Opinion: The tyranny of constant contact
By Henry Alford, New York Times
Everything I know about the Internet, I learned from my 87-year-old mother.
Like, the harder you hit “Send,” the faster the email travels. If you want wholly to colonize your reader’s subconscious, just end your email or text right in the middle of the. If you’re still not sure your reader is fully invested, simPLY LEAN ON YOUR CAPS LOCK TO IMBUE YOUR MISSIVE WITH A THROBBING IMMEDIACY.
But Mom’s larger message is that the Internet and cellphones have created a kind of tyranny of connectedness: Even those of us who don’t have small children or jobs with the State Department, it seems, now need to be accessible at all hours of the day. It’s as if we’re doctors on call.
Like Madonna confessing that during her marriage to Guy Ritchie each kept a BlackBerry tucked under their pillows at night, we have to keep up standards. If you go to the theater and discover your phone has died, you better borrow a seat mate’s phone and pre-emptively call the last five people you spoke to; if there’s a glitch in Gmail, you better start checking all your other portals with an assiduousness that verges on the robotic.
I recently read “The Shallows” by Nicholas Carr. In this 2010 book, he looks at the negative consequences of the Internet and constant connectivity. As a great Internet fan, I was prepared to dismiss the book. However, he made a convincing case that there is much evidence that frequent interruptions reduce reading comprehension and the ability to “think deeply.” As a result, I turned off notification that an e-mail has arrived. I still check my e-mail 2-3 times a day, but on my schedule, not someone else’s.
As a ‘Top Contributor’ (their term) on UN Sustainable Development blogs [specific subjects], I am noting an Internet rise as a ‘lowering fog’ (almost a climate change issue of its own), as more & more more find what they think is an outlet for their increasing anxiety over the world’s inattention to coming realities that are being experienced on more levels now. . .
Journalistic media is still ‘old school’, so in-depth issues are still among the ignored, as the Internet becomes the only means of expression & source of information (quite often, not reliably so). . .
This is the ‘back-side’ of the tyranny mentioned, as for those who control the media this is more about BAU (business-as-usual – aka “ad-revenue-streams”) than it is about great investigative or expository reporting.
This is a serious societal disservice, as the anxiety will only increase, while the discussion stays buried. . .
As John Thiel (a Founder of PayPal with Elon Musk) has said: “We in the computer world wanted flying cars; what we got was ‘140 characters’. . .”
What does that say about us as a culture ?
Seeing couples “out-on-the-town” everywhere barely talking to each other while occupied with their own smart phones cannot be a good sign of progress for “Humanity”. . .