The packed commuter train is such an anti-social environment.  Putting the avoidance of eye contact to one side, one used to be able to get a crude, stereotypical take on what other people in the carriage were like by the newspaper, magazine or book they were reading.  But with the anonymous array of mobile devices to hand, individuals just morph into a colourless crowd.

Based on a very biased sample of train carriage commuters travelling in to London from the Home Counties, there is an awful lot of electronic reading on mobile devices.  I would say 40% on my journey today were reading books, newspapers or magazines on their e-readers or tablets, others (let’s say 25%) were either playing games or catching up on e-mail or social media on their phones.  Another 30% or so were reading a printed newspaper, magazine or book.  The rest were asleep.  No one was talking. Read more »