A short stroll through any Korean mall, subway or park shows people wombling absently through crowds with no discipline, strategy, predictability or predetermined route. Whether on foot, scooter, bike, roller-blades, skate board, crutches or wheelchair they will invariably slow down, stop, lurch sideways, bend down, backup or effect a complete u-turn with absolutely no awareness of, or consideration for, anyone else moving around them. Physicists might recognise this as pure Brownian motion. At best this is highly frustrating for a nimble foreigner moving purposefully on a planned trajectory through the same crowd. At worst said foreigner can trip over one stooping local, tumble into the next and wipe out a whole clump of others like dominos.
 |
| The ever-popular and ever-hectic Myeongdong shopping area |
Even today custom dictates that people generally avoid making eye contact with others to whom they have not been introduced - so walking through a crowd with lowered gaze has become an ingrained trait. Historically, few people will have glanced down at their abacuses while sauntering through the market, but today the leading cause of crowd collision is simply the daft assumption that someone else will be the first to look up from their phone to make the necessary last minute course correction. The problem is now recognised as an addiction and so endemic that it has the government's attention;
http://iamkoream.com/south-korea-pledges-to-fight-teen-smartphone-addiction/
 |
| "Romance ? Yeah, uh, does 14:30 to 15:15 next Tuesday work for you ?" |
Seamless internet though the malls and public transport, combined with free mobile surfing and ever-more ingenious apps now make it possible not only to meet friends but to actually intercept them en-route. The real-time mapping of public transport means it is no longer cool to simply meet people at an agreed time and place; now it is possible to go one step further and actually leap aboard the same bus, train carriage or subway car which they are travelling on. All that is required is to be at the right bus stop or station platform, standing at your friends' carriage as the doors open. All very simple and not very spectacular - unless of course you're running a few seconds late; in which case, this becomes one person’s frantic dash through a tide of zombies all grinning at their phones while meandering about on autopilot. The seemingly genetic lack of spatial awareness, combined with traditional averted gaze and today's fixation with mobile phones leaves Korean crowds particularly susceptible to - Dashing Commuter Peril.
Most often the Dashing Commuter is an athletic guy in military fatigues who suddenly breaks from the collective unconsciousness of the crowd. However svelte PAs in stilettos, tightly fitted blouses and pencil skirts are not unknown to take up the chase. With a bag in one hand and smart phone in the other, the Dashing Commuter starts to cut a surgical slice through the throng. With urgent (but typically polite) shouts they can usually clear enough space ahead of them to accelerate into Full Pursuit Mode (FPM). On a good day the the Dashing Commuter can be seen vaulting over ticket barriers, careening down flights of stairs, sprinting along platforms and leaping through closing doors to successfully join friends in transit. However, more often than not, one earbudded misfit, wombling aimlessly through the crowd, drooling over an explicit online Japanese comic on his phone will suddenly, for no reason whatsoever, make one, unanticipated, totally unnecessary, lurch sideways.
At this point the Dashing Commuter in FPM is effectively a bowling ball with unstoppable momentum bearing down on the human skittles in front of him. The result is a multiple collision, a sprawling tumble of arms and legs, accompanied first by loud shrieks and then by the diminishing clatter of $800 worth of phone flying from the hands of each person in the human cascade.
Inevitably there's a disorganised scramble to recover phones, batteries and covers from the floor and lots of hotly vented disparaging comments. However these are not directed to anyone in particular, because, of course, that would not be polite.
 |
|
- The global number of internet users now exceeds 3 billion
- The number of Facebook accounts now exceeds 1.5 billion
- Annual smart phone sales are expected to reach 1.5 billion in 2015.
- In Q1 of 2015 Apple sold a relatively modest 18% of the world’s smart phones, reaping a staggeringly immodest 92% of global smart phone profits.
The wolves bought company stock, the sheep just bought the phones ;)
