Without the Net

Slate has this account of eight reporters who went offline for a week. That is no Internet for a week. While continuing to work. And carrying on with their lives.

The rule was that if they had to get in touch with someone they had to call or meet the person. Reading their accounts takes us through various debates of technology, society and how our behaviour is changing as we include more technology in our lives.

I often ask myself how long could I do without the Internet. Often times this is not about how bad technology is but how much we are using technology as an excuse to fill our time doing useless things. Of course people on FB would love to know what I am doing NOW. But on an hourly basis? Really?

I have written about television elsewhen. Not having cable TV has definitely helped me return to writing and reading. But what about the Internet? This is a far more complex creature than television in the sense that it is just not about entertainment or information – a lot of our work is tied to it.

But all of us who have been using email for the last decade would be the first to admit that today we do log on too many times to delete junk mail or update our status on a networking site. With mobile phones we have reached a point where we hardly think about the act of going online.

So how long can you go without the Internet ? 1 hour? Two days? A week ? Want to test this out?