Dumb Co dared me to trade my iPhone for a hacked flip phone

Dumb Co 挑战我：用一台“魔改”翻盖机替换我的 iPhone

When Lydia Peabody saw her friend pull out a flip phone at a party last year, she burst out laughing. “I was like, ‘Girl, what are you doing with that thing? That has to be a joke!’” Peabody told TechCrunch. 去年，当 Lydia Peabody 在派对上看到朋友掏出一台翻盖手机时，她忍不住大笑起来。“我当时心想：‘天哪，你拿那玩意儿干嘛？这一定是在开玩笑吧！’”Peabody 在接受 TechCrunch 采访时说道。

But it wasn’t just a prop — her friend was participating in Month Offline, a community challenge in which a small cohort of people exchange their smartphones for flip phones. Peabody couldn’t fathom giving up her smartphone, but her friend inspired her. A year later, her life looks different. She left her career as a licensed therapist to become the founding CMO of Dumb Co, the flip phone company that grew out of Month Offline. 但这并非道具——她的朋友当时正在参加“离线月”（Month Offline）活动，这是一项社区挑战，参与者会暂时用翻盖手机替换掉智能手机。Peabody 起初无法想象放弃智能手机的生活，但朋友的行为启发了她。一年后，她的生活发生了翻天覆地的变化。她辞去了持证治疗师的工作，成为了 Dumb Co 的创始首席营销官（CMO），这家翻盖手机公司正是从“离线月”活动中孵化出来的。

She’s happier. “I did Month Offline, and I was like, ‘Whoa, why am I suddenly not anxious? Am I feeling good?’” she said. “I didn’t even know that this is what I needed, and that spending this much time on my screen after work was causing me to feel so yucky.” 她现在过得更快乐了。“我参加了‘离线月’，当时我就想：‘哇，为什么我突然不焦虑了？我感觉这么好吗？’”她说，“我甚至不知道这就是我所需要的，也不知道下班后花这么多时间盯着屏幕，竟然让我感觉如此糟糕。”

Dumb Co sells flip phones that sync to your smartphone, rather than replace it, forging a happy medium between the infinite connectivity of the iPhone and the unrealistic limitations of an early 2000s relic. Funded by friends and family, the company is run by a small team in their 20s and early 30s. Like their peers, they’re dissatisfied with the fast pace of plugged-in, frictionless life. They grew up with iPads and Instagram but now crave something simpler. Dumb Co 出售的翻盖手机旨在与你的智能手机同步，而非完全取代它。这种方式在 iPhone 的无限连接性与 21 世纪初老古董手机的不切实际限制之间，找到了一个完美的平衡点。该公司由亲友资助，运营团队是一群 20 多岁到 30 出头的年轻人。和同龄人一样，他们对那种时刻在线、毫无阻碍的快节奏生活感到不满。他们伴随着 iPad 和 Instagram 长大，但现在却渴望更简单的生活。

In the humble shell of a $20 TCL flip phone, Dumb Co loads its own software so that users can access apps like WhatsApp, Spotify, Apple Music, and Uber. You can even access iMessage through a third-party app (shh, don’t tell Apple). By packaging familiar comforts like music streaming, maps, and blue bubble texts in a flip phone, Dumb Co is creating something for people who want to reduce their screen time and be more present, but struggle to fully disconnect in a world built for the smartphone. 在售价 20 美元的 TCL 翻盖手机外壳下，Dumb Co 预装了自研软件，让用户可以使用 WhatsApp、Spotify、Apple Music 和 Uber 等应用。你甚至可以通过第三方应用使用 iMessage（嘘，别告诉苹果）。通过将音乐流媒体、地图和“蓝泡泡”短信等熟悉的便利功能整合进翻盖手机，Dumb Co 为那些想要减少屏幕时间、更专注于当下，却又难以在智能手机主导的世界中彻底断联的人们，提供了一个解决方案。

“We are trying to make something where you can leave your smartphone at home and literally just live your life and engage with other people,” Afreka Ebanks, Dumb Co’s communications director, told TechCrunch. “And when you want to be on your smartphone and you come back home, you can use it, because the feature for call forwarding and text forwarding can be turned off.” “我们试图打造一种产品，让你能把智能手机留在家里，真正地去生活、去与人面对面交流，”Dumb Co 的传播总监 Afreka Ebanks 对 TechCrunch 表示，“当你回到家想用智能手机时，你随时可以恢复使用，因为呼叫转移和短信转发功能是可以随时关闭的。”

I spent over a month testing the device — which Dumb Co calls the Dumb Phone — buoyed by the knowledge that in case of emergency, I always had my iPhone on hand. I didn’t use the Dumb Phone that much at first, but as I carried it around to show my friends, I noticed that they weren’t confused by my flip phone — they were envious of it. 我花了超过一个月的时间测试这款设备（Dumb Co 将其称为“笨手机”/Dumb Phone）。想到万一有紧急情况，我身边还有 iPhone，这让我感到很安心。起初我用得不多，但当我带着它向朋友展示时，我发现他们并没有对我的翻盖手机感到困惑，反而表现出了羡慕。

“I’ve been getting into a lot of interesting conversations with people as I’m walking and someone sees me at the stoplight like, ‘What is this thing you have?’” said Ebanks, who bedazzled her flip phone. “I think it’s a great conversation starter, and I think it’s incredible watching people — myself including — work through the awkwardness of socializing with others, because I’m no longer distracted because I’m looking down at my phone.” “我在走路时经常会和人展开有趣的对话，有人在红绿灯路口看到我，会问：‘你拿的是什么东西？’”给自己的翻盖手机贴满水钻的 Ebanks 说，“我认为这是一个很好的破冰话题。看着人们——包括我自己——克服社交尴尬，这种感觉太棒了，因为我不再因为低头看手机而分心。”

The Dumb Phone is clunky at times. It’s slower than I’m used to, and I end up spending more time typing T9 texts than if I just used my iPhone (what I really want is a dumb Sidekick with a QWERTY keyboard). Yet there’s something undeniably refreshing about knowing that if you want to open social media, take a picture you’ll never look at again, or check your email, you can’t. “笨手机”有时确实很笨重。它的反应比我习惯的要慢，打 T9 短信花的时间也比用 iPhone 多（我真正想要的是一台带 QWERTY 全键盘的“笨”Sidekick 手机）。然而，当你意识到自己无法打开社交媒体、无法拍那些永远不会再看的照片、也无法查看邮件时，那种感觉确实有一种不可否认的清爽感。

When I talked to Peabody toward the end of my month of dual iPhone/flip phone ownership, she asked if I had ever left the house with just my flip phone. I confessed that I had not. I explained that sometimes I need to check public transit schedules, or keep up with Slack if I go to an appointment during the day. 在我进行“iPhone + 翻盖机”双机生活一个月的尾声，我与 Peabody 谈话时，她问我是否曾只带翻盖手机出门。我坦白说没有。我解释说，有时我需要查看公共交通时刻表，或者在白天有约会时处理 Slack 上的工作消息。

“The truth is, when you say the word need, it almost gives the same meaning as like, ‘I need food or shelter,’” Peabody told me. “Yeah, sure, it’s actually helpful to know when the buses are coming, but if you don’t have that information, you turn to your neighbor and say, ‘Do you know when the next bus is coming?’” “事实是，当你使用‘需要’这个词时，它几乎等同于‘我需要食物或住所’，”Peabody 对我说，“没错，知道公交车什么时候来确实很有帮助，但如果你没有这些信息，你大可以转过头问问旁边的路人：‘你知道下一班车什么时候来吗？’”

Peabody dared me to leave my iPhone at home. The day we spoke, I had already planned to report on an event at a library across town. I tried to explain that I had never been to this library and wasn’t sure what subway stop to get off at. She told me to just write down directions before I left. I worried that I wouldn’t be able to record interviews at the event. She told me that the Dumb Phone can record audio. Peabody 挑战我把 iPhone 留在家里。我们通话那天，我原本计划去城另一头的图书馆报道一场活动。我试图解释说我从没去过那个图书馆，不确定该在哪一站下地铁。她告诉我，出发前把路线写下来就行。我担心无法在活动中录音，她告诉我，“笨手机”是可以录音的。

“I really, really want you to do this, because I know that this is something that’s best experienced,” Peabody said. “When I switched to a Dumb Phone last summer, I did not use my smartphone for seven weeks, and I went on a cross-country road trip to New Mexico. I did not think I could do that, but I’m telling you that you can.” “我真的、真的希望你试一试，因为我知道有些事只有亲身体验过才知道，”Peabody 说，“去年夏天我换用‘笨手机’时，有七周时间没碰过智能手机，我还去新墨西哥州进行了一次跨国公路旅行。我原以为自己做不到，但我告诉你，你可以的。”

I was running out of excuses. Peabody drove thousands of miles without a smartphone. How could I tell her that I needed my iPhone so that I could triple-check that Tasker-Morris is the right train stop? 我的借口快用完了。Peabody 没用智能手机就开了几千英里的车。我怎么好意思告诉她，我需要 iPhone 是为了反复确认 Tasker-Morris 是不是正确的地铁站呢？

Smartphones and social media are not a one-sided evil. There’s real value in connecting with friends online, sending pictures of your dog to your grandma, and using Apple Pay when you forget your wallet. While researchers don’t classify smartphone dependence like they would a substance addiction, there are certainly parallels. Not everyone has an adversarial relationship with their phone, but for people like me, more screen time often makes me feel more anxious, unfocused, and less grounded. 智能手机和社交媒体并非一无是处。在线与朋友联系、给奶奶发狗狗的照片、在忘带钱包时使用 Apple Pay，这些都有其实际价值。虽然研究人员不会像对待物质成瘾那样定义智能手机依赖，但两者确实有相似之处。并非每个人都与手机处于对立关系，但对于像我这样的人来说，屏幕时间越长，往往让我感到越焦虑、越无法集中注意力，也越缺乏脚踏实地的感觉。

Peabody even compared her relationship with her phone to getting hooked on Juul in college. “It was really, really hard, but I totally broke that addiction, and now when I see a vape or something, I actually detest it — I’m like, ‘Oh no, I do not want that,’” she said. “When I turned off my smartphone for seven weeks, I would think about using it again, and I felt that same…” Peabody 甚至将她与手机的关系比作大学时对 Juul（电子烟）的成瘾。“那真的非常非常难，但我彻底戒掉了。现在当我看到电子烟之类的东西时，我反而很厌恶——我会想：‘噢不，我才不要那个，’”她说，“当我关掉智能手机七周时，我确实会想再次使用它，我感受到了同样的……”