Always on.
Constant connectivity. Information at your fingertips. The internet in your pocket (or are you just happy to see me). Thanks to the remarkable advances in technology over the last 20 years in particular we have an always on connection to everything and everyone.
Which is great?
Which is great! It allows us get more done. To work from anywhere. To work with anyone. Opening up possibilities and opportunities to beat the band. As someone working within their own business i literally couldn’t function now without it.
But is there a flip side?
The recent Blackberry outage got me thinking. Whilst not an entirely new thought or movement (see orange’s good things happen when you turn off your phone) i increasingly get the impression that we need to learn to control this access to everything especially when we are “not working”. Waiting for something? Check your mail. Walking home? Flick on Broadsheet. Just woke up? Having lunch? Enjoying a glass of wine? Almost without thinking i am reaching for the phone or laptop and hitting an app or my browser.
My worry is that this constant seeking and bombardment with information, whilst ensuring we know everything that is going on, is also filling some of the spaces in life where you are wrapped in a moment; where we actually stop & think. For me anyway, those spaces often equate to happiness and are a great source of creativity.
Excuse the musings. I guess the point i am trying to make is that we should not necessarily fall into the trap of always being on and connected just because we can be. And that perhaps some of us need to examine, or at least think about, turning off from time to time.
Getting back to the Blackberry outage- one point i’m sure they won’t be promoting is the effects it had in the Abu Dhabi…
