A couple days ago I read a story in the local paper about land lines being taken out of dorm rooms because all the students have cell phones now. Apparently it's standard for every student to have their own line in his or her room. When I went to college we had one pay phone on each floor, and no one had ever heard of cell phones. Somehow we managed to survive without being instantly reachable. In my opinion it's not always a good thing.
Your opinion != reality. Somehow your generation survived, but technology has changed how the new generation communicates and goes about their daily lives. Just look at the iPhone. It converges phone, text, e-mail, Facebook, Myspace, IM protocols, etc into one device. Not just the iPhone, too; most smartphones provide access to most communications means that the younger generation uses. I do agree it's not always a good thing, but society's not about to make a u-turn, either.
That said, people that turn off any means of communication until they need to use it themselves do get on my nerves. A friend of mine was having an issue and needed help from one of my suitemates urgently; I was the only one in my apartment whose phone was on. Guess who got inconvenienced? And if my phone were off, that'd probably just be tragic.