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Virtual Addiction
If the dangers of working, living and playing on the Net have been overstated by political moralists and the media, our dirty little secret is that this is a compulsive culture. Many people do have trouble from time to time balancing e-mail, IM, gaming, coding, IRC-chatting, arguing, shopping, trading, even moderating, with the demands and balance of real life.
The Net is a magnet for brainy, even addictive obsessives, an outlet for their curiousity and creativity that is often much more appealing than home, school or work. So Dr. David Greenfield's book maybe handy help for "Netheads, cyberfreaks, and those who love them," as he puts it.
Greenfield knows what he's talking about. He writes about the intrinsically compulsive elements of life online for shoppers, gamblers, sex-chatters, auctioneers, gamers and kids. He doesn't present the Net as a dangerous menace, just a place so diverse, challenging and compelling that many of the people who go online regularly sometimes struggle with finding the right balance between life online and off. The book is really about balance and perspective, always useful to think about. And there are few college kids or tech workers who don't know somebody who's dealing with this issue in one form or another, if they aren't themselves. The perils of cyberlife are real, if wildly overstated by a phobic society.
Greenfield wrote this book (out in paperback for $12 bucks) because he found his own time online was getting too intense. He describes himself as a "true cyberfreak with technophilic tendencies," and offers useful information about warning signs and remedies. He also believes the Net is going to become much more addictive as it becomes even more interesting and ubiquitous.
Greenfield believes that multimedia stimulation, ease of access, twenty-four-hour availability, lack of boundaries, loss of time, disinhibition, stimulating and creative content are all factors that can contribute to compulsive, even addictive Net use.
"The line from my perspective," he writes, "is when it interferes with your life significantly." If somebody enjoys being online six or eight hours a day and they still lead a healthy and balanced life, there's no problem. But, he says, he isn't certain that anybody can spend most or all of their spare time online and still have a truly balanced life.
This book is sensible. Greenfield's style is easy and straightforward, and the book could be valuable for employers, peers, colleagues and friends concerned about themselves and other people who sometimes struggle with balance and perspective in a culture that is compelling not because it's dangerous but because it's so damned interesting.
You can purchase this book at FatBrain.
I don't think it is as simple as this. In my case, I'm a 21 year old college student. I've been to the bars, the frat parties, etc. I continue to these events on occasion to humor friends, or to remind myself there ARE other things. However, I just don't find my "real friends" as interesting as the linux kernel, or the sorts of bizarre reading material that you can find on the internet. The internet enables people to delve deeper into what it is that makes them happy, or allows them to escape the not-so-interesting details of the real world.
I work 40 hours a week, during which I develop hardware + software. At the end of the day, I still haven't had enough. I go home, after work, and I write *more* kernel patches and try to design more hardware. This practice involves using the net some more, and IM'ing or talking to fellow technical nerds on the net. When I go out into "the real world", conversation and interaction seems dull in comparison to the exchange of dialogue with kernel hackers on the other side of the world. The article mentions things being "so damned interesting" -- that's the focus of the article and the book. I don't think it's so much about people with problems -- it's more about the net being "that thing" that enables people to more effectively directly attack their source of boredom. I don't think it's fair to say ALL of the people have self-image or confidence problems and somehow imply have have defficiencies in their ability to interact with others. It might be more appropriate to say that what we have here (the net) is an extremely effective tool for targetting all sorts of voids in day-to-day reality in all different types of people, and that, in the future, it is going to get better at targetting those voids.
Wow, this came awfully close to being a real book review. Katz's normal approach is to briefly describe one of the book's major themes and use it as a springboard for a rant about corporate America. (Not that I always disagree with him, but a book review ought not to be an editorial.) Aside from the occasional spurt of Usenet abuse, I've never been inclined to spend most of my time online. I find it detracts from my real obsession, which is software development. I love coding more than any other computer-related activity. And I think that coding for eight to ten hours a day at work, followed by another six to eight hours at home, punctuated by fitful sleep, helps me keep my balance and prevents needless web-surfing. :)
--
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
First, I'm glad to see books like this. The internet is changing things for people. I have and do know people that overuse it. In fact, at times, I have myself.
However, though I've seen net addiction, the author (and others) seem to be missing part of the point. People can get addicted to anything - so what people "losing life" to the net is really about is the impact of technology. The net is no more unique than television, sex, sports, drugs, religion, or anything else people can become obsesed with.
What should be studied and discussed is why people get addicted, how to identify and help addicts, and how to avoid witch-hunts againt innocent people who get improperly labeled. Though the book sounds interesting and helpful, it still sounds like it's got a bit of the "the addictive agent has some magic influence" mentality.
As a programmer and web developer whose friends are usually geeks too, the internet is so much part of my life that its easy to loose perspective. Sometimes I did. However, I found once I treated it as a tool, perspective came back. Thus I use it to meet people, make friends, arrange meetings, publish my column and my serial novel, and learn. But it's a tool.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
Most of the users on the net become addicted especially in the younger age brackets. Its fun, informative, and a place to intermingle when you normally wouldn't on a social level for whatever reasons, shyness, no time, etc.
Working in an Internet related company however takes a higher toll for those who are online most of the time as we'd normally be exposed to more than we'd like to be sometimes. Generally though I feel people learn more online than they do in schools at times.
Where else could you get such a broad look at the cultures from abroad, the struggles others go through, whereas you would normally never hear about them through local media.
Recently however I was joking around with some friends who attent law school, and I stated jokingly about pleading out in a case by reason of 'e-sanity` which makes some sense if you think about it. Out here in New York City, I'm not exposed to hardcore racism which I find on my travails throughout the net. So its extremely easy for someone of low intellect (anything lower than me is fine) to misconstrue something and go bonkers in society.
Personally I'd rather stay addicted to technology that be hooked on drugs, alcohol, gambling, etc.
blackbox themes
Want Root?
Online gaming is stimulation not simulation. Remember the early days of muds. Outside of Muds, where could you have found 30 or so fantasy gamers role playing in an interactive mythos at 2AM in the morning? Then take something like UnReal or Quake. Where outside of the navy seals are you going to find stimulation like that?
Someone you trust is one of us.
Coming soon from OmegaMan Industries, LLC, is Booze-B-Gon, the corn liquor that helps you battle alcoholism!
This sig is xenon coated, and will glow red when in the presence of aliens
Oh come on Jon, pull the other one. Virtual addiction indeed. You're trying to make it sound like some kind of genuine psychological problem when it's nothing more than a complete lack of any kind of social contact or anything else to do.
People don't get "addicted" to being online, they find they have nothing else to do. Most internet "addicts" have no real friends, suffer from image and self-confidence problems (which if they ever left the house, they might be able to do something about!) and are general afraid of what's outside their front door. That's not addiction, that's just sad.
There are too many people out there today willing to put a label on any kind of behaviour and label it an addiction, a disorder or a syndrome. In 99% of these cases, it's nothing more than a load of crap designed to inflate therapist's bills, who then proceed to talk it up, turning nothing into a real issue.
When are we just going to realise that the only way to do anything is to take responsibility for our own actions and future? By putting labels on things, you make it easier to avoid and easier to blame external causes, rather than dealing with your own problems.
Jon Erikson, IT guru
You're all addicted, but you just don't know it.
And Keanu is coming to save you.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
Addiction is a word bandied about very much today. Various kinds of addictions are cited as causes of social problems. We blame drug addicts for crime, net addicts for business failures, sex addicts for social problems such as the high divorce rate and other kinds of addicts for problems too numerous to mention in a brief post.
Yes, some people can become addicted to X -- whatever X is these days. But we should ask why do people become addicted to X? Is the addiction the true cause of the problem cited? Does citing addiction as the cause of the problem benefit in some way the person or persons making the charge?
An older kind of addiction -- that to drugs -- has been around long enough to provide some data to consider these questions. Drug addiction is higher in the United States than in other developed Western democracies. This is in spite of an extreme war on drugs. People who cite drug addiction as a cause of U.S. problems typically blame the drug addicts for their own behavior. Protests that drug addicts have been driven to their dysfunctional behavior are dismissed out of hand. Yet available evidence suggests that people turn to drugs not out of any moral failing on their part but out of a despair caused by events in their lives that are out of their control. For interesting looks at the drug culture, I recommend "Trainspotting" and "Traffic."
Is drug addiction the underlying cause of the problems cited? Yes, drug addicts can screw up. So can supposedly healthy people. I like to remind people that it wasn't stoned hippies or drunken playboys who blew up Challenger. That particular disaster can be laid at the feet of "hard working professionals" who didn't think they could stand up to unreasonable demands by management.
The example I've just cited shows that many problems faced by the United States are the result of dysfunctional bureaucracies that would rather blame somebody else -- anybody else -- for their failings rather than alter their own behavior. Similar things can be said about schools, corporations, government agencies, political movements and more.
A healthy counterpoint to this behavior is that exhibited by the U.S. military between 1975 and 1990. The Vietnam war exposed a multitude of problems with the U.S. military. Rather than attacking critics or low level personnel, however, the U.S. military undertook many significant reforms. The consequence of this behavior was a military that won back considerable respect (even from many critics) and showed demonstrably better performance.
Yes, we should all consider whether our behaviors are dysfunctional. A book like this can help many. But we should also consider the roots of these behaviors -- and not just reflexively blame the persons exhibiting them.
"Beer is proof God loves us and wants us to be happy." -- B. Franklin
I certainly didn't get caught up in the dotcom explosion and collapse, BECAUSE I'd already seen such things come and go years before. Years ago, I could sift through a couple hundred e-mails every day, no problem. I developed a keen ability to prioritize degrees of BS, in fact. Now, I try to keep my e-mails down to less than five messages a day, because I've got a life. But that same keen ability to prioritize BS keeps me from getting excited by ANY degree of spam, which people around me fall for left and right.
My point is that the long-term effects of geeking can be more beneficial than y'might think at the time. Back in the day, I was failing classes and annoying girlfriends left and right. Now... they pay me for it. Hmmm....
information is immaterial
The days of gopher, IRC, usenet and mudding.
Then came Netscape, with its 4 simultaneous connections, mucking up all of the networks, and suddenly, you'd be trying to kill 4 trolls, only to get a network lockup, and wait and pray for 10 min, and then see your death shouts.
(bah...and I remember when people called me an adict for clocking 2hrs/day mudding)
But we'll get revenge on them all, once people realize that WAP is just gopher all over again!
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Its not like I HAVE to run the latest bleeding edge, I just choose to. I can quit any time, I swear.
apt-get dist-upgrade
Honest. I am in complete control
apt-get dist-upgrade
I can quit any time I want, man, I just do it for fun. It's recreational, man!
apt-get dist-upgrade
Nowadays, I can go without full access to the net pretty easily for a week or two at a time, longer if I'm visiting one of the good friends I've met there. In fact, I vastly prefer being offline and doing something, to being in front of a keyboard. The only problem really comes in that my entire life has been lived in a virtual manner. My friendships, my relationships, I can't think of more than a half dozen in a decade that weren't first met on the Internet. It's become so much a habit, that even though it isn't an addiction anymore, I find it difficult to socialize in reality.
Maybe I need to get a copy of this book. Sigh.
My own pointless vanity vintage computing page
Now if I could read it online in a window...
..when you interrupt your surfing to check yourself for warning signs.
Modearation is for Monks!- R. Heinlein.
Thing is, some people today have "broadband" access at home (I do), and the most compelling feature isn't the speed, it's the fact that you are _always_ online. There is zero resistance to checking something out on the web (if nothing else, just to reload /. to see if any new items have popped up), mail is received at all times, and friends are just one ICQ window away.
Add to that that I work a lot on the machine, and that the most comfortable chair in my apartement is by the desk, and one interpretation could be that I'm using the net 18 hours a day, every day.
So how much _am_ I using the net? Do I count only when I do a volitional act to access the net (like using a browser to check a wab page), whenever my computer accesses the web (autochecking for mail), or whenever I'm sitting at my desk? Am I using the net if I'm composing a mail on the hotmail site, but not when writing the same letter in gvim (even if I intend to send the finished text as mail)?
Deciding when you are using something too much is kind of hard when it quits being a separate activity and blends seamlessly into everyday life.
/Janne
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
Why should addictions interfere with your life? What if your "addiction" -is- your life? If my addiction is my life, then how can it be interfering with my life? What do you mean by life?
If I'm not on the fast track to getting rich and have a wife, kids, dog, suburban, boat and ranch home does that mean I don't have a life? If I choose to spend my time coding instead of persuing those things then is my "coding addiction" interfering with my life? If I'm already married and I choose to start spending all of my time on IRC instead of with my wife, did I make a lifestyle change or did I let an addiction "ruin my life"?
Who is to say what is normal?
Is anyones life not good enough?
Sigs are awesome huh?
Sounds a lot like the problems people have had for years with cable television--the exception being that I can't watch TV at work and pretend to be productive.
I don't know if interesting is the key. I mean, right now I have work to do and instead I'm reading Jon Katz, waiting for a LinuxToday article to load so I can read idiots' responses to Dennis Powell flamebait and waiting for SpamCop to let me click. Is any of that really more interesting than work?
To the degree that Net activity is interesting, it's not such a wake. What galls me is when I realize I've just blown 2 hours clicking through a flamewar on list, updating KDE from CVS or talking on IRC with teenagers. Is that really more interesting or fun than if I had read a book, gone for a run or watched SportCenter?
I think what makes the Net "addictive" is the easy and quick feedback you get. It's just too easy to do one more little thing.
As a rule, statements like this have an effect on me opposite than what was intended. It suggests to me that the speaker has little or no familiarity with other cultures and imagines the flaws of members of his own culture to be unique rather than universal. American liberals have a particular fondness for such formulations -- it's a (far more common) variation on the stereotypical jingoistic, parochial American.
Unsettling MOTD at my ISP.
I can quit /. for good anytime.
I've already quit it six or seven times already.
The brief litany the reviewer provides of what's available on the web - sex, gambling, shopping - reveals no new arenas of obsessive/compulsive behavior. Of course, for people with problems in these arenas, the internet holds compelling benefits - most notably instant access, the perception of privacy/anonymity. There is nothing more unique about the internet, as regards these behaviors, than that.
So what exactly is the use or point of a book addressing these copiously documented and discussed topics in the particular context of the internet? None, as far as I can tell, except providing some shrink with a vehicle to cash in on his own lack of self-control and a newsy pop-culture topic. Here: read my book on obsessive internet behavior and save yourself 12 bucks: If your gaming/gambling/porno-pandering/chatting/ and/or shopping is interfering with your life and relationships, slow down or stop. If you can't stop, seek counselling. The end.
It Is the Nature of Information to Transgress Artificial Boundaries