One lit phone in a dark theater ruins the movie for two hundred people. That is not a personal choice, it is a shared-space problem, exactly like talking during the film. Alamo Drafthouse proved the market rewards strictness: their famous no-talking, no-texting rule, enforced with ejection, is the core of their brand, and plenty of customers choose them partly because of it (policy). Making phone-free the default, with a few clearly labeled phone-friendly screenings for anyone who needs a device, protects the experience for the majority without banning anyone. Theaters sell immersion you cannot get on a couch. If they will not defend it, streaming will keep winning.
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