texting when appropriate, it does seem a bit bizarre to warn police to be cost conscious in their communicating with fellow police.

Filed Under: police, radios, texting, uk

New Study Shows Texting Bans May Make Roads Even More Dangerous

from the unintended-consequences... dept

For many years we've questioned the wisdom of various "distracted driving" laws -- such as bans on talking while driving or texting while driving. It's not -- as some people have accused -- that we think texting or using a mobile phone is a good idea while driving. We don't. In fact, it seems to go without saying that trying to send a text message while driving is one of the dumbest things you can do, and I'm amazed that anyone even considers it. My concern has always been that I don't believe the laws work. And, now, it appears that we have some more evidence to support that. A new study has shown that state laws banning driving while texting have not reduced accidents, and in some cases may have even resulted in more accidents. How could it have increased accidents? Because people who want to text anyway -- especially unskilled young drivers -- begin holding their phones lower to avoid detection, making it that much more difficult to control the car and be aware of their surroundings. The study compared before and after stats in states that implemented texting-while-driving bans, and then also compared the findings to neighboring states that didn't have such laws.

This seems like a classic case of politicians not understanding unintended consequences. Politicians love to ban stuff, but they never take into account the actual response to those bans, and just assume that if the law bans something people will stop doing it. Instead, they may continue to do the action in an even less socially acceptable way -- and that can put a lot more people in danger.

The article quotes someone who makes the point that I've been trying to make for years:

"The trouble is that texting and using a cellphone while driving is definitely hazardous. Nobody argues that. The danger in putting all the emphasis on laws is that it is being done to the exclusion of something else that would be more effective."

No one is arguing that texting while driving is a good thing -- just that these laws aren't helping (and may even be making the problem worse). Instead of pretending we live in a perfect world where if something is banned by law, people will stop doing it, why not focus on looking for solutions that actually make people safer?

Filed Under: distractions, driving, texting, unintended consequences