San Francisco to require cell phone radiation warning labels
I have a confession to make. Sometimes, when I'm stuck at a red light, I check the email on my Apple iPhone. I know that's a horrible, horrible thing, not to mention illegal. I challenge anyone reading this, however, to swear that they've never done the same thing with their own mobile gadget. Right. I thought so.
Yes, I do think that laws governing the use of distracting technology in cars is (sadly) necessary. Because you know sooner or later some clown is going to try to sue an automaker because they had an accident while trying to answer a call or punch an address into their GPS.
But a law declaring it mandatory for retailers and manufacturers to disclose exactly how much radiation your particular mobile phone puts out? Hmmmm.
That is exactly what the city by the bay, San Francisco, has done. On Tuesday, the council voted to pass a law requiring all retailers to disclose and display how much radiation particular cell phones emit.
This is actually something that IS tracked, so the information is available. But exactly how this data is presented isn't all that consistent.
The law calls for the information to be displayed in type that at least 11 point type. (No hiding this in the fine print!) So, does that mean that anyone making a mobile phone has to create special packaging for San Francisco? Is there a special sticker? These ratings are tracked, so the information is available, but who is responsible? Unclear. Also, if the phone I want to buy emits less radiation per call than another phone does that mean it is safer?
Remember when stories about the dangers of using a mobile phone dominated headlines? No one really seems to know just how much damage they might cause, but San Francisco isn't taking any chances.
Normally, I'm in San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsome's camp on stuff like this. But personally, I think this law is a big bummer for retailers in the city because they will probably be the ones that have to pay to figure out the right labeling system.
Then again, it took us an awful long time to figure out that cigarettes were bad for us and for us to decide that we needed warning labels. Who's to say that San Francisco isn't simply being visionary?
This post was originally published on Smartplanet.com