The one that has a purpose and leaves you alone

There is a type of object that we have almost forgotten that it can exist: technology that does one thing, does it well, and then leaves you alone.

He took four years reading in a Kindle. I could use the mobile, which goes with me everywhere and is easier to handle. Or the tablet, which I already have and serves more things. But I don’t. Because the Kindle does not compete for my attention. Amazon has already won when I bought the book, you don’t need to return every five minutes. Is Unique purpose technology In a world of screens looking for our addiction.

I recently bought an FM pocket radius. To batteries. The initial reason was practice: after the Dana and the blackout I understood what needed to have devices that work when everything else fails. Without Wi -Fi, without mobile data, without needing electricity. The radio simply works.

But I discovered another use. In Mestalla, to follow the narration of the game without covering the ambient sound of the field. From the stands there are details that you do not capture, and the radio gives you that without getting out of the stadium.

I tried to use live radio apps. Inviable, networks are saturated in the stadiums. And even if it works, the signal is late. The FM goes in real time because it does not go through servers. It is ancient technology being superior in context. There is the key: it is not nostalgia, only that a certain technology does its job without asking for anything in return.

The smartphone business model is based on the engagement: The longer you use it, the more data they generate, the more ads come, the more subscriptions they sell. The electronic book reader cannot be so aggressive. A radio does not have what you hear.

At the beginning of the year I went from Apple Watch to a Garmin. In addition to being superior for sports use, it is a casio come up, not an “smart watch.” Once you see certain metrics, there is nothing more to do with him.

A principle similar to what made me Spotify to Apple Music. The first has a more fluid desktop application, but It has become an audio bazaar. Your cover competes for your attention. Apple Music has its own problems, but its experience is cleaner, more similar to the traditional: albums and artists have more prominence, there is life beyond the Playlists.

The same pattern is repeated outside the hardware. Newsletters and podcasts against Tiktok or YouTube. The former require a deliberate act: you open the mail, you give the Play. You consume what you chose to consume and then end. Tiktok and YouTube are designed to never stop. The next video is already loading. The recommended tab pursues you. Your business model depends on not closeing the app.

This philosophy – let’s call it “technology that serves without dominating” – operates under different principles:

1. Single purpose. The device does one thing. Its value is in the specialization.
2. Interface that disappears. The design is so simple that you forget it. The goal is for the tool to become invisible.
3. Asynchrony for flaw. The device does not interrupt you. It is you who starts interaction, at your pace.
4. Clear end point. You finish a book. A game is over. There is no infinite loop designed to drag you from content to another.

The problem is not technology. It’s how we have accepted that you should behave. We have normalized to interrupt us, measure us, push us towards the following content. But that logic is not inevitable. It is a design choice. And reflects a business model.

The technology that serves without dominating will not replace the smartphone, but its existence reminds us that we can still choose tools that do not treat us as a resource to extract. They work for us, not vice versa.

They are concentration islands in a distraction ocean. And its value is to remind us that the ocean is not inevitable.

In Xataka | An eternally decentralized generation: “I can’t do anything for more than fifteen minutes without looking at the mobile”

Outstanding image | César Abner Martínez Aguilar