PASSAGE THREE Americans like to think that, they are a cyber-thrusting, cutting-edged people, unafraid of new ideas: Give us a frontier, and we’ll conquer it. That spirit has given the world such innovations as the light bulb, the Internet, and the drive-through funeral home. But in coping with the details of daily life, the U.S. can be resolutely primitive. Take the cell phone. Europe has a single standard, known as GSM , America has multiple standards, of which CDMA and GDMA are the most common. These standards are not compatible. That means many American cell phone owners cannot use their toys overseas, and vice versa. Tech inferiority poses question about whether American can take the lead in “third generation’ cell phone technology, but who cares? The bottom line is that the GSM standard serves most of the Eurasian landmass, while our cell phones can go dead in the next country. That helps explain why close to half of Israeli, Finish, and Swedish homes have cell phones, compared with a quarter in the U.S. Well, maybe America doesn’t need cell phones because the public phone network is so good. Once you’ve stopped laughing, considering this: Not only are U.S. public phones often vandalized, dirty, or broken, but most of them only take coins. Helloooo. In most civilized countries—and some that are far from it—pay phones take cards that can be bought from vending machines or corner shops. Pop in card, make call. No need to scrounge for change. Nor do you have to dial an 800 number, then another number, and then the number you want. Just insert the card, and the proper sum is subtracted. Simple, elegant, and unavailable in the land where the customer is king. Another great American institution that has seen progress pass it by is the parking meter. Created in America (of course) in the 1939s, it looks much the same now as it did then, when it was the last word in traffic control. In many European cities, by contrast, meters are being replaced by sleek “pay and display” machines: Drivers punch in the number of hours they wish to park, then display the receipt on their dashboard a couple of machines can serve a good-sized lot. They are cheaper to install, hold more money, and give drivers more flexibility. America, of course, is best at many things: refrigerators, ice cream, and showers, for a start. But in many ways, Americans accept a decidedly shabby status quo. Why? Partly because you don’t miss what you don’t know about. Partly because of competition flaws. And partly because Americans can become deeply attached to stupid things, like light beer and spray-on “cheez.”