With increasing frequency, I refer to the proverbail 'age thing' on this site, and here it is again.
I have been a fan of live performances, musical and dramatic for a very long time, but recently, I find myself distracted by the constant waving of phone cameras and tablets in the general direction of the stage. In 'my day', you watched the gig because it was a one-off experience, no technology to preserve it, ixcept your own memory.
What annoys me more, is that when the lights go down in a cinema or theatre, all sorts of glows light up around the audotorium as tablets and texts flash to and fro.
I know that people today feel they cannot be out of communciation even for a few seconds, but really, for the sake of courtesy to other audience members, can they not just leave the bloody things alone for an hour or two?
I am entirely with performers who humiliate audience members who have managed to ignore the standard warnings about turning phones off - and as for ringing someone in the middle of a performance, that deserves as much hostility from the performer as can legally be mustered.
I find MM as funny as dysentary on a coach holiday, but i am entirely with him on his actions here.