1
00:00:02,080 --> 00:00:06,520
Here I am, one of 3 billion phones in the world.

2
00:00:06,560 --> 00:00:11,800
You and your fellow Brits clocked up 99 billion minutes of chat last year.

3
00:00:11,840 --> 00:00:14,440
I've changed the way you talk.

4
00:00:14,480 --> 00:00:17,520
I was talking even louder, you know, "I'm talking now, I'm on a mobile!"

5
00:00:17,560 --> 00:00:20,000
And who you talk to.

6
00:00:20,040 --> 00:00:22,560
I looked at the screen and I actually said out loud,

7
00:00:22,600 --> 00:00:25,120
"You can get knotted, I don't want to talk to you today."

8
00:00:25,160 --> 00:00:27,880
I can be a dangerous friend.

9
00:00:27,920 --> 00:00:31,760
I've actually learned to really despise the mobile phone.

10
00:00:31,800 --> 00:00:36,000
That destroyed me, destruction through a mobile phone.

11
00:00:36,040 --> 00:00:39,560
I share your every secret, 24/7.

12
00:00:39,600 --> 00:00:45,080
If it's on charge it's on, if it's off charge, it's still on.

13
00:00:45,120 --> 00:00:46,120
It's never off.

14
00:00:46,160 --> 00:00:51,160
Then, after all that, you go and ditch me.

15
00:01:26,400 --> 00:01:29,680
I can't believe you've done this to me.

16
00:01:29,720 --> 00:01:34,840
You've dumped me and here I am, running down my battery on a grubby floor...

17
00:01:34,880 --> 00:01:37,440
in Belgium, for Christ's sake.

18
00:01:39,880 --> 00:01:43,280
We used to be so close, you and me.

19
00:01:43,320 --> 00:01:46,960
I was your constant companion, your confidante,

20
00:01:47,000 --> 00:01:49,440
your right-hand man.

21
00:01:51,480 --> 00:01:54,160
Do you remember how we met?

22
00:01:54,200 --> 00:01:58,200
I watched you walk into the shop and I knew you were mine.

23
00:01:58,240 --> 00:02:02,400
I was sleek and silver, smooth to the touch.

24
00:02:02,440 --> 00:02:04,400
You cradled me to your cheek.

25
00:02:07,760 --> 00:02:10,440
We were made for each other.

26
00:02:12,920 --> 00:02:16,040
Each mobile phone is unique.

27
00:02:16,080 --> 00:02:20,360
Each mobile phone is like an old pair of shoes moulded to your preferences.

28
00:02:20,400 --> 00:02:25,000
It's yours. What you use it for, how you use it, is exactly up to you.

29
00:02:25,040 --> 00:02:27,880
I never move without my mobile phone.

30
00:02:27,920 --> 00:02:32,200
I keep it just here, next to my heart. I love my mobile phone.

31
00:02:32,240 --> 00:02:35,000
I always have pink mobile phones.

32
00:02:35,040 --> 00:02:38,800
Well, this particular phone comes in two parts, I believe, now.

33
00:02:38,840 --> 00:02:40,320
PHONE BEEPS

34
00:02:40,360 --> 00:02:41,920
Oh, this is typical.

35
00:02:41,960 --> 00:02:44,200
This phone is very sleek.

36
00:02:44,240 --> 00:02:47,040
It's lovely. It's comfortable against the ear.

37
00:02:47,080 --> 00:02:49,640
It's got the best ring tones, best games.

38
00:02:49,680 --> 00:02:50,960
Another message.

39
00:02:51,000 --> 00:02:53,200
Text messaging, that's another that nightmare of mine.

40
00:02:53,240 --> 00:02:55,240
I couldn't think of a better phone.

41
00:02:58,320 --> 00:03:03,520
Things used to be a bit more clumpy and dumpy between your kind and mine.

42
00:03:03,560 --> 00:03:05,720
But we worked hard.

43
00:03:05,760 --> 00:03:09,880
We lost ever more weight to make you love us more.

44
00:03:09,920 --> 00:03:13,080
Well, the earliest phones were transportable phones,

45
00:03:13,120 --> 00:03:15,960
which essentially was a giant car battery

46
00:03:16,000 --> 00:03:20,400
with almost a car-phone-type handset on top and most of the time

47
00:03:20,440 --> 00:03:24,320
you plugged them in the car and watched the headlights dim when you switched them on to charge.

48
00:03:27,120 --> 00:03:32,200
In 1983, in the USA, they released the Motorola Dynatac phone,

49
00:03:32,240 --> 00:03:34,960
which cost ¤3,995

50
00:03:35,000 --> 00:03:36,720
and the phone had shrunk

51
00:03:36,760 --> 00:03:40,880
in terms of the size and the technology involved in making it,

52
00:03:40,920 --> 00:03:44,080
to mean it was the first truly hand-held portable phone.

53
00:03:47,040 --> 00:03:51,360
Flip-top phones started first of all in the very late 80s.

54
00:03:51,400 --> 00:03:53,560
They designed the flip mouthpiece.

55
00:03:53,600 --> 00:03:57,000
An interesting thing about this phone is that they give you the impression

56
00:03:57,040 --> 00:04:00,840
there's some sort of microphone electronics within the flip that actually work,

57
00:04:00,880 --> 00:04:03,960
but in fact the microphone was fitted down here near the hinge,

58
00:04:04,000 --> 00:04:06,600
so the flip doesn't actually really do anything at all.

59
00:04:06,640 --> 00:04:10,920
The aerial in these early Motorola flip phones also was for show.

60
00:04:10,960 --> 00:04:12,880
They were dummies. They didn't do anything.

61
00:04:12,920 --> 00:04:15,760
They were fitted to the phones

62
00:04:15,800 --> 00:04:19,600
due to the results of early American focus groups,

63
00:04:19,640 --> 00:04:23,280
who decided that all telephones should have a big aerial,

64
00:04:23,320 --> 00:04:24,760
like a walkie-talkie.

65
00:04:27,080 --> 00:04:29,800
30 years ago we didn't exist.

66
00:04:29,840 --> 00:04:33,040
Now there's one of us for every two of you.

67
00:04:33,080 --> 00:04:37,400
And every year another billion bright, shiny newcomers.

68
00:04:37,440 --> 00:04:41,440
We connect 4 billion people worldwide.

69
00:04:41,480 --> 00:04:45,320
The blank space is squeezed out so you can be in constant touch.

70
00:04:45,360 --> 00:04:49,160
I never turn my mobile phone off and indeed the studies we have done show

71
00:04:49,200 --> 00:04:54,680
that by far most people never turn their mobile phone off, not even when they have sex.

72
00:04:54,720 --> 00:04:59,560
Really?Yeah. They put it on silent but they never turn it off.

73
00:04:59,600 --> 00:05:02,880
I don't think there's anywhere I don't go without my phone.

74
00:05:02,920 --> 00:05:04,800
Nowhere, the toilet, everywhere.

75
00:05:04,840 --> 00:05:09,320
When I don't have my phone I have to steal my friend's phone and hold it as if I have it.

76
00:05:09,360 --> 00:05:12,600
In some way it's become a control piece,

77
00:05:12,640 --> 00:05:15,080
you know, "You didn't answer your phone."

78
00:05:15,120 --> 00:05:17,080
It's an accusation, you know.

79
00:05:17,120 --> 00:05:20,560
"If you'd answered your phone you'd have known what I was going to do."

80
00:05:20,600 --> 00:05:22,880
I put it on silent when I go to bed.

81
00:05:22,920 --> 00:05:24,480
I put it on silent.

82
00:05:24,520 --> 00:05:27,560
Why don't you turn it off? Because somebody might ring me!

83
00:05:31,920 --> 00:05:34,680
We give you ubiquity.

84
00:05:34,720 --> 00:05:41,320
We give you constant availability, all that sheer din of chatter.

85
00:05:41,360 --> 00:05:46,120
But we end up here, at the industrial end of Belgium.

86
00:05:52,440 --> 00:05:53,800
Welcome to Belgium.

87
00:05:53,840 --> 00:05:55,120
Welcome to Umicore,

88
00:05:55,160 --> 00:05:58,760
where we're recycling 5 million cellphones per year.

89
00:06:04,480 --> 00:06:06,640
Well, we're now sitting here at the pile

90
00:06:07,440 --> 00:06:09,600
of about 100,000 shredded cellphones.

91
00:06:09,640 --> 00:06:13,440
Cellphones that have been collected by a supplier of ours

92
00:06:13,480 --> 00:06:15,600
and transported from another continent to Belgium.

93
00:06:15,640 --> 00:06:22,200
This pile of 100,000 shredded cellphones contains 20 kilograms of silver,

94
00:06:22,240 --> 00:06:27,120
one kilogram of palladium and around 400 kilograms of copper.

95
00:06:28,160 --> 00:06:30,720
Was that all I was to you?

96
00:06:30,760 --> 00:06:34,000
E-junk to be shredded and melted down?

97
00:06:34,040 --> 00:06:38,040
Did you know you held a whole world in your hand?

98
00:06:38,080 --> 00:06:40,520
Nickel from Chile,

99
00:06:40,560 --> 00:06:43,640
silver from Argentina,

100
00:06:43,680 --> 00:06:46,280
palladium from Siberia?

101
00:06:46,320 --> 00:06:49,040
But you never knew anything about me, did you?

102
00:06:52,640 --> 00:06:55,120
But I knew you.

103
00:06:55,160 --> 00:06:57,120
Intimately.

104
00:06:57,160 --> 00:06:59,440
I was always there.

105
00:06:59,480 --> 00:07:01,880
Master of the bedchamber.

106
00:07:01,920 --> 00:07:05,600
I was the custodian of all your secrets.

107
00:07:05,640 --> 00:07:08,960
I entrusted those in favour to speed dial.

108
00:07:09,000 --> 00:07:12,440
Together we were text addicts.

109
00:07:12,480 --> 00:07:15,400
You Brits, really,

110
00:07:15,440 --> 00:07:18,360
anything to avoid a conversation.

111
00:07:19,920 --> 00:07:23,720
We're in the texting country of the world.

112
00:07:23,760 --> 00:07:27,840
We're one of the countries in the world, at least in the ones we've studied,

113
00:07:27,880 --> 00:07:30,880
that has an extreme large amount of texts compared to voice.

114
00:07:30,920 --> 00:07:35,360
People send texts because it's a cop-out from having a conversation.

115
00:07:35,400 --> 00:07:37,160
The art of conversation is dead.

116
00:07:37,200 --> 00:07:41,960
They talk about 4 billion texts a year being sent around the UK.

117
00:07:42,000 --> 00:07:45,800
4505 messages

118
00:07:45,840 --> 00:07:47,640
in the last month and a half.

119
00:07:47,680 --> 00:07:52,440
I don't like ringing my friends even. I'm very kind of, I don't know, and I think it's the thought that

120
00:07:52,480 --> 00:07:58,680
I don't want to disturb them, or am I going to disturb them in the middle of something, so I just... I don't.

121
00:07:58,720 --> 00:08:03,920
I send them a nice little text message and then they can text me back or if they ring me that's fine!

122
00:08:03,960 --> 00:08:07,560
I'm going to get arthritis when I'm older in my thumb, definitely. That's a definite.

123
00:08:09,120 --> 00:08:11,600
Then the oldest story.

124
00:08:13,160 --> 00:08:15,600
Girl meets boy.

125
00:08:15,640 --> 00:08:18,720
Girl and boy swap numbers.

126
00:08:18,760 --> 00:08:22,960
Things move on in an agreeable sort of way.

127
00:08:24,720 --> 00:08:30,680
And then, indecently early the next day, the eager text.

128
00:08:30,720 --> 00:08:35,360
The inevitable postscript.

129
00:08:35,400 --> 00:08:40,120
If someone says, "I love you," with one X, you know that if you're together by the end of the month

130
00:08:40,160 --> 00:08:44,320
there should be more than one X on it and I've noticed it progresses as time goes on.

131
00:08:44,360 --> 00:08:49,560
You get more Xs and as you're together three or four months, it can just go back to one or two.

132
00:08:49,600 --> 00:08:53,640
If you're used to receiving one or two Xs, if there's one less

133
00:08:53,680 --> 00:08:56,240
or none at all then yeah, absolutely, what does that mean.

134
00:08:56,280 --> 00:08:57,760
You're on the phone straight away.

135
00:08:57,800 --> 00:08:59,440
What have you done?

136
00:08:59,480 --> 00:09:03,800
I've got a habit of sending two Xs whether I love them or not, if they're friends, I do that,

137
00:09:03,840 --> 00:09:06,600
and I feel a bit guilty if I get four or five.

138
00:09:06,640 --> 00:09:08,720
I think, oh, I'd better add a few more.

139
00:09:11,440 --> 00:09:15,400
Once you'd met him things started to change between us.

140
00:09:15,440 --> 00:09:19,400
From then on you were preoccupied and I was merely a go-between,

141
00:09:19,440 --> 00:09:22,040
a gooseberry.

142
00:09:22,080 --> 00:09:23,960
While you made a fool of yourself.

143
00:09:25,440 --> 00:09:30,320
But love is blind and you were heedless to the looks you were getting.

144
00:09:30,360 --> 00:09:34,440
On and on you droned.

145
00:09:34,480 --> 00:09:36,040
When people talk to other people,

146
00:09:36,080 --> 00:09:41,560
if they don't hold eye-contact with other people,

147
00:09:41,600 --> 00:09:45,160
they tend to feel that nobody else is aware of what they're doing.

148
00:09:45,200 --> 00:09:49,960
It's like when you're a bit drunk and you get that tunnel vision thing and you're chatting to your mate,

149
00:09:50,000 --> 00:09:53,200
you're chatting in the pub and as far as you're concerned it's just you and them,

150
00:09:53,240 --> 00:09:56,200
but suddenly you're talking louder and louder as you get drunker and drunker

151
00:09:56,240 --> 00:10:00,120
and everybody else becomes aware of what you're saying and you think you're just talking to them.

152
00:10:00,160 --> 00:10:03,680
One of the ideas that's been put forward is that the reason we're so annoyed

153
00:10:03,720 --> 00:10:09,160
with people talking on the phone in a public space is because we only hear half of the conversation.

154
00:10:09,200 --> 00:10:12,280
If we heard both sides we'd be very keen.

155
00:10:12,320 --> 00:10:16,160
It's because we get annoyed and we have to sit and guess what they're talking about.

156
00:10:16,200 --> 00:10:18,880
There's got to be different categories of mobile phone users.

157
00:10:18,920 --> 00:10:20,640
You've got the show off.

158
00:10:20,680 --> 00:10:27,960
You've got the, "Oh, look, I am Ted from Washington and I've got a huge schooner in the bay."

159
00:10:28,000 --> 00:10:29,920
You've got that sort of fellow.

160
00:10:29,960 --> 00:10:31,880
I think they become oblivious to it.

161
00:10:31,920 --> 00:10:34,720
They switch off to the outside world.

162
00:10:34,760 --> 00:10:40,760
Actually talking to people down the phone giving bank details and dates of birth, and you're thinking,

163
00:10:40,800 --> 00:10:44,400
do you realise what you've just done in public, given all that information about you?

164
00:10:44,440 --> 00:10:47,040
Then you've got the, "Darling, I love you!"

165
00:10:47,080 --> 00:10:49,600
SHE WHISPERS "Last night..."

166
00:10:49,640 --> 00:10:54,400
In Russia there was a guy telling his mate about the size of this woman's

167
00:10:54,440 --> 00:10:56,480
boobies and what a goer she was,

168
00:10:56,520 --> 00:11:01,040
and I looked up at him and he went, "I'll call you back."

169
00:11:01,080 --> 00:11:05,080
"That bloke I went out with last night, did you hear about him? Yeah, he ain't that good!"

170
00:11:05,120 --> 00:11:07,920
And you think, do you really have to talk about it!

171
00:11:07,960 --> 00:11:12,880
And you've got the practical, "I'll be home at 5 o'clock, make sure you put the meat in."

172
00:11:12,920 --> 00:11:16,800
The thing is about you English, you listen to so much

173
00:11:16,840 --> 00:11:18,240
and merely tut tut,

174
00:11:18,280 --> 00:11:21,080
but after a while you'll finally boil over.

175
00:11:22,920 --> 00:11:28,080
He'd ring his wife and give her an update on which station we were in.

176
00:11:28,120 --> 00:11:30,680
Now, I didn't mind the first three,

177
00:11:30,720 --> 00:11:35,000
but after eleven I was, like the rest of the passengers,

178
00:11:35,040 --> 00:11:40,840
somewhat frustrated and bemused and can only hope that his wife was hard of hearing, or deaf, actually.

179
00:11:40,880 --> 00:11:43,800
To cut a long story short,

180
00:11:43,840 --> 00:11:49,200
he would stop and we'd be in places such as Three Bridges and he'd say,

181
00:11:49,240 --> 00:11:51,360
"Hello, darling, it's me.

182
00:11:51,400 --> 00:11:54,760
"I shall probably be there about half past seven,

183
00:11:54,800 --> 00:11:56,760
"but I might be a bit late.

184
00:11:56,800 --> 00:11:59,280
"There's quite a lot of passengers getting on this train.

185
00:11:59,320 --> 00:12:02,480
"I've counted 15, to date.

186
00:12:02,520 --> 00:12:05,920
"But there could be a few more, I don't know."

187
00:12:05,960 --> 00:12:09,280
I got on the bus and I quickly phoned work and I was saying,

188
00:12:09,320 --> 00:12:12,400
"Can I speak to so-and-so, I need to get through to them."

189
00:12:12,440 --> 00:12:15,280
While they put me through, I had a tap on my shoulder

190
00:12:15,320 --> 00:12:18,520
by this man who was late 50s, 60s, and he said,

191
00:12:18,560 --> 00:12:22,320
"Turn that phone off and don't be so rude on the bus!"

192
00:12:22,360 --> 00:12:24,440
Anyway, the waiter came past with the drinks trolley.

193
00:12:24,480 --> 00:12:27,000
I said, "Can I have a small bottle of brandy, please,

194
00:12:27,040 --> 00:12:30,080
"because that guy is going to drive me nuts in a minute."

195
00:12:30,120 --> 00:12:34,760
I just was so angry. But I told him with a few words where to go,

196
00:12:34,800 --> 00:12:38,040
and I said, "Oh, I've got to get off this phone a minute."

197
00:12:38,080 --> 00:12:40,480
I got off the phone and I thought, I'm not having it.

198
00:12:40,520 --> 00:12:42,520
I'm going to phone back because I need to.

199
00:12:42,560 --> 00:12:47,520
As I was standing to get off this man was glaring at me like that.

200
00:12:47,560 --> 00:12:52,880
And I don't know, I can't swear, so it's not going to sound the same,

201
00:12:52,920 --> 00:12:58,840
but I was on the phone, in my ear and he just said,

202
00:12:58,880 --> 00:13:02,040
"Thanks for effing enlightening us, you effing B,"

203
00:13:02,080 --> 00:13:04,840
and Michael goes, "What's that?" I goes, "Call me back,"

204
00:13:04,880 --> 00:13:09,360
and I put the phone down and he goes, "Yes, you, you effing B,"

205
00:13:09,400 --> 00:13:11,480
and he really didn't abbreviate.

206
00:13:11,520 --> 00:13:16,400
He was just, he looked mad and he just said, "I'm going to slit your...throat, you know."

207
00:13:16,440 --> 00:13:21,520
And I don't know what happened then because I suddenly went,

208
00:13:21,560 --> 00:13:23,400
"Oh, shut up!"

209
00:13:23,440 --> 00:13:27,760
And then he ran off and I ran off because then I really got scared

210
00:13:27,800 --> 00:13:29,720
because I think that was just a reaction.

211
00:13:29,760 --> 00:13:32,920
I had to say something and I said, "Look,

212
00:13:32,960 --> 00:13:36,920
"I don't know why you had to say what you said

213
00:13:36,960 --> 00:13:42,520
"every single station we stopped at, but why don't you just say to your wife, I'll be there at 8.30?"

214
00:13:42,560 --> 00:13:47,400
He said, "Well, it's her birthday, I've got to take her to dinner, blah blah blah, we've booked a table."

215
00:13:47,440 --> 00:13:52,560
I said, "Fine, but why did you have to actually say after every station

216
00:13:52,600 --> 00:13:53,600
"where we were?

217
00:13:53,640 --> 00:13:55,680
"And why did you have to mention the passengers

218
00:13:55,720 --> 00:13:58,520
"and why did you have to announce the delays on the train?"

219
00:13:58,560 --> 00:14:00,000
It's just driving me nuts.

220
00:14:00,040 --> 00:14:05,200
Anyway I did phone back. I was going, I'm just looking for this man who doesn't want me to speak on my phone!

221
00:14:05,240 --> 00:14:10,640
I was looking at the back of the bus and I was talking even louder, "I'm talking now, on my mobile!"

222
00:14:13,360 --> 00:14:20,200
You put me through all that and then you consign me to scrap at the biggest, hottest smelter in Europe.

223
00:14:21,920 --> 00:14:27,200
In our time together I gave you 1,500 hours of chat.

224
00:14:27,240 --> 00:14:32,720
I sent 73,000 texts for you.

225
00:14:32,760 --> 00:14:38,960
And I end up here, in 2,000 degrees of heat to be plundered for profit.

226
00:14:39,000 --> 00:14:42,400
My metals skimmed off a red hot soup.

227
00:14:42,440 --> 00:14:44,800
What's in those buckets behind us?

228
00:14:44,840 --> 00:14:50,680
Well, in the buckets behind us you can find lead, aluminium, iron, silica, zinc and so on.

229
00:14:50,720 --> 00:14:55,200
I had even more valuable ingredients you never suspected.

230
00:14:55,240 --> 00:15:00,840
Well, the precious metals can mainly be found on the circuit board and in the connectors.

231
00:15:00,880 --> 00:15:07,840
They increase connectivity and they can resist rust corrosion.

232
00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:15,880
Me, I was laced with precious metal, sparkling in a precise instrument.

233
00:15:15,920 --> 00:15:20,280
You and your kind, you're blunt, pink, soft, clumsy.

234
00:15:21,520 --> 00:15:25,120
You infect everything with your virus of human error.

235
00:15:25,160 --> 00:15:30,360
You press the wrong buttons, you fire off hot, ill-judged words.

236
00:15:32,920 --> 00:15:36,600
Everything was tickety boo for you until that night.

237
00:15:36,640 --> 00:15:38,960
Then...

238
00:15:39,000 --> 00:15:44,680
so what if he'd had a couple of drinks and mis-sent the text which ended up by your bedside?

239
00:15:44,720 --> 00:15:48,080
So what if it showed he was still in touch with his ex?

240
00:15:48,120 --> 00:15:50,720
Still sending her smoochy texts at 1am.

241
00:15:52,720 --> 00:15:57,040
And so began the long night of doubt.

242
00:15:57,080 --> 00:16:01,360
But you weren't the first to feel the dark side of texting.

243
00:16:01,400 --> 00:16:05,840
You do it and you see the name. You go, no, I don't want to send it to that person

244
00:16:05,880 --> 00:16:09,680
but there's no way of stopping it! It just says "sending" and you can't get it back.

245
00:16:09,720 --> 00:16:14,400
I have arguments via text message because I'm not a very aggressive person, I'm very passive.

246
00:16:14,440 --> 00:16:16,600
I don't like having arguments.

247
00:16:16,640 --> 00:16:23,000
If somebody does something to annoy me I'll quite often send a text message and say exactly how I feel.

248
00:16:23,040 --> 00:16:28,480
I was seeing a guy and we finished and I was very upset for about two years really

249
00:16:28,520 --> 00:16:34,680
and I know when I went out one night, I was in Bagleys, at 3 o'clock in the morning, dancing.

250
00:16:34,720 --> 00:16:37,600
I went into the toilet and I was texting him saying,

251
00:16:37,640 --> 00:16:41,000
I know we haven't spoken for a while but I still love you.

252
00:16:41,040 --> 00:16:45,840
I don't know what's happened between us but I think we should still be friends or whatever,

253
00:16:45,880 --> 00:16:47,320
and nothing's happened, no response.

254
00:16:47,360 --> 00:16:50,280
It's three in the morning, he might be asleep, but I'm not thinking that.

255
00:16:50,320 --> 00:16:52,960
Then afterwards, it's how dare you ignore me?

256
00:16:53,000 --> 00:16:55,320
I can't believe you're ignoring me!

257
00:16:55,360 --> 00:16:57,480
You have all this front to do it.

258
00:16:57,520 --> 00:17:00,160
If I'd rung them I'd have chickened out.

259
00:17:00,200 --> 00:17:03,920
I'd have just gone, yeah, yeah, it's all right, I don't mind, it's fine.

260
00:17:03,960 --> 00:17:08,520
But I know that if I'm really annoyed I should tell them, so I told them in a text message.

261
00:17:08,560 --> 00:17:14,720
It's an amplifier so if you have a very intimate and trusting relationship then you can amplify it.

262
00:17:14,760 --> 00:17:16,960
If you're on the verge of...

263
00:17:17,000 --> 00:17:23,360
suicide or divorce or breaking up, then I think it could also amplify that, because of course the problem

264
00:17:23,400 --> 00:17:28,880
with these 160 characters or less is that they don't tell the whole story and even sometimes they can

265
00:17:28,920 --> 00:17:31,880
tell a story between the lines that might not even be there.

266
00:17:35,080 --> 00:17:39,680
With that text the doubt was sown, wasn't it?

267
00:17:39,720 --> 00:17:44,200
What was bright and silvery became dark and ominous.

268
00:17:44,240 --> 00:17:48,600
Who's in touch with who, where, and when.

269
00:17:48,640 --> 00:17:51,800
Constantly available, constantly in touch.

270
00:17:54,600 --> 00:17:57,040
You had to know, didn't you?

271
00:17:57,080 --> 00:18:00,560
So I wasn't wholly surprised when you crossed that line to delve into

272
00:18:00,600 --> 00:18:04,040
the secret world of someone else's phone.

273
00:18:04,080 --> 00:18:07,440
Typical boys' toy. Loads of features, all fur coat

274
00:18:07,480 --> 00:18:12,880
and no knickers, and there, in the photos, you see her.

275
00:18:14,440 --> 00:18:17,360
Picture taken the wrong side of midnight.

276
00:18:21,560 --> 00:18:26,920
I have to say that this is the one and only time I actually went through anybody's phone

277
00:18:26,960 --> 00:18:31,960
and again he was somebody else who always had his phone with him so it was quite hard to do that.

278
00:18:32,000 --> 00:18:34,840
But on this one particular occasion he left his phone behind

279
00:18:34,880 --> 00:18:38,120
while he was off walking the dog, so I did have a look through.

280
00:18:38,160 --> 00:18:43,520
I looked through the messages and I couldn't see incriminating evidence, but in his templates,

281
00:18:43,560 --> 00:18:47,280
being the creature of habit that he was, there was the template to me which said

282
00:18:47,320 --> 00:18:50,480
"Goodnight gorgeous", but there was another one in there which was "Goodnight beautiful",

283
00:18:50,520 --> 00:18:55,080
which of course he'd never send to me because he never ever called me that, he always called me gorgeous,

284
00:18:55,120 --> 00:19:00,640
so I guessed that template was going across to the woman across the road.

285
00:19:00,680 --> 00:19:04,760
I got the impression she had met someone from the way she was speaking so sneakily

286
00:19:04,800 --> 00:19:08,400
I went and had a look at her mobile phone on the off chance

287
00:19:08,440 --> 00:19:12,720
and I spotted quite a graphic text message from him...

288
00:19:12,760 --> 00:19:16,720
to her. I mean this continued over

289
00:19:16,760 --> 00:19:22,280
the space of about three months, that I was checking her phone,

290
00:19:22,320 --> 00:19:27,560
just reading some of the texts that were on there and the whole time feeling quite guilty about it.

291
00:19:27,600 --> 00:19:30,720
I've looked at the number and I've thought,

292
00:19:30,760 --> 00:19:36,840
"I don't know this." So just out of curiosity, I sent a text message.

293
00:19:36,880 --> 00:19:41,640
I had a feeling that this was not right, but I thought, "I'm going to be calm."

294
00:19:41,680 --> 00:19:45,320
I remember shaking so much that I had to hold the phone with two hands

295
00:19:45,360 --> 00:19:49,160
to send this text message which said, "Hi, how are you?"

296
00:19:49,200 --> 00:19:55,840
And the reply came back, "Oh, hello, not heard from you for a while."

297
00:19:55,880 --> 00:20:01,080
And then I said, "OK, calm, deal with this."

298
00:20:01,120 --> 00:20:07,720
"Would you like to come for dinner", I text. And again, I'm having to hold my arms on the worktop.

299
00:20:07,760 --> 00:20:12,040
And the reply came back, "Oh, yes, please, I'd love to come to dinner.

300
00:20:12,080 --> 00:20:14,120
That would be great. How about Thursday?"

301
00:20:14,160 --> 00:20:17,040
It's Tuesday. "You're a bit quick, aren't you?"

302
00:20:17,080 --> 00:20:24,560
So finally, to really make sure, I then text, "Would you like a cuddle?"

303
00:20:24,600 --> 00:20:29,880
And it came back "Oh, yes please. Hugsy." Hugsy!

304
00:20:29,920 --> 00:20:35,760
I just sort of felt there was such a guilt about invading someone's privacy, looking at their phone.

305
00:20:35,800 --> 00:20:39,480
I sort of thought, "If I tell her what I know, it makes me look bad.

306
00:20:39,520 --> 00:20:44,320
"It makes me look like... I mean, I have been reading her texts, I have been going through her things."

307
00:20:44,360 --> 00:20:48,200
So I didn't like that aspect at all, so the guilt just kept me quiet, if anything.

308
00:20:48,240 --> 00:20:51,440
And what had he said to the woman?

309
00:20:51,480 --> 00:20:55,080
Oh, it's wonderful. It's a wonderful romance.

310
00:20:55,120 --> 00:20:58,480
He told her he was a water gypsy and lived on his boat!

311
00:20:59,480 --> 00:21:02,440
So you wait and you wonder,

312
00:21:02,480 --> 00:21:06,000
and you fume and you fret,

313
00:21:06,040 --> 00:21:09,880
and you pace and you postpone.

314
00:21:11,440 --> 00:21:16,200
But the pressure inside your head means there comes a time when you make the call...

315
00:21:17,760 --> 00:21:19,880
..when you confront.

316
00:21:19,920 --> 00:21:23,280
I told her then that I'd been checking her phone for three months.

317
00:21:25,280 --> 00:21:28,880
Yeah, that was a shock. What did she say?

318
00:21:28,920 --> 00:21:32,440
I mean, immediately she admitted what had gone on.

319
00:21:32,480 --> 00:21:35,240
She said it was over. So...

320
00:21:35,280 --> 00:21:38,600
I won't go into all the details, but we talked it over.

321
00:21:38,640 --> 00:21:41,560
It was quite tough, emotionally.

322
00:21:41,600 --> 00:21:47,120
I did take about four days to pluck up courage to confront him with it, mostly because I thought he'd

323
00:21:47,160 --> 00:21:54,040
be quite affronted that had gone through his mobile phone. But, no, he was caught, well and truly caught.

324
00:21:54,080 --> 00:21:56,240
So that was the end of that relationship.

325
00:21:56,280 --> 00:22:01,960
I served him his dinner, gave him a drink and I just said very quietly, "Now, listen to me."

326
00:22:03,520 --> 00:22:08,400
"I'm going to tell you this and I'm not going to repeat myself,

327
00:22:08,440 --> 00:22:11,800
"but if you ever do anything like this again

328
00:22:11,840 --> 00:22:15,640
"I'm not going to come for you, I'm going to go after the woman.

329
00:22:15,680 --> 00:22:18,480
"And anything that happens to the woman

330
00:22:18,520 --> 00:22:21,280
"is going to be your responsibility."

331
00:22:21,320 --> 00:22:23,400
And then I just left it.

332
00:22:23,440 --> 00:22:26,360
Now, I would not have touched another woman.

333
00:22:26,400 --> 00:22:29,800
I would probably just have kneed him next time and thrown him out.

334
00:22:29,840 --> 00:22:32,920
But the point was it scared him enough

335
00:22:32,960 --> 00:22:35,280
to behavefor another three years.

336
00:22:35,320 --> 00:22:37,640
And then he went off with someone else!

337
00:22:39,200 --> 00:22:42,800
Then about a month later, after this had all come out,

338
00:22:42,840 --> 00:22:45,440
call it habit, I don't know what,

339
00:22:45,480 --> 00:22:48,400
I thought, "Things just aren't quite right."

340
00:22:48,440 --> 00:22:51,960
And I checked her phone again and the texts had been continuing.

341
00:22:54,120 --> 00:22:56,320
How many men are sneaking off to the bathroom

342
00:22:56,360 --> 00:23:03,000
at midnight and just, you know, texting quietly to somebody afar?

343
00:23:04,920 --> 00:23:08,360
In terms of infidelity, the mobile phone, of course,

344
00:23:08,400 --> 00:23:12,560
can equally play the role of enabling you, by having a spare phone,

345
00:23:12,600 --> 00:23:15,120
to lead a double life much more effectively.

346
00:23:15,160 --> 00:23:17,240
At the same time, if that phone is found,

347
00:23:17,280 --> 00:23:19,400
then it is a gigantic hair on your lapel.

348
00:23:19,440 --> 00:23:21,240
Obviously, because there is a story.

349
00:23:21,280 --> 00:23:23,080
You can see all the messages.

350
00:23:23,120 --> 00:23:28,480
In our studies we have found that on several occasions people have been caught out.

351
00:23:28,520 --> 00:23:33,360
Of course, instead of hiring a private detective, you just go and read the text messages.

352
00:23:34,800 --> 00:23:39,600
I could have told you the phone isn't the best way to have these conversations.

353
00:23:39,640 --> 00:23:44,600
I was just a go-between, but it was me you cast aside,

354
00:23:44,640 --> 00:23:49,360
to begin my strange and lonely last journey.

355
00:23:49,400 --> 00:23:52,760
You hurled me into a watery oblivion.

356
00:23:52,800 --> 00:23:54,680
You know I don't swim.

357
00:23:54,720 --> 00:24:00,000
Me and water just don't mix, but you abandoned me,

358
00:24:00,040 --> 00:24:02,600
leaving me to sleep with the fishes.

359
00:24:07,800 --> 00:24:11,680
Here I came, still dripping, to an alleyway off Holborn,

360
00:24:11,720 --> 00:24:15,800
a knacker's yard of phones rejected, ill-used and battered.

361
00:24:18,320 --> 00:24:23,280
We get 70,000 to 80,000 a month at the moment

362
00:24:23,320 --> 00:24:25,200
but that's building up quite quickly,

363
00:24:25,240 --> 00:24:28,040
so we'd anticipate by the end of the year

364
00:24:28,080 --> 00:24:30,240
getting 90,000 to 100,000 each month.

365
00:24:30,280 --> 00:24:33,920
MOBILE ALARMS RING

366
00:24:35,720 --> 00:24:37,760
You were heedless and far away.

367
00:24:37,800 --> 00:24:43,400
In my distress, and with my last breaths, I tried calling out to you.

368
00:24:43,440 --> 00:24:48,000
We get 200 or 300 alarms going off each day, and it can get very annoying, obviously,

369
00:24:48,040 --> 00:24:52,560
because they're going off every day and they might be buried at the bottom of a box.

370
00:24:52,600 --> 00:24:56,600
So we spend a fair amount of time scrabbling around trying to find these alarms.

371
00:24:58,360 --> 00:25:02,720
About 80%, we try and resell to markets all over the world,

372
00:25:02,760 --> 00:25:07,600
predominantly Africa, south-east Asia, places like that.

373
00:25:07,640 --> 00:25:14,440
But the phones that we can't resell, which amount to about 10 to 15%,

374
00:25:14,480 --> 00:25:17,920
if it's smashed up, we get quite a few that have been bitten by dogs

375
00:25:17,960 --> 00:25:20,840
and carried around, a lot of water-damaged stuff.

376
00:25:20,880 --> 00:25:26,400
So ultimately, yeah, they will be recycled and taken apart and the bits recovered.

377
00:25:28,360 --> 00:25:31,880
Water-damaged stuff, my arse.

378
00:25:31,920 --> 00:25:35,320
Shunted here, shivering and in need of warmth.

379
00:25:36,520 --> 00:25:38,520
I found it here,

380
00:25:38,560 --> 00:25:42,760
in the fiery crucible where my last secrets could be liberated.

381
00:25:46,640 --> 00:25:52,680
Hot tears I'd wept for you and our lost life together.

382
00:25:52,720 --> 00:25:57,240
Bitter tears, too, for the way you cast me aside as junk,

383
00:25:57,280 --> 00:26:00,640
when I was worth so much more,

384
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:02,680
because I was golden.

385
00:26:10,200 --> 00:26:13,840
How many mobile phones to make that amount of gold?

386
00:26:13,880 --> 00:26:15,720
500 tons of mobile phones.

387
00:26:15,760 --> 00:26:17,880
How much gold is there? What is it worth?

388
00:26:17,920 --> 00:26:19,720
This is 150 kilograms.

389
00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:23,840
In value, you're talking about the value of about £3.5 million sterling.

390
00:26:25,600 --> 00:26:29,120
We are mining, we are recovering what has already been mined in the past,

391
00:26:29,160 --> 00:26:31,320
and we are putting it back on the market.

392
00:26:31,360 --> 00:26:36,440
Quite often this gold will be used again to produce mobile phones.

393
00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:45,040
And so I have become eternal,

394
00:26:45,080 --> 00:26:50,840
alchemised on and on, in an ever vaster merry-go-round of mobiles.

395
00:26:50,880 --> 00:26:56,560
I've changed you and the way you live forever, endless connectivity.

396
00:26:56,600 --> 00:26:59,840
For me, it's just dot-to-dot.

397
00:26:59,880 --> 00:27:00,880
For you,

398
00:27:00,920 --> 00:27:06,400
it's a global mobile monster, eating up your time on this earth.

399
00:27:06,440 --> 00:27:08,880
It sort of nibbles away at our attention.

400
00:27:08,920 --> 00:27:14,400
All the constant e-mail, instant messaging, text messages, mobile phone calls,

401
00:27:14,440 --> 00:27:21,440
suddenly we have no attention left to ourselves and we have no time to just chill out and be quiet.

402
00:27:21,480 --> 00:27:23,880
And I think that is the discussion we are undergoing.

403
00:27:23,920 --> 00:27:26,520
There is a sort of niceness to not being contacted,

404
00:27:26,560 --> 00:27:32,080
to sort of be out of the reach of other people and just have a bit of space and time to yourself.

405
00:27:32,120 --> 00:27:35,120
Now they've created it, it's like a monster you can't get rid of.

406
00:27:35,160 --> 00:27:37,280
Everyone has to have one now.

407
00:27:37,320 --> 00:27:39,360
I think it's an enemy.

408
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:41,520
I do feel as though...

409
00:27:43,280 --> 00:27:44,920
..it's just such an intrusion.

410
00:27:44,960 --> 00:27:52,120
Can you imagine giving an exercise to everybody, no mobile phones for seven days and seven nights?

411
00:27:52,160 --> 00:27:53,200
You know,

412
00:27:53,240 --> 00:27:57,320
a lot of people would just implode.

413
00:27:59,680 --> 00:28:03,720
# Well, I can't live without you

414
00:28:03,760 --> 00:28:07,920
# I need you night and day

415
00:28:07,960 --> 00:28:11,680
# But sometimes, phone, I hate you

416
00:28:11,720 --> 00:28:13,680
# And the things you say

417
00:28:15,840 --> 00:28:17,080
# Ba-da-ba, ba, ba-da-ba

418
00:28:17,120 --> 00:28:19,680
# Baba-da-ba, ba, ba-da

419
00:28:19,720 --> 00:28:21,520
# Ba-da-ba, ba,ba-da-ba

420
00:28:21,560 --> 00:28:23,640
# Ba ba-da-ba ba ba

421
00:28:23,680 --> 00:28:27,400
# Life and death of the mobile-phone. #

422
00:28:29,960 --> 00:28:32,960
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