Slashdot Mirror
How the Smartphone Killed the Three-day Weekend
An anonymous reader writes "As we in the U.S. settle in for Memorial Day weekend, this article points out how our cultural addiction to technology is making it less of a vacation than it used to be. 'The average smartphone user checks his or her device 150 times per day, or about once every six minutes. Meanwhile, government data from 2011 says 35 percent of us work on weekends, and those who do average five hours of labor, often without compensation — or even a thank you. The other 65 percent were probably too busy to answer surveyors' questions.' Even for those of us who don't have any work to do over the weekend, we'll probably end up reading all of our work-related emails as they roll in, and take time out of our day to think about what's going on — to the detriment of our weekend activities: 'A study at the University of California, San Francisco, found that new experiences fail to become long-term memories unless brains have downtime for review.' I imagine it's even worse for your average Slashdotter, who's likely plugged in to more technology at home and at work. How can we make our employers understand that downtime needs to remain downtime? 'It took labor unions 100 years to fight for nights and weekends off, some say, while smartphones took them away in about three years.'"
...posting to Slashdot.
I think I'll go investigate this "outside" that I keep hearing about.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
...as far as I can remember. :p
What took away the three day weekends is having unreasonable deadlines... and wanting to keep a job.
Has nothing to do with a smartphone.
This is how I handle it. If I'm not on the clock, they don't get a response. Hell, a lot of the time my weekends are spent 10 to 20 miles from the nearest cell coverage.
Hey, they can be turned off. I recommend it. I remember moving from college with a networked mainframe (any one remember Wylbur?) to a research site which had a PDP 11/34 in one of the building that I didn't have access to and some Wang computers. I went through withdrawal for months. We did get pc computers networks etc, but I still can walk away at the end the day. Sure I may turn the computer on at home and check slashdot, pay some bills, or I may give it a couple days to check that email. Stay in control!
I work in technology in Canada, and extremely few people check their work email on (long) weekends. It's simply not expected. Some people do, sure, but for those who don't, no one ever judges or cares. It's just a cultural thing.
I pity people who live in a reality where you are expected to work when you're not working in order to keep your job or move up.
Sad.
(this is NOT a troll)
As a person (senior management) who has been told by his CEO "I don't care about what happens to the employees, I care about my company making money," I don't see there is anything you can do to get 'companies' to recognize the value of vacations... other than quitting and making them scramble to find someone else they can screw over. Sadly, the perception of vacations, much like IT and paid training in general, is that it is a drain on the company (doesn't produce IMMEDIATE revenue but DOES result in IMMEDIATE costs), and if it was possible to run the company without it, most companies would do so in a heart beat. Of course, those companies are often hell-holes to work in and fail on a regular basis.
Toil is Stupid. Don't be Stupid.
Why do we keep posting this FUD? People have fretted about their jobs on weekends forever. Checking your e-mail is a smaller opportunity cost than walking past your artisan shop or out to your fields after church but plenty of people did it even then. Don't blame your smartphone, blame your own unwillingness to focus your attention elsewhere.
We have an on call rotation at work, and I am plugged into my work smartphone when on call. That's it. When I'm not on call, the smartphone stays at home (and gets ignored while I'm at home).
There are those who get forced into spending weekend time on work, and I do have a lot of sympathy for those people (though I would encourage them to find a job with an employer who isn't abusing them). But a lot of people who spend weekend time on work don't do so because they'll get fired or anything... they just do it out of a misguided sense of loyalty to their employer and dedication to their job. Those people are fools, unless their employer is repaying them for that devotion (which almost none do).
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
I nearly never checked my work e-mails at home, even if I've been a lead in most companies. I started a successful company with other people. Even then, my evenings were my evenings, and my week-ends were my week-ends, not my company's. Some exceptions of course, but they remained exceptions.
I give my all when I am at work, and disconnect myself from work at home. Like every good geek, I check my personal e-mails, and I check my personal phone messages approximately 594,000,000 times per microsecond (slightly exaggerating, but let's just say that number would be higher if I didn't have to drive sometimes ;) ), and everyone @ work knows they can call me or phone me if they are stuck. However, I will not jeopardize my mental sanity or my family's sanity for work. Starting a company is enough hard work to feel the strain, starting early AM and ending late PM (if ever), I won't add up a chain up on my nose when I'm away.
Which doesn't mean it doesn't work for you, I mean, I have people whose job it is to be 24/7 (some IT and some managers). Then you have to adapt your rhythm so you are relaxed most of the time, so your brain can work during long marathons, instead of 8 hours sprints. Even then, they all know the meaning of disconnecting, and will resort going to a place where their phone doesn't work if needed, but they will relax.
And if you feel like you work too hard, then don't :) There are other jobs elsewhere that doesn't require constant connection. Just change. It's your life. You do what you want.
It is quite enough to check it once per day. Or not at all on the weekend. That users have panic of becoming "unreachable" is not really rational. Almost all things can wait a few hours, typically a few days. Switching the phone off is not treason to the world, it is just rational. Oh, and when answering work-stuff on the weekend (which I occasionally do), it of course goes onto my time-sheet and gets fully paid for. Otherwise I would not even bother looking at it.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
so if something goes down on the weekend you just leave it down until work time and screw the customers?
i'm sure they won't mind their paid services being down until lunch time on Monday
dont you know? unions are only on this earth to promote the obama socialist muslim communist agenda to abort our children and fill our cheese with unhealthy dragon feces.
Indeed. The problem is that these people cannot relax in the first place. Now they are working themselves into the ground. But I predict that the problem will be solved in a few years, by a flood of burn-outs. Most companies need to have a longer-term focus with regard to employees or they will fail.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
why? Company will hire a new meat. There are 7 billion people out there , it is a resource cheap and abundant.
Unfortunately, in the context of the American mind this makes sense but in fact it's totally incorrect. Nights and weekends off has been lost over the last 30 years or so because corporations and governments worked together to reduce labor laws that protect workers and reward offshoring of labor as another avenue to damaging worker rights. Taking away our right to unionize did not make them enough money, so they had to exploit slave labor in Southeast Asia to have another implement to control workers: threatening not only individuals but entire communities with factory shutdowns.
And then they realized that with the militarization of our police forces they didn't have to threaten anything, so now they're just taking.They take our national wealth through tax loopholes, they drain our coffers with lucrative government contracts, and yet they continue to demand more and more money because there's no such thing as enough. Apple can't afford to pay full taxes, and they can't afford to pay Americans a living wage to build their products, but somehow they have over one hundred billion dollars in hard cash. They have so much money they haven't figured out how to spend it yet, and pretty much every corporation operates in a similar fashion.
Corporations continue to take and take and the only thing that will stop them is a popular labor movement, which may or may not be around the corner. Until Americans understand the root of the problem -- corporate power far outpacing democratic will -- corporations will continue to take our rights, our money, and the inheritance of a living planet away from our children. That's not because corporate people are evil, it's because absolute power corrupts absolutely, and despite all of their protestations to the contrary, they operate as any warlord or king or priest does when they are in centers of power. If they see something they want and they can get away with it, they will take it.
Smartphones don't have much to do with it.
Humans crave information. We take hits of data like the best junkies. First thing I do when I wake up is look at whats new in technology, stocks, world events, and local news. I also check facebook and play a few "with friends" type games.. Then I'll write code or work. Then I repeat throughout the day. This is by choice.. and it is voluntary. People do what makes them happy. And in most cases, that means being wired in to work and their favorite sources of data -- sports, news, politics, work, or social media. If given a chance, people would never trade their smart phones in for electronics-free "solitude". We're just not built that way.
stolen iphone i call one of the other IT people and ask them to wipe it
or i find the nearest computer with a web browser and wipe it remotely
declining wages and wealth inequality is. You're working that extra day to make up the pay you've lost over the last 30 years.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
a nice gilded wood box with a velvet lining works wonders in the whole "can't call you" thing.
If its a real emergency they will track you down.
list as follows
1 Job is ON FIRE
2 Boss is dead/out of action
3 somebody wants to say the words "You have Been Served" to you
4 somebody that did work the weekend dropped out/over
5 TLAs have shown up and they are making frowny faces
99% of the rest can wait until Tuesday
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
Finding God in a Dog
... if you can't go through a long weekend without constantly checking your smart phone.
Either you are in a job that you choose that requires 7x24 support, or you choose to work on a project that has a tight deadline, or you put up with a bad corporate culture for fear of having to find a new job, or you haven't trained co-workers, or you haven't faced the fact that you are a work-a-holic, etc.
There are companies that value employees and recognize the benefits of personal time. Go find one.
PS: This comment does not apply to situations where real emergencies occur. Those are obviously exceptions.
Not all of those 7 billion can do certain jobs.
and whenever im away on the weekend, i check my cellphone to see if my friends are dead.
The average smartphone user checks his or her device 150 times per day, or about once every six minutes.
How in the world can someone check their smartphone that often? You'd have calluses from sliding the unlock icon surely.
I check my android phone if it buzzes from a message and I'm not already doing something else, or if a voice call comes in. But I'm definitely not getting voice calls every six minutes.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
No, this call from work is top priority and vitally important. It's life or death!
Except I'm not an MD, I'm not doing heart transplants. I'm just a software engineer writing drivers for smartphones and tablets.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
get rid of salaries pay or have a high min level to be on it with no OT pay say min of 80K-100K + cost of living bumps.
about about going some where with poor coverage and or a place to loud to hear the phone.
I've made it exceptionally clear that I am not available 24x7. If my boss would like me to be on call for some period, I'm willing to discuss that, but it needs to be arranged in advance for a clear time period.
If some communication is coming in for work right now, I don't even know about it and I'll handle it on Tuesday, given the 3-day weekend. Weekends are not "extra work days", they are my time to relax, unwind, and come back to the office ready to do a much better job than if I were constantly tired, fatigued, and burnt out. Ultimately, that benefits my employer, too.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
At the end of the day, if you can't turn off your phone, it's your fault. If you have a job that's so miserable that you'd be better off not thinking about it, that's your fault too. If you can't finish your work fast enough to go home and enjoy time with your family / relax, totally your fault. People like to blame society for their own faults. Go to work, finish your work, go home, have fun, enjoy the weekend. It's pretty simple you guys.
Or rather if the job requires any kind of specific experience, most people cannot do most jobs. Experience cannot be replaced be replaced by anything else.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Not everybody works Monday to Friday
(or 9 to 5 for that matter)
I have a 3 night weekend (I work nights) every 2 weeks. (Friday, Saturday, Sunday nights)
But then I have to work the other weekend.
Statutory holidays don't make any difference, I work every Monday (and Wednesday)
I get alternate Tuesdays and Thursdays off. (Total 72 hrs every fortnight)
I am part of a large telco (13k+ employees). I work from home, have a Blackberry and check my email religiously. I am not penalized for turning the BB off for the weekend if need be however, putting out that fire on Sat means my Monday is free for drinks on the patio. I prefer to manage my own time and not have weekends forced upon me.
I am not required to work on a weekend and there is no expectation to do so. But taking care of something when I have free time almost always means I can make that time up later. I have been in this role several years now and I feel my employer has consistently supported a good work/life balance.
Granted, that is probably the exception. Not the rule.
What is meant is that they are paid the same as someone that DOESN'T check their smartphone all day when off work. I.e. someone is working 40 hours and being paid the same as someone that is working 60 hours, in the office or at home.
Being a little older its interesting to see the arc of human behavior. Younger people don't question the way it is, it's just the way it is and they rationalize why it's that way and they thing it's normal, even good. There was a time when people actually mattered as people and not interchangeable widgets in a service based industrial engine that consumes people in precisely the same way it consumes paper or water or raw materials.
When people mattered, their human needs mattered. How the company was loyal to the employee just the way an employee was supposed to be loyal to a company. My Father worked for the same company for 30 years and got a generous retirement from them. Today the shrinking bone and the increasing number of ever hungrier dogs forces us to be happy to give away all our human time, with our families, with our interests and personal joys and passions, or we are forced to do work that leads to living a life that is hungry and wanting.
The problem isn't and can't be cell phones. It is a ceaselessly ravenous industry that wants all of you, and when it is done will spit you out sans vital juice. The future bodes that human labor is coming to an end. But the industries are the only recipient of the changing world. We must begin to look at how we will deal with a human population that no longer can compete in the market place with robot labor Or society itself will unravel.
My smartphone came with an app called "Power Off" that I find to be 100% effective in preventing work interruptions of my personal life. The only catch is that it seems to require a reboot to turn the app off. However this is a small price to pay.
This sig is not paradoxical or ironic.
I have blocking software and use it. There are four people on this earth who can call me during vacation or holiday who can get past my shields. Not even POTUS can get my fucking phone to ring.
Yea right fire me you fucking marionette.
I'd go on a Vegan diet but the delivery time from Vega is too long. --brownkitty
No internet, email or smartphone. I'm usuualy outdoors doing something.
Unlike many folks, my workphone is sitting on a table some distance away from my personal computer. It sits there quietly, and I ignore any of the bloops that come from it when mail arrives. The only times I pay attention to it is either if there's a EAM (Emergency Action Message) or if it's a phone call from one of my three executives I support 24/7. But since they're engineering-type folks, I rarely get bothered by them on the weekends or holidays, so the phone sits there. As for my work-issued laptop, it sits at work, the only times I'll bring it home is if there is an absolute need for me to support folks (usually over an extended holiday, and even then it may be just one call at most.)
The same is true for my personal cellphone. Yes, if it's from one of the two people who have my number (good friends) then I'll reply, otherwise I ignore the phone. When I'm at home, I don't care to deal with work issues, this is the time where I relax from work and enjoy some quiet time. As for vacation, *nothing* from work is brought with me, and the rule of thumb is that the building had better be burning down and I don't smell smoke, so it has to be that level of importance before I'll answer the phone.
I work for a very large company, so when it comes to vacation time, the management wants you to use it. They at least recognize the value of an employee who is rested and relaxed, although I often see management taking their work equipment with them on vacations. If that's what they want to do, that's fine... just understand that when I have my time off, it's *MY* time off, and I am going to savor it.
Well said. There are other ways they gain productivity/wealth from us. When they lower wages, they put the burden on tax payers to help people survive while at the same time they pay less taxes, so the burden is shifted to the dwindling middle class and fellow working poor who are all making less.
Technology has given companies a way to steal your time away from work. The first way is the obvious, mentioned here. The other is through what we do online, such as liking something, sharing and organizing content, creating free content for websites who make money from the content we provide and the ads. There's a reason Facebook is trying to get people to share as much about their viewing and listening habits as possible, and that's not to benefit your social life. Everything about your life can be turned to profit, and the more they keep you busy sharing that info with them, the more money they make off of your time without you getting a penny. Yes, developers need to make money, but the money that is made from this is more concentrated towards the top and it distorts the supposed purpose of the websites. A social networking site that really isn't interested at all in helping you socialize with your friends (offline). And the money you help them make with your free time activities goes to great things like helping get a tar sounds pipeline through the US and getting cheap, exploitable labor from outside the US into the US to drive your wages down (see Zuckerberg).
http://www.amazon.com/Supernormal-Stimuli-Overran-Evolutionary-Purpose/dp/B0057DC3VY
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article16.aspx
Which agree with your point and then go beyond it... People become "neuroadapted" to the new level of stimulation and have as much pleasure as before, except they tend to have negative health effects of a diversity of things they need for true health.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Why not just go the whole hog and eliminate that nasty pay all together? That way they company can be super competitive.
Why do you think they invented unpaid internships?
You forgot that the 200 hours is paid at 50c an hour. And then you thank your employer on bended knee.
.... chances are you're working on Memorial Day, because 1. you don't get holidays, only paid compensation, and 2. You've been asked to put in extra time. These tendencies are totally independent on the prevalence of smartphones.
...would you work weekends without getting paid?
Employers don't say to computer manufacturers, "We want seven PCs, but we're only going to pay you for five", so why would you let them do this with your labour?
Weekends are your free time. You never get this back. If your employer wants you to work on a weekend, tell them to pay you.
worldmobilenet.com -- World Prepaid Wireless Internet plans
Again something that's pretty much unique to America. The UK certainly doesn't stand for that kind of nonsense.
"socialist atheist muslim communist agenda"
TFTFY
That is pretty much untrue for pretty much any non-menial job. Or rather "the right education" does not exist and cannot be created.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
guess there must be people who check their phone every minute (or more) to make up for people like me who turn our phone off when we're relaxing on a holiday. mines plugged in and charging but on airplane mode right now and will stay there for the rest of the day as I go out for lunch (may as well the restaurant I'm going to is in a rural area with no phone reception (at least not for my carrier))
One could always just shut it off!
Seriously. If you're at home, why do you need to play with a smartphone?
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Yeah unions are great. That steel industry sure is kicking ass and the cost/quality of American cars can't be beat!
The Germans and Japanese don't seem to have any trouble building competitive cars with union labor. So either American unions are considerably worse than their counterparts in other countries, or the problem lies somewhere else. The Big Three haven't exactly had brilliant management. In fact, their management has traditionally been crappy and shortsighted.
German workers get paid much more than American workers and even have representation on corporate boards. Yet manufacturing in Germany is thriving and the quality of their goods is among the best in the world.
Tell me more! I'll just grab some Twinkies first and... oh... wait...
As always, the happiness is in the middle ground.
Have you priced Mercedes/Audi/BMW against American cars? Excluding that new $30k Merc they all cost twice as much.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Unions priced themselves out of business. They demanded outrageous wages and concessions so the companies moved overseas. Some places you can't even change a light bulb or move a desk without calling in union workers. Sorry but you aren't worth $40 per hour to push a button or turn a bolt on an assembly line.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Yes. Yes it is.
Add in off-shored/outsourced manufacturing and support, H1Bs, and the loss of, by some estimates, roughly 30% of the manufacturing and some of the other jobs remaining due to robotics and automation.... There are exceptions in some sectors and geographic areas, but for employers across-the-board it's mostly a sellers' market. Especially at the lower end, where people are cheap and easily made, and on up, even given the rise in minimum wage, there's been a downward shift in wage structure in relation to purchasing power even when, overall, taxes are lower compared to twenty and fifty years ago. And even with a smaller percentage of tax payers paying a larger portion of total taxes their net is often higher than before.
Fun times. Please do come visit, for the charm of it.
The solution to checking work on weekends is to focus on your weekend.
Sure, there is almost always something. Where a group or person is fully utilized, there always is.
"No problem, I can get on that first thing Tuesday AM, have a great holiday weekend --I'm going camping, yeah no service up there, see you Tuesday..."
Blogging because I can...
When and where are you hiring? ;-)
New Zealand does. My work has a few people through every year, working hours for free. They even get yelled at when they screw up, and come back for more.
Again something that's pretty much unique to America. The UK certainly doesn't stand for that kind of nonsense.
oh but it is fairly common in europe, in similar positions probably that is in america. that is: advertising and graphics industries. half of the adverts you see were made by someone for free in the hopes of getting a permanent gig. it's a field of work where nobody gives a shit about regulations or laws or fairness.
thing is - the schools even invented internship requirements so people can't even graduate without getting a gig and often it means a free gig.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Show me pictures of the beach while I'm sitting in an office meeting.
Show me messages from the office while I'm lying on the beach
Have you priced Mercedes/Audi/BMW against American cars? Excluding that new $30k Merc they all cost twice as much.
I have priced out American cars lately and unless you want a POS they cost just as much as Mercedes/Audi/BMW.
I'm a truck guy too which is worse. I priced out a truck that I considered minimum requirement and it was over 50k, closer to 60k with the stuff I actually wanted. The prices on American cars are ridiculous. On the other hand, Japanese vehicles seem to be priced more competitively. They used to be a hell of a lot cheaper but ever since Toyota got the reputation for being crazy reliable the prices sky rocketed.
The Union issue in the US is one of corruption. American Unions are beyond corrupt. The Union execs are constantly under scrutiny for corruption charges, never mind the history of Mob involvement with them. This all leads to added manufacturing costs. There's a reason Pinto's arent built anymore. Its not because they are ugly as fuck it's because they cant make any money of them. SUV's have flooded the market for two reasons, they have huge profit margins and they sell like hot cakes. The age of the 3-15k car in the US is dead and gone.
When and where are you hiring? ;-)
Hopefully at some point by mid summer. In London.
The salary is a bit low for London, but I prefer having 30+ days annual leave, no stress and a clear conscience to a job in a bank.
Do you hire immigrants? I am looking to get out of the US again.
Not often, I think it would be difficult. The government is the employer (indirectly).
"For the year from 6 April 2013 to 5 April 2014, a maximum of 20,700 skilled workers can come to the UK under Tier 2 (General) to do jobs with an annual salary below £152,100." -- which probably means it's not easy to come anyway. (This has recently changed. We used to let in as many skilled workers as could get jobs.)
dont you know? unions are only on this earth to promote the obama socialist muslim communist agenda to abort our children and fill our cheese with unhealthy dragon feces.
...and force us to gay marry.
So ... since it's your personal smart phone (work-issued ones are a different question), at some point between you taking it out of it's box, and you "reading work-related emails as they roll in", someone spent some time configuring the smart phone to access the relevant servers, using your user name and password (or whatever other system). So, at some point, you have collaborated in this circumstance.
I tried that, 2 or 3 smart phones back ; since our work email solution has no option but to use a webmail interface (on those rare occasions when I'm in the same country as the office, or when at work anywhere in the world), it was unusable - as most desktop-targeted websites are on smart phones. So I haven't attempted since. If Work need to get a message to me, they have my (work) email address for when I'm at work, and they've got my mobile phone number for emergencies.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"