Those Indispensable Phones

For better or worse, mobile phones have joined the ranks of life’s necessities. In a Synovate report released this month, based on June polling of adults who own a cell phone, 42 percent of U.S. respondents said they can’t live without it, and 82 percent never leave home without it. Thirty-three percent own at least two mobile phones; 20 percent own a smartphone. Asked to cite the feature on their phone they’d most like to see improved, a plurality (31 percent) picked the camera.