Advancements in technology have become so commonplace that sometimes we forget to stop and think about how incredible it is that a girl on her laptop in Texas can see photos and cell phone video in real time that a young college student has posted of a rally he's at in Iran.

Second we're spending a huge amount of money on technology so that everyone can check out laptops and portable phones. We're spending more money to write our existing information into databases or onto CD-ROM.

As a matter of fact when compression technology came along we thought the future in 1996 was about voice. We got it wrong. It is about voice video and data and that is what we have today on these cell phones.

Technology gives us the facilities that lessen the barriers of time and distance - the telegraph and cable the telephone radio and the rest.

The moment of drifting into thought has been so clipped by modern technology. Our lives are filled with distraction with smartphones and all the rest. People are so locked into not being present.

Well clearly Apple is a role model of the American innovation whereby it produced all these products - iPod iPhone iPad - that are really now dominating all the technology arena in the world.

I would absolutely love to go back to the simplicity of the '80s where there wasn't texting social media iPhones or smartphones. I love the fact that you would go home and check your messages. I'm not well suited to the world of modern technology.

There was a time when nails were high-tech. There was a time when people had to be told how to use a telephone. Technology is just a tool. People use tools to improve their lives.

You know I do music. If you look under the hood of the industry I'm in it's all based on technology. From radio to phonographs to CDs it's all technology. Microphones reel-to-reels cameras editing chips it's all technology.

The telephone is a 100-year-old technology. It's time for a change. Charging for phone calls is something you did last century.