42
IMPACT
Phoneless Clubs: Is Phone-Time Ruining our Fun-Time? From providing us with instant access to communication, to being a trusty digital companion archiving the best moments of our lives, mobile phones have become a thing of wonder which we seemingly cannot live without. But does phone-time ruin our fun-time, and could there be a future where we spend whole nights out without them? Waking up to a slew of drunken snaps on your story is a feeling many of us have experienced. Whether it’s you, singing your heart out to the cheesiest pop hits, or just documenting your drunken antics more generally, it can be mortifyingly embarrassing. As you rush to delete it, you realise that hundreds of people have seen it already – don’t worry, I know the feeling all too well. Phones can be a menace on a night out: the random photobombers in the back of your pictures, a list of random people added on social media, the brutal bank-destroying reality of Apple Pay and contactless payments. How can this one small device be a source of so much havoc sometimes? Although the concept may be hard to imagine in our Gen-Z technology-dependent societies, phoneless clubs can be, and are, a pretty successful invention. London nightclub fabric recently announced a no-photo and no-video policy, following FOLD nightclub doing the same in 2018. And the concept isn’t new. Clubs in Germany took the lead on the trend, with one of the first clubs to ban phones being Berghain in Berlin, which opened in 2006. A lot of clubs in Germany implemented this policy to downplay the scandalous parties taking place behind closed doors – the risk of a respectable figure losing their dignity and reputation after a wild night was solved by banning phones altogether. Eradicating the possibility of any photographic evidence, whilst adding to the mystery and intrigue of these exclusive clubs, seemed like a pretty smart sales strategy. The reasoning behind phoneless events has taken on a whole new meaning this year, however. Living in the moment, especially after being in lockdown for eighteen months straight, has taken on a whole new appeal. We all know the temptation to document your night out in a club with drunken videos and photos, or to record your favourite songs at a gig in sheer excitement that you’re finally hearing them live. But realistically, if you’re living a moment through a phone screen, are you really living it at all?
