I had to walk uphill, both ways, to school in two feet of snow every day. I travel ten hours in a car with no electronics, squeezed between my three brothers in a five-passenger car.

These are some of the clichés our parents or grandparents say to illustrate how hard life was for them forty years ago. However, those sayings may be lost with our parents and grandparents passing generations, but a new saying, something like, “When I was a kid and traveled on a plane, all I had to play with was a coloring book,” will be said amongst our generation to our children in a few years.

The thought of walking from place to place was forgotten with the advancements of transportation, and now the thought of reading a book to pass the time will be forgotten too with the advancements of smartphones, which airplane passengers are now able to use during flights to play games or watch pre-downloaded movies with the aim to make travel more pleasant.

JetBlue flew from New York to Buffalo, Friday Nov.1, and marked the first flight allowing the use of cells phones gate-to-gate; from one airplane terminal to the next, including when the flight takes off and lands. Before the Federal Aviation Administration changed their regulations, passengers in the U.S. were prohibited from using the devices until their plane rose above 10,000 feet. However, while passengers are allowed to use their portable electronic devices such as tablets, laptop computers, e-readers and cell phones in Airplane Mode throughout the flight, there is still a ban on using cell phones for voice communication.

When Airplane Mode is activated, the device’s signal transmitting functions are disabled, along with the device’s capacity to place or receive calls or send text messages. Other functions that do not require signal transmission such as games, built-in camera, or listening to music is still allowed.

The Federal Communications Commission states that cell phones had been banned from being used during a flight because of the potential for ground network interference, as well as to avoid problems with navigation and communications systems.

Technology has always amazed me— constantly advancing and changing the way people live and ultimately function. An aspect of life that I believe should not change with advancing technology is the increased security precautions that were initiated to protect people from the harm these technologic advancements pose.

It is no guarantee that every passenger switches their cell phones to Airplane Mode when they are instructed to, and controlling the mode that cells phones are allowed to operate in is now harder when they are allowed to be on in general— if they were still required to be off, the flight attendants job would be easy; “Sir please turn off your cell phone.”

Some people have commented that this makes life easier for frequent fliers. Businessmen and women can continue to work, and children can stay more relaxed and entertained during long flights.

However, there is still a voice ban preventing communication and games or movies have to be pre-downloaded. While this is an understandable regulation, it is still hard to manage and enforced— an internet based game can not visually be differentiated from a pre-downloaded one, so how can a flight attendant assess that situation in order to enforce that passengers not use their online games?

If used against the regulation, online games open the door for communication between passengers of the plane and their fellow gamers on the ground. Cell phone hacking has been an issue for smartphone users, so while tragedies, such as mass shootings and other attacks, are occurring why is it acceptable to decrease security when it should be increased?

Before an airline switches to these relaxed rules, it has to prove to the FAA that its aircraft can tolerate the interference. Following the same technological advancements cell phones have made, airlines have recently built newer planes with portable electronics in mind, hardening them against electromagnetic interference.

Newer planes are one thing, but allowing cell phones to make passengers more comfortable is another. A danger is still presented when cell phones are on, no matter what mode they are in. Our parent’s generation would tell passengers to suck it up and sit uncomfortably for a few hours with a good book and be thankful for making it to their destinations alive, because they still have the luxury of flight instead of long car rides.