{"id":183867,"date":"2025-12-01T13:53:40","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T12:53:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/?p=183867"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:27:59","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:27:59","slug":"stop-de-verscherming-over-een-leven-zonder-smartphone-op-de-universiteit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2025\/12\/01\/stop-de-verscherming-over-een-leven-zonder-smartphone-op-de-universiteit\/","title":{"rendered":"Stop the screenification! About life without a smartphone at university"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is minor misery that goes unseen: the troubles of the student without a smartphone. It is becoming increasingly difficult to manage without such a smart phone, especially at the university. As EUR professor and fellow sufferer Willem Schinkel writes in his book<\/a> of aphonisms<\/em>: The smartphone is a solution to the problem you have when everyone around you has a smartphone. Every morning, when I want to settle myself in the university library, I am confronted with it.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\n\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\tImage by:<\/span>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSonja Schravesande<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>

Students like me (temporally non-nominal, to put it euphemistically) still remember the pre-covid era in the library. No reservation system, but the old-fashioned \u2018first come, first served\u2019 was still the rule. The logic of the swimming pool prevailed, with everyone rushing in the morning to claim a deckchair with their towel. You had cards you could put on your study place, on which you could write when you would be back to reclaim your seat. These days such an analogue method no longer suffices. Anyone wanting to secure a study spot without the risk of being sent away shortly afterwards by a fellow student must first \u2018check in\u2019. That must be done by scanning a QR code. And that is precisely impossible for people without a smartphone.<\/p>\n\n\t

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\n\t\tFortunately, I have found another workaround, namely briefly logging in on a university computer and confirming my reservation via the webpage using the email code.\n\t<\/blockquote>\n\n\t<\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n

Such eccentrics can turn to the information desk to ask to be \u2018checked in\u2019 there. Because simply stating that you do not own a smartphone is often enough to earn a pitying look, and because I do not like giving people the feeling that they work at an airport, I try to avoid that awkward interaction as much as possible. Fortunately, I have found another workaround, namely briefly logging in on a university computer and confirming my reservation via the webpage using the email code.<\/p>\n

It was therefore quite a surprise when, after the holidays, almost all computers in the library turned out to have disappeared. Strangely enough, all the screens were still there. A staff member told me this was intentional: the computers were hardly used; students wanted a second screen to connect their laptop to. Crestfallen, I looked around. I saw people with headphones sitting behind two or even three different screens. My earlier association with air travel was not so far-fetched, as this now resembled a cockpit more than a study place. Airplane mode took on a whole new meaning.<\/p>\n\n\t

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Lees meer<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t