No iPhone apps, please -- we're British

A BBC report has caused a hailstorm of criticism over government agencies trying to modernize -- has cool Britannia become fool Britannia?

If ignorance is bliss, many in the United Kingdom want to be blissful. At least that's the impression left by a furor in Britain over the shocking revelation that the British government has spent tens of thousands of pounds creating iPhone apps meant for citizens' use, such as an app that shows motorcyclists how to change their wheels and acts as a warning light in case of a breakdown on the road. Another scurrilous app helps the unemployed access the government's job service -- as the BBC article notes, many people say that if the unemployed can afford an iPhone subscription, they need no help in finding a job.

As a result of the controversy, the govenment has halted all its iPhone app development.

[ Stay up on tech news and reviews from your smartphone at infoworldmobile.com. | Get the best iPhone and iPad apps for pros with our business iPhone apps finder. | Keep up on key mobile developments and insights with the Mobile Edge blog and Mobilize newsletter. ]

When I first heard about this controversy from an Irish firm, Lagan Technologies, that creates apps for government agencies, I thought it was a joke. Then I read the venerable BBC's news story and was shocked that people would believe it to be unseemly and even objectionable that a government was using modern technology to help its citizens in noble tasks like avoiding becoming roadkill when their motorocycles break down or keep track of potential jobs without being stuck at home all day -- the very things you'd want government to do with your tax dollars.

Apparently not in Britain, a country that not so long ago positioned itself as "cool Britannia," a driver of innovation and entrepreneurship, smugly contrasting itself against those lazy, red-tape-entangled Continentals across the Channel. Apparently, today's Britons -- or at least the ones represented by the BBC's reactionary report -- would prefer to put the future in the past and go even further back to the oh-so-wonderful, manual, uncaring methods of the Dickensian era: fool Britannia.