Is it time to ditch the devices at rock shows?

How many rock shows have you been to lately where folks are more involved with their device in hand than with the band onstage playing? Plenty, I'm sure, and we're all collectively guilty at one time or another of doing so. Has it all gone too far? Can a rock band play its songs onstage without cell phones being held up in their face to snap real-time updates w/Twitpic photo attached?

I was reminded of this when I read TechCrunch's piece on being part of last weekend's MySpace/Weezer show, from reporter Paul Carr, who wrote this bit about Rivers Cuomo saying onstage "...remember," he said "this is a secret gig, so shhhhhh, no writing about it on Facebook or Twitter."

"Cuomo was joking of course – a ham-fisted attempt at a target reference – but there was a strange and tragic truth in his plea. I mean, what were we all doing? Filming and tweeting and checking in rather than just putting our phones away and enjoying the gig. Why does the world need two thousand photos of the same band on the same stage, all taken from a slightly different angle. That kind of 360 degree imagery might have been useful on the day Kennedy was shot – not least because it would have kept Oliver Stone quiet – but for a Weezer gig? And what’s the point of checking in on Foursquare at a ticketed event that no one else can get into. You might as well tweet “I’m a dick” and be done with it."

Isn't it time we slap our phones into our pockets or purses before it kills the live music experience as we know it? Would I have enjoyed all those live GBV shows 1997-2004 as I did if I was fussing about to fuckin' tweet something about what Pollard just said? I doubt it. Let's dump the device before we become less the audience and more the telegrapher. Figure it out.