Tag: smartphone

I Gave Online t-shirt

Post author By Kevin Spear
Post date July 15, 2015

cartoon of a guy in church. An offering plate is being handed to him. The guy has a t-shirt that says, — © 2015 Kevin Spear

It’s fun when tradition collides with technology! For a few months, I’ve been using my bank’s web payment to pay my tithes and offerings. Why not? I’ve paid all my other bills that way for years. I didn’t expect the feeling of guilt when the offering plate came around even when I knew perfectly well I was giving.

So how do you combat that feeling when someone gives online? You can’t put your smart phone in the offering plate. Printing out a receipt seems tacky. If you wave it off and say, “I gave online,” you’re only calling attention to yourself and sound pretentious. Oh, the dilemmas!

A t-shirt would solve all the awkward exchanges. All the church has to do is pass them out in the back before the service. You can make them big enough to fit over any outfit. And if you decorate your church for the season, you can make them match colors for Lent and Advent!

I drew this cartoon for the July CHOGNews.

Tags Church (building), church cartoon, generosity, giving, online giving, smartphone, technology

technology cartoons

What do cell phones and clean water have in common?

Post author By Kevin Spear
Post date May 23, 2014

Sketch note of cell phones and clean water

I heard a TED Talk this morning from Andrew Bastawrous about cell phones in the Third World and an app that will help diagnose and cure blindness.

What struck me was when he said more people own cell phones than have access to clean water. I found an article confirming that:

More People Have Cell Phones Than Clean Water | The Corvallis Advocate.

That amazed me for several reasons.

In effect, more people have technology than basic health needs
Land line telephones have become obsolete in the Third World before they became widespread.
This probably means illiterate groups have more access to information than ever before.

While smart phones are still rare in developing nations (according to a Pew survey) , it is only a matter of time until this changes.

This is key for publishers and media professionals. Up to five years ago, I was in discussions where we believed most of our customers still didn’t own a desktop computer. Now, we must admit even remote villages in far-flung regions of the world can access technology. It stands to reason a household may be more likely to own a mobile phone than a printed book.

Think of it! Households that may not have a literate person living there could suddenly have access to information that was otherwise out of their reach. This is more than revolutionary. This could fundamentally change how the world thinks.

Tags cell phones, media, Mobile phone, print media, Science and Technology, smartphone, TED, Third World

cartoon

Too much information?

Post author By Kevin Spear
Post date May 6, 2014

cartoon of a woman tossing her smartphone — Copyright Kevin Spear

Cartoon of a frustrated woman tossing her smartphone. She says, “Stop giving me so much information!”

One morning, while I was watching Captain Kangaroo, a television ad came on the old picture tube. This was in the 1970’s, mind you. It said, “More information is being gathered each week than in all the previous years before 1970. It was complaining about how we were drowning in information.

I heard a stat the other day from Matt McKee. He said thanks to social media, more content is being created every hour than in all the content created between the dawn of time and 1950.

That isn’t to say it’s all good content. I have my fill of cute puppy and crazy kitten videos. Maybe it is too much information. I keep wanting to yell, “TMI! TMI!” at my smartphone, don’t you?