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How Long Could You Live Without Your Gadgets?
DruCipher writes "CNet.co.uk is running a very funny article about Andrew Lim, the resident mobile phone reviewer, trying to live without all his favorite gadgets. The article sees Andrew try to survive without a mobile phone, a computer, an MP3 player and a TV. At the end of his technology detox he feels more relaxed without all his gadgets but cracks after a few days, 'Like all proper detoxes, though, my zen-like calm didn't last for long. Once I'd finished my gadget starvation, I was straight back to the tech binging. A remote control gun you say? Yes please!'"
Once an nerd, always a nerd. The return to high tech shows that once you get a taste of high tech and live it, you cannot stop. While the relaxation and peace were good for Andy, as it is for us all, high tech is our way of life, period. Though, just to gain some inner peace, I would recommend this plan to anyone who is stressed out. My college professor is reading this, and seems to like the idea as well.
Is the computer really a "gadget" anymore? Laptops, perhaps, and handhelds most certainly, but the desktop computer is a pretty integral part of my household - "gadget", to me, is something that's fun but more interesting than necessary. It's possible it's all in the eye of the beholder, but my desktop (and more importantly, internet access) is just about as important as any other utility in my house.
For myself, I have gone months at a time without a cellphone, TV, computer, or portable music player. I didn't miss them much. This wasn't in the distant past, either, this is several times over the last decade. The key to this was the simple fact that I was well away from the hustle and bustle of my usual life. I was not at my everyday tech job, nor at my heavily tech-invested college, nor even in a major city. For portions of this time I was at a large ranch in the southwest U.S., where the main means of communication was CB radio; in a foreign country that was not heavily modernized; and on a boat skirting oceanic coastline. I didn't miss the tech because there was no real need for it - it would have seemed quite out of place, actually.
I have in recent times, and in my usual techie world, tried to do without a lot of modern gadgetry. By and large, though, it is hard to simply set aside. I am a practicing engineer doing a lot of mechanical design work - I simply could not do my work without a computer. I call up datasheets and other reference information hourly from the Internet. I do not have a landline, and so rely on my cellphone. I type much faster than I write longhand, so I usually email my long-distance friends and relatives instead of sending letters.
I have made some concessions to toning down my digital life. I don't find cable television to be worth the exhorbitant rates they charge, and broadcast TV is filled with a lot of vacuous crap, so I watch about 2 hours of TV a week. My iPod just died; I am waiting to see how the iPhone pans out, or whether Apple will release a 6th-gen iPod this year. Very few people have my cell #, so I receive about 20 calls per week on it; rarely is anything urgent enough that a landline and answering machine couldn't have handled it.
So, I guess one could say that the context matters in how successfully you can ween yourself from technology. Some lifestyles and work-styles have been enabled by modern gadgetry, and simply couldn't exist without it. In other contexts, the gadgetry is superfluous, a sort of reverse anachronism, if you will.
I no longer have a TV. I had one for awhile, but found that there are more interesting ways to spend time, like dating women for example. I have ADSL, which is not quite as fast as that 10 gig network I got used to at one point, but it still lets me work effectively from home, and keep up with party invitations. But when I'm up at the island I do completely without, for weeks at a time, until the boat comes to take me back to the mainland.
I have a cell phone, which is handy when I want it, for example when I'm alone on the island running a chainsaw or something, but it usually stays in its charging cradle where it won't intrude on my life. Before cell phones came along I did without that as well. We have a community radiophone down by the dock and in the old days it was either that, when it worked, or wait a day or two for a boat to come along.
I found that degree of isolation scary for the first few years, but also inexpressibly delicious, far more deeply rewarding than playing with some new techno toy. I already get plenty of technology at work, and I approach its use, I suppose, with a certain amount of professional reserve, knowing that nine out of every ten hot new technologies are going to be forgotten within five years anyway.
Want to invest attention in something worthwhile? How about spending time with your friends? Yes, there's more to friendship than showing off your toys.
Parity: What to do when the weekend comes.
but what happens when gadgets are the hub of your life? What's the point of starting new hobbies (woodworking?) if my most dear personal projects require gadgets and computers? Have I become a pseudo-slave of gadgets.
It sounds like you've become a slave of NOT having gadgets. Sheesh, the point is to own stuff and not become attached to it, not to just avoid having it in the first place. You can equally become attached to an obsession over not having anything to become attached to.
AccountKiller
dude, it's easy to be philosophical when you OWN A FUCKING PORSCHE