by Jordan Chan

News Editor

Picture this: I’m dying. Or actually, I’m choking. Or maybe someone stabbed me — it doesn’t really matter. The point is, there is an emergency and my life is at stake. You grab the nearest iPhone. For the sake of my argument, you don’t use the emergency call function because you’re rather stupid or just freaking out in general because, for goodness’ sake, I’m dying here. And again, for the sake of my argument, the phone is unlocked (but you should really be more careful about your privacy nowadays; it’s 2020). Now you open up this phone and look for that bright green phone icon in the hopes of saving my life, which – remember – is slowly fading away before your eyes. However, when you open the phone, you’re faced with a bunch of aesthetic app icons, and you cannot find anything that you’re looking for. Well, now I’m dead. And it’s your fault. Do you see the problem here? 

Okay, I get it. I’m probably not going to die from Apple’s latest phone update iOS 14. But let’s be honest here. Disregarding bug fixes and whatever other crap the Apple company sells us to make us believe that they’re actually improving our devices, the iOS14 update is a step back. It’s not 2014 anymore. None of us want to be a “tumblr girl,” and to a certain extent, we understand the idea of functionality over fashion. Yet somehow, every time I scroll through my For You page or talk to one of my friends, I hear about this ridiculous update. I don’t care if all of your app icons are pink and sparkly, or characters from Avatar: The Last Airbender, or poorly drawn MS paint inspired drawings. Although, I must admit that the last one… is pretty creative. Spending all of this time on this update just seems pointless.

Which brings me to my next point – the iOS 14 update really is just a total waste of time. Whenever someone brings it up, they mention how many hours they spent getting their widgets and photos just right. Do you want a cookie? What do you want me to say? In the time that you re-did your entire device, I was able to write this mediocre article. In the time that you re-did your entire device, you could have finished that summer reading essay you put off for the past week or so. Or better yet, you could have caught up on a couple of hours of sleep, because you and I both know that we all need some more of that. 

But, you chose to spend your time aestheticizing your iPhone. You spent all this time making your screen look pretty when you probably spend more time in the settings app than you do looking at your screen. You spent all this time when nobody but you will even look at or appreciate it – unless I’m dying and someone takes your phone to call for help, of course.

P.S.: No one wants to see your home screen on their Tik Tok for you page. I said what I said.