The Dangers of the Internet

Charles sent me an interesting and great article on Slate about the "Dangers of the Internet." It's a review of a book called Data Smog by it's own author. The book was written in 1997, forcasting the dangers our information age might bring.

I love the review, and would probably love the book, because the author is quick to point out that the situation is highly nuanced. In all of our "is the internet killing our culture?" discussions, spanning my blog to JMC's to Mair's, I've been trying to say something like this:

"The more interesting reality, of course, is that—as with cars, planes, and nuclear power—progress and trouble often come intertwined. We are blessed to have these extraordinary tools, which empower us, entertain us, educate us, and powerfully connect us to friends, family, and strangers. But these same tools also threaten to fill up our every waking moment with speedy information, drawing us away from slow, unfragmented conversation and contemplation."

The internet is part of a new, fascinating and terribly dangerous tool set. The dangers shouldn't be ignored, and certainly many people are, but they shouldn't keep us from using those tools either.

J. Morgan's real point, I think, is that using these tools can fundamentally change the way we perceive ourselves and our environment. I don't disagree with that either. It's true and very important and something we need to keep in mind.

The author goes on to describe some of those dangers - things like ignoring your family in pursuit of the cell phone and letting your mind become bloated with useless information and being constantly distracted at work. These are things we all need to consider when using the technology our information age offers.

I like to think I do a fairly good job. I love the internet and all of this new information and I'm the first to defend it, but I think I know when to turn it off. I take my computer home with me every night in case I want to work from home later, but I rarely take it out of my backpack. I ignore my cell phone during dinner, on the light rail, or any time I'm speaking with anyone unless the call coming through is an absolute emergency. I ignore instant messages frequently at work and rarely run off to search the web in the middle of any task.

I think I'm getting most of the benefits of the internet while only suffering a few of it's dangers, and I can't help but wonder if some of the propensity towards distraction isn't generational. I've grown up with this technology and learned to work during the age of the internet. I've always had email and IM, so I learned to ignore them in college when I realized it was taking me 10 times longer to complete my homework when I let myself be distracted.

The only distraction I see really hurting people in my generation is text messaging. For some reason many people responsible enough not to answer their phones in the middle of a meal or conversation think it's perfectly acceptable to tune out and type with their thumbs every 5 minutes or so. That's one I could do without.