The Liminal Librarian

Yet another one of Pew’s endless reports — this one from a survey done in April 2009 — talks about the increase in wireless Internet usage. The part that interests me is that about mobile devices:

The report also finds rising levels of Americans using the internet on a mobile handset. One-third of Americans (32%) have used a cell phone or Smartphone to access the internet for emailing, instant-messaging, or information-seeking. This level of mobile internet is up by one-third since December 2007, when 24% of Americans had ever used the internet on a mobile device. On the typical day, nearly one-fifth (19%) of Americans use the internet on a mobile device, up substantially from the 11% level recorded in December 2007. That’s a growth of 73% in the 16 month interval between surveys.

Hey, that’s me they’re talking about! Before I got my piPhone in March, I had an old brick of a phone that basically… I know, how silly… made phone calls. Now, I read email or look things up or otherwise go online on my iPhone just about every day — and after just four months, you’d have to pry the thing away from me.

And that’s some serious growth in less than 1.5 years. Some interesting stuff for libraries piloting mobile services.

So, last week my cell phone died — it was about 5 years old, I’d been out of contract for some time, and after being finicky for a while it just stopped charging. Since I didn’t want to travel without a phone on Monday, I shopped around on Saturday and ended up with… an iPhone! I have been coveting an iPhone since they first came out, particularly since my husband has one through work and tends to taunt me with his.

Mine’s a refurb, but still not so frugal — especially because the data plan will cost about $35/month (including taxes) more than what I was paying for my previous phone-only plan. How do I justify this? We poked at the numbers and figured that if we could cut at least $35 out of recurring monthly bills to come out even, we’d go for it. Here were our steps:

1. The first thing to go: long-distance home phone service, saving around $10/month. (The iPhone gets great reception in the house — we’d been holding off on dropping long distance because my old phone, well, didn’t.) Total savings: $10/month
2. Then, we called DirecTV, asked for the cancellation department, and made noise about switching to cable. Savings? A one-time $25 credit and $10/month off our bill for 18 months. Total savings: $20/month
3. We then dropped down a Netflix tier to save $4/month — we’ve been holding onto movies way too long and watch fewer DVDs since we  have streaming, the library, and Redbox as options. Total savings: $24/month
4. Then, we called Comcast, asked for the cancellation department, and made noises about switching to DSL. They dropped us to a slower tier — still faster than the DSL service we can get in our area — saving $20/month. Total savings: $44/month

So, iJustify the iPhone (which I’ve nicknamed piPhone because it was purchased on 3/14) by saying it is saving me $9/month .

What should we have done? Cut all of the above and not bought an iPhone. But I do think there is a case to be made for not being frugal all of the time — I’m not a go-out-and-buy-every-new-gadget type of person, but my gosh, do I love my new iPhone.

What sorts of things do you splurge on?

(xposted at mashup mom)