For smartphone-dependent world, Samsung troubles hit hard

NEW YORK -- Yes, you heard that right. Samsung is asking owners of its fire-prone Galaxy Note 7 to "power down and stop using the device."

In an age when smartphones have become extensions of ourselves, the last thing we look at before falling asleep and the first thing we grab in the morning, this is all but unthinkable, even at the dinner table, even on the toilet.

Risking a battery fire might seem like a small price to pay for obsessively checking your latest Instagram "likes," catching up on email, Skyping your grandkids across the country, getting directions, confirming your travel itinerary, reading the news, searching for a dinner recipe, hailing a ride and so on.

For those traveling with children, a long flight without a smartphone to serve as distraction is akin to torture.

Power down and stop using the device? You might as well go live in a cave in a distant mountain (if you can get there, since you no longer have GPS). According to the Pew Research Center, 43 percent of the world's population uses a smartphone. Rates are highest in places such as South Korea (88 percent), Australia (77 percent) and Israel (74 percent).

And use it they do. We check Facebook so often, the company no longer just measures its users on a monthly basis.

A more important number is how many people check in on a daily basis.

In June, more than 1 billion people checked Facebook on a mobile device at least once a day.

In a report on global mobile device usage, the consulting firm Deloitte found the obvious, namely that "device obsession is deepening" and that people are using their phones for "everything from watching TV to simply crossing the road."

Some of us even use the phones while crossing the road, which is not the safest thing in the world.

A small 2015 study by Nottingham Trent University that tracked 18- to 33-year-olds found they checked their phones an average of 85 times a day --often without realizing.

Entire industries have sprung up to try to pry us away from our gadgets, such as phone-free summer camps for adults, anti- texting-and-driving apps and apps that track how much time you spend on your phone.