yitzchokm – Agree 100%. Every shul should have a box by the door, where mispallelim are required to deposit their smartphones (or any cellphone) before they enter. There is no excuse for a phone going off in the middle of Shmoneh Esreh.
As for addiction, maybe someone can do some research in the frum community about smartphone use? Given our very different life-style, I’m not sure research done on other groups would apply to us, but we definitely need to do something. I see people walking down my street on this beautiful spring day – with a phone glued to their ear, oblivious to HKBH’s wonderful world, and I feel terribly sorry for them.
TLIK – It wasn’t so long ago that some gedolim were all for banning computers. For various reasons that didn’t work. I suspect the same thing will eventually happen with smartphones. One thing that does alarm me is that schools are punishing kids for the perceived transgressions of their parents. Throwing out kids because of their parents’ phone use sounds like a good way to make those kids wonder about Yiddishkeit, and sometimes go off the derech. Being machmir in a negative way isn’t always productive.