The reason you give your kids a phone is so that they can reach you in an emergency, and so that you can reach them when you’re worried about them, which is most of the time. In the old days, before cell phones, when your teen went out, he was out until he got home, and you just dealt with it, because there was no choice. (Although there was that time my mom tracked me down at a friend of a friend of a friend’s house. But I digress.)
Today, when your teen is out, you can check in on him periodically to reassure yourself that everything is okay. Until you can’t reach him. Then everything is not okay, even if it is.
So you keep calling because there is not much else you can do. And each time there is no answer, your concern grows, until you’ve imagined every possible ominous outcome. And when your teen walks through the door (safe and sound), you exhale, and then ask why he didn’t answer his phone, and you get some version of “my phone died.”
The battery life for the average, relatively new smartphone is about 8 ½ hours, when the phone is surfing on a 4G LTE network with at least three bars of service and the display is at 100 nits. A nit, a measurement of the brightness of light, is equal to one candela[1] per square meter (1cd/m2). The sun at noon is rated at 1.6 billion nits, while a typical LCD panel has an output between 200 and 300 nits.[2],[3],[4]
With an 8 ½ hour charge and a variety of charging options everywhere, a dead battery seems highly unlikely and way to convenient, no? I thought so. So I Googled “my phone died” and got this entry in Urban Dictionary – When you’re on the phone and you really just want to get off, you say: “My phone is dying, gotta let you go.”
Nuff said.
[1] The candela, formerly called candlepower, is approximately the amount of light emitted by a common tallow candle. (I would argue that a tallow candle is not so common anymore.) Like horsepower, candlepower uses the technology that was in use at the time the new technology was introduced to measure the relative output of the new technology. Isn’t it time to update these measurements? We’re not measuring our boats in cubits anymore, are we? Any chance you’re going to drive 325 horses down to the supermarket? I say neigh.
[2] http://bestsmartphones2016.com/which-smartphone-has-the-best-battery-life-going-into-2016.html
Lies Kids Tell Their Parents 