Why I’ve bought a Punkt MP02 phone and a Remarkable II tablet?

A bit of backstory first

If you want to just know the reasons why I bought specifically the Punkt MP02 phone and the Remarkable II tablet, skip this section.

For a few months, I’ve been trying different things to have a more mindful usage of my phone. There are a lot of things that have pointed me in this direction. One of the strongest things I remember that tipped me in this direction is seeing all the other parents glued to their smartphone while their kids where playing in the sand and I was one of the few playing with my toddler in the sand.

I’ve tried a few things:

• A smartphone challenge, first in solo then in couple, where I put a goal of max screen time for my phone. It worked nicely, had good effects, but also made me use more my laptop.

• Blocking distracting apps and websites, I’ve tried that both on my phone and my computer. That worked for a time. But then, I’ve changed the settings.

• I’ve deleted apps, like Youtube, but finally re-installed them or used them via the browser.

I’m really someone who has a lot of fun with technology. There are my grown up toys. But one thing has become more and more clear over the months and years: I spend a shit load of time in these digital toys.

The excuse is often that these are things I need for work. Or that I’m geek and it’s my passion. But when looking at it through the dad eyes something becomes clear: I don’t want my kid to end like that.

I feel I’m like a smoker who tells his kids to not smoke.

And that’s hard for me personally because I have this principle of “leading by example”: I act in the way that I think we should act, and hope that it motivates others to do the same. Especially my kid.

The relationship that I would love my kid to have with technology is that it’s a tool. He is the master of it, and not the servant of it.

So if I want by example to showcase this, it’s important that I change my way of using tools and maybe even the tools themselves.

Why did I buy the Punkt MP02 phone?

It’s clear to me that reducing screen time, deleting apps, etc. on my smartphone isn’t enough. So I’ve decided to buy a phone that isn’t a smartphone. I’ve looked at a few but the two ones that I was most hesitating on were the Light Phone III and the Punkt MP02.

I finally chose the Punkt for one main reason over the Light Phone III: it signals visually to my son: dad hasn’t a smartphone and doesn’t need one to be happy and organized.

Other things that I like about the Punk are:

• It has a good data sharing mode: which means I can work in the train with my laptop when I need

• It doesn’t have games, a browser or stuff like that

• It does the basics: phone, texting

The one things that bother me about it us:

• It doesn’t have any navigation feature

In the end, I hope that it exemplifies clearly to my son that we don’t need a smartphone to live a functionning life.

For sure, there’s gonna be a bit of a shitty domino effect where I’ll have to change many things: authentification apps, train schedules, how I take photos, etc.

And only the fact that I feel this will be hard, is already a big motivation for me, because I feel it should be hard to live without a smartphone. It’s just a tool, not a way of life.

The last thing that makes me smile about the Punkt MP02, is that it’s a phone designed by a Swiss company. Which is definitely unique, so that’s also nice for someone who runs a website called the Swiss Innovation Academy.

Why did I buy the Remarkable II tablet?

The issue I want to avoid is that many of the things I did on my smartphone, I end up doing on my laptop. This would then just create the example that “dad is a lot on his computer”.

So I need another way to do my work: writing, planning, creating education material, etc.

I could do it all on paper. But writing a blogpost on paper, then scanning it, and bringing it on my mac to then OCR it, fix the OCR and then publish is just a shitty process. Especially because a lot of my work is around writing. Writing blog posts, newsletters, books, educational material, etc.

The Remarkable tablet makes it possible to have a device on which I can write by hand, and then in one click transform it all into a digital text. And I can even attach to it a keyboard and write directly on it.

But how does that fix my problem?

Because, hopefully, when my son will see me working at home, he’ll see me using the Remarkable tablet. And if one day he says I want to do like dad, I won’t have any issue buying him the same tablet. Because he’ll be able to write and draw on it. And that’s it.

So now, why did I buy the Remarkable II tablet when there is a newer version with colors, and that’s more fancy? Here’s why:

• The OS between these tablets is basically the same.

• It’s way cheaper that the Remarkable Paper Pro

• I found a pretty good refurbished deal on the website with the tablet, the better pen and the keyboard for 239 € less.

• I don’t need the colors, I usually write by hand and on my computer all in black. So no need for that.

A big experiment

At this stage this is all a big experiment. These new tools will arrive in the next days and weeks at home and they’ll change drastically how I plan my travels, do my work, etc. But more importantly I think it will allow me to show by example to my son that I’m the master of my tools and not a slave to them. And that I don’t need to have the addictive tools to be a functionning humans. Just like an ex-alcohlic might say: “I don’t need to drink to be sociable.”

We’ll see over the next weeks, months and years if this big bet works.

For now at least, I’m happy that I’ve made the hard first step which is to commit to a big change of way of working, especially one that is tied to a piece of personal identity: I’m a geek who loves to play with the newest tools. I just need to play with them everyday for hours.