To me a smartphone is not the same as other pieces of equipment I use when hiking. When I'm at home I don't use my backpack or my hiking pole or my boots or my tent or my sleeping pad (uh except for backyard sleeping), my hiking shorts, my MSR stove, my cook pot, my water filter, my little radio---like I use my phone at home. --- ETC ETC.
But when I'm at home I do use my laptop and my cellphone and my car and dozens of things I don't want to use on a backpacking trip; in fact, I don't want to see a car or a computer or a smartphone or a television or a hundred other things when I'm out. Going out for several weeks is my pitiful neanderthal attempt to get away from this crap. If I have to explain it then people just aren't getting it.
I go backpacking to get away from Screens. Get away from forums and the Interwad. Most certainly away from News and TVs and telephones and online blogs and electricity and air conditioning and the usual detritus of modern Syphilization.