Are we all turning into smartphone zombies? This pressing question is posed by philosopher Hans Schnitzler in his book Digital detox (2023). As an experiment, he had students undergo a week-long digital detox. Their testimonies raise uncomfortable and fundamental questions about our relationship to the screen world. 'I only now realise how numb I am all the time,' one of his students declared. Is the smartphone actually still at the service of us, or are we at the service of the smartphone?