Gadget Addiction or Work Intrusion?

Yesterday the NY Times ran a story about the worry in Silicon Valley of addiction to gadgets, and how it might affect stress levels and people's ability to focus. But today an article in the Atlantic takes issue with "gadget addiction," and instead highlights how workplace concerns are intruding more and more on employee's private lives, suggesting that the inability to put down your smartphone is merely a symptom, rather than a disease. "To elide that one of the reasons we spend so many hours in front of our screens is that we have to misses the key point about our relationship with modern technology. The upper middle class (i.e. the NYT reader) is working more hours and having to stay more connected to work than ever before. This is a problem with the way we approach labor, not our devices. Our devices enabled employers to make their employees work 24/7, but it is our strange American political and cultural systems that have allowed them to do so. And worse, when Richtel blames the gadgets themselves, he channels the anxiety and anger that people feel about 24/7 work into a different and defanged fear over their gadgets. The only possible answer becomes, 'Put your gadget down,' not 'Organize politically and in civil society to change our collective relationship to work.'"

Comments

Well. . .

[Anonymous Coward]

I work too damn hard on the projects I manage to let any harm come to them in the time I am off work. If my email dings, I check it because it could be useful information to ensuring the success of those projects. And if I can do something quickly from home that will save me a headache in the morning it is worth it. I also don't want to walk into a business place surprised by whatever is going to hit me when I walk in.

I'm salaried, and paid to get projects done. They get done and done well. I also find plenty of leisure time, and on more than one occasion have left work early or come in late for whatever personal reason demanded it. It's never been a problem - as long as the projects are completed on time and on budget.

Re:What does it mean to be willing?

[Sarten-X]

As a very anti-union person, I agree. Let's see the unions actually improve conditions for their workers, and I'll happily sign on. Let's see pressure for 4-day work weeks, now that automation can maintain production. Let's see minimum wage increases to something above 1960s levels. Let's see a reasonable way for union members to express their concern for current jobs, without their votes being overrun by more senior retirees worried mostly about their pension guarantees. Let's see open membership for anyone with a stake in the working conditions of an industry, rather than just those with a certain amount of experience (which must be earned in non-union shops). Let's see something more than pointless political maneuvers to "maintain leverage" and actually do something with that leverage.

As I said, let's see that, and I'll happily sign on.