Around 2015 or so they became a lot more accepted. From talking to teachers, a surprisingly large amount of the distraction is parents texting kids while they're at school.

Late 2000s was just after smartphones became a thing, and before they became a crack epidemic. In my personal experience, it has really been bad for about the last 10 years, getting better over the last few years however. Took a few years for everyone to really understand how bad the problem had become and how quickly.