"Online sociability fatigue?"
A coworker recently forwarded me an article from the Baltimore Sun about a phenomenon the writer calls "online sociability fatigue." I call it good timing, because when I got her email I hadn't touched my Twitter or Google Reader feeds in about a week.
As a person with more than 1000 unread items in Google Reader at any given time, a twice-weekly blog, a Twitter feed for the not-as-blog-worthy tidbits, a Flickr stream, and a healthy addiction to Facebook Scrabble (among other things), it's out of character for me to go even a few days without any of these things. I even considered getting a smartphone just so I could stay connected and productive during the rare times I don't have access to a computer, like the three-hour drive up to my parents' place in Pennsylvania. This description doesn't even address the blogging, Facebooking, Flickring and YouTube-ing for work, which is another story entirely.
Sometimes, though, I wonder if I shouldn't be doing more to stop the tide here. How much is just too much? I have friends who don't log into Facebook every day and they get along just fine. Though I don't think it takes up too much of my time, on days when I consciously shun my computer upon returning home from work I do get a lot more accomplished. I play my flute, I sing classic show tunes, I pick up around the house or plant a new garden. If I feel especially brave, I might make plans with friends.
Somehow, these seem like the elements of my life that constitute the meat, the stuff that means something. In the end, the best friendships are ones where I can invite someone over and sit on the porch with a drink for a couple hours (geographic location permitting, of course). Likewise, at some point I feel like a lot of the time I spend looking at art blogs should be spent exploring with my camera.
We constantly seek balance in our lives, and in many ways the irresistible flood of information coming from the Intarwebs is usurping the grounded, physical time we need to keep it together. The thought of turning my computer off for a day, even though I still have one at work, scares me a little. But I think it's something to aspire to. I think I need to refocus on what I did before the Internet became a way of life (and yes, I do remember).
And, ironically, I'll probably blog about it along the way.
As a person with more than 1000 unread items in Google Reader at any given time, a twice-weekly blog, a Twitter feed for the not-as-blog-worthy tidbits, a Flickr stream, and a healthy addiction to Facebook Scrabble (among other things), it's out of character for me to go even a few days without any of these things. I even considered getting a smartphone just so I could stay connected and productive during the rare times I don't have access to a computer, like the three-hour drive up to my parents' place in Pennsylvania. This description doesn't even address the blogging, Facebooking, Flickring and YouTube-ing for work, which is another story entirely.
Sometimes, though, I wonder if I shouldn't be doing more to stop the tide here. How much is just too much? I have friends who don't log into Facebook every day and they get along just fine. Though I don't think it takes up too much of my time, on days when I consciously shun my computer upon returning home from work I do get a lot more accomplished. I play my flute, I sing classic show tunes, I pick up around the house or plant a new garden. If I feel especially brave, I might make plans with friends.
Somehow, these seem like the elements of my life that constitute the meat, the stuff that means something. In the end, the best friendships are ones where I can invite someone over and sit on the porch with a drink for a couple hours (geographic location permitting, of course). Likewise, at some point I feel like a lot of the time I spend looking at art blogs should be spent exploring with my camera.
We constantly seek balance in our lives, and in many ways the irresistible flood of information coming from the Intarwebs is usurping the grounded, physical time we need to keep it together. The thought of turning my computer off for a day, even though I still have one at work, scares me a little. But I think it's something to aspire to. I think I need to refocus on what I did before the Internet became a way of life (and yes, I do remember).
And, ironically, I'll probably blog about it along the way.
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