View Full Version : technology cocoons
Although this (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/03/opinion/bruni-traveling-without-seeing.htmlhttp://) essay was about travel, I found several of the comments very interesting - author Frank Bruni says within "...In theory the Internet, along with its kindred advances, should expand our horizons, speeding us to aesthetic and intellectual territories we haven’t charted before. Often it does.
But at our instigation and with our assent, it also herds us into tribes of common thought and shared temperament, amplifying the timeless human tropism toward cliques. Cyberspace, like suburbia, has gated communities." Food for thought anyway at what we are becoming as technology zooms forward. I am thinking too about how we are all here due to an interest in simple living though we have different cultural points of view yet usually manage to get along.
Gardenarian
9-9-13, 7:59pm
The link didn't work for me.
Me, neither.
This Seattle Times link (http://seattletimes.com/html/opinion/2021747444_frankbrunicolumndigitalcocoon04xml.html ) works, though.
And so I read the article. Interesting exposition, though I'm not sure how much of this kind of thing was happening before and it was just less visible.
The helpful video-store clerk or bookstore owner has been replaced, refined, automated: We now have Netflix suggestions for what we should watch next, based on what we’ve watched before, and we’re given Amazon prods for purchasing novels that have been shown to please readers just like us. We’re profiled, then clustered accordingly.
So on what criteria did the helpful video-store clerk or bookstore owner make his/her recommendation? He or she knew what you had rented/purchased before and suggested other works like it. Or did a quick assessment, choosing not to recommend "Sense & Sensibility" to the gaggle of 20-year-old male college students or "Die Hard <fill-in-the-number>" to a woman "of a certain age". To some extent, Netflix and Amazon do a better job because the recommendations are far more colorblind.
To bypass NY Times subscription, you can just google Traveling Without Seeing by FRANK BRUNI to read in its entirety.
This has a greater impact than just keeping us within our cultural biases, it impacts our impromptu interaction with families, casual acquaintances etc.
I love going on transit or standing in line and making a new acquaintance with no effort. The shared knowledge has been amazing to mutual benefit over the years - places to explore, news, ideas, resources in the community...
DD1 used to travel transit for a number of years so eventually a group started talking and then playing cards going to and fro on the hour-long ride. They discussed all kinds of issues in a supportive way and when she changed jobs and got married the group collected the funds to buy her and surprise her with a joint wedding gift. The sense of human interaction and community building is suffering as a result IMO.
Now people on transit or in line, simply keep checking their smart phones and live in isolation or their own cliques.
early morning
9-11-13, 7:16pm
Maybe it's just location, but when I've used transit in the past - before cell phones - people rode in isolation or their own cliques, or read books, magazines, or papers, so I don't think that's really such a new thing. Many of us keep ourselves to ourselves, for good or bad - just the way we are.
I'm hardly young (45) and have been riding transit to work for all of my adult life except the 5 years when I lived close enough to walk to work. Even 23 years ago when first doing so I wanted a barrier from everyone else. At that time I used a combination of walkman and reading material. Today I use iphone and reading material. It's not because I only want to interact with my "tribe". It's because I'm an introvert and don't want to have lots of casual interactions with random people.
There must be an awful lot of introverts out there.
ApatheticNoMore
9-12-13, 12:13pm
Well transit isn't always an ideal place to socialize even if one actually was so inclined. Sometimes the trains are jam-packed. Want to socialize when packed in like sardines, standing room only? There's always some creepy types one is avoiding eye contact with as well (the person literally ranting to themselves on the train). But maybe you socialize if the time is right and the situation allows. Anyway, the minor imperfections of public transit is not why I usually drive - because it adds another hour to a commute that driving already takes two hours round trip is why I drive - and I don't feel proud of it.
An aweful lot of introverts out there? Nah I think the not wanting to socialize with total strangers in a subway is just kind of a cultural thing. Extroverts are supposedly the majority, but introverts aren't that rare (we're not that special of snowflakes :)). The thing is society mostly encourages introverts to be more extroverted and not to exploit their introversion. By which I mean avoid all people always and do it to ever greater degrees - preferably NEVER leave the house - tell you can say you go weeks at a time without talking to anyone. Oh wait no that's not what I mean :~). Exploiting introversion - what I really mean is to really explore the inner world. Because if you're introverted enough you're already so inclined but probably never considered it an asset. Not necessarily toward fun and profit (having the things we are supposed to pursue), though it's possible some might come incidentally, but toward inner growth.
I find that, just as before cell phones/etc, i have just as much human interaction in lines, transit, cafes, etc. People before would go and read books/magazines/etc; today they use phones or e-readers to do it as well. I don't have the second group, just the first, and I am the same.
When I read "technology cocoon" i actually thought of it as a cocoon *from* technology. We definitely do this when we travel, only using email every 3rd or 4th day or so. it's *really nice* to be able to do that. We set auto-replys and go from there. It's great.
The last two days, we've not had power at home (wiring from the grid to our house was blown out by a storm -- required a specialized electrician, an inspection, and then reconnection to the grid -- got done pretty quickly, all things considered). So, we had no internet or power at home. Our neighbor ran an extension cord from her house to our fridge, but that was it for our power.
Can I tell you that it was great? We had dinner by candle light -- cooked on our other neighbor's grill. We read books by flashlight, and then went to bed early (9:30 both nights). It was so pleasant that when we returned home with the power on, we only used the overhead light to cook dinner on the stove, and then basically got back into bed with candle light and flashlights to read. Had a peaceful two hours of reading and cuddling time, and went to bed early.
Bliss!
We decided to continue this. We'll get home this evening and do a skype call, but after that, just go back to candle light, reading, and early bed. :)
rosarugosa
9-13-13, 7:31pm
Zoebird: I love the idea of your voluntary power outages!
Gardenarian
9-16-13, 3:14pm
This is interesting. A friend of mine is traveling in Europe and seems to be posting to Facebook every couple of hours. Having that smartphone with her keeps her tied to her life back here. Almost...why travel?
I've been wondering if she needs to post to make the trip feel 'real' to her; this idea that if you don't 'share' something then it didn't really happen.
I kind of like to keep my journeys (inward and outward) to myself. I carry a blank book and draw and scribble my thoughts.
I recently started using a smartphone but I find I keep it turned off most of the time - so you can have the convenience of technology but it doesn't have to take over your life.
Zoebird - your nights sound sweet and quiet.
This is interesting. A friend of mine is traveling in Europe and seems to be posting to Facebook every couple of hours. Having that smartphone with her keeps her tied to her life back here. Almost...why travel?
I've been wondering if she needs to post to make the trip feel 'real' to her; this idea that if you don't 'share' something then it didn't really happen.
I know many many people who treat their mobile phone as their photo album. Pictures from June's graduation party? Swipe, swipe, swipe -- there you are! Then there are the folks who seem to use Facebook as a virtual darkroom, filling a Facebook album with 14 pictures of little Jason, 12 of them essentially the same picture. Sometimes, these are the same people.
Perhaps, for your friend, Facebook is the new photo album and this is her way of documenting her trip. I don't know as I see it as her being tied to life back here. It's a completely recreational use of Facebook (and her phone, ftm). On my smartphone, it's like two clicks to post something on Facebook. I'm guessing it's not consuming her days.
ApatheticNoMore
9-17-13, 1:23am
It has an element of living to perform. Is she traveling alone though? That can get lonely, not that it can't be fun still but.
My husband blogs the trip, and so we would hit an internet cafe now and again to do that. It's nice to have a blog for the best photos and stuff. he might work on the blogs before we get to the cafe, too, because if you're only buying 30 minutes or an hour, you need to get it done! :)
ToomuchStuff
9-17-13, 1:02pm
If/when I am out to eat, and run into people I know, when I see them now, so many of them are not talking to each other, but into their phone and whatever is on them. These are people they CHOSE to go out to eat with, so I just smile and say "they are right there, you don't need to text one another".
Smart phones (thankfully I don't have one) have become another firewall, so one can't see or hear, something that may bother them.
Gardenarian
9-17-13, 1:27pm
My friend is traveling with her family, and not only posts pictures but lots of writings. I think it's true that there is a performance aspect to it - if for her this is creatively satisfying, than I guess that's kind of cool - that a smartphone makes that available. She's not sitting back and watching old TV shows like the guy in article.
In an earlier time the people who today are posting non-stop on facebook about their vacation are probably the same people who would invite their friends over for a really long slide show after they got home from their trip.
The other type of vacation posts I've seen is the gloating "I'm posting from [insert fabulous location here/accompanied by picture of ocean, Eifel Tower, etc] while all you losers are sitting in your cubicles doing your daily grind."
I had forgotten the slide shows. The endless, soporific slide shows. Thank God for technology.
Thinking about the slide shows, the very dear mother of a good friend from college has always been a bit needy emotionally. She and her husband were recently on a lengthy trip to europe where she was one of those people posting pics all day long about everywhere they had been. At some point she apparently did a massive photo dump onto flickr (I admit, I did not go check it out) and ended her facebook post about it with "...and maybe some of my family will even take the time to look at them..." I had to laugh because her personality just came screaming through in that post. She probably longs for the old days of slide shows before technology could save us all from them!
It's a funny thing. DH and I don't do any sort of "showing our pictures to people." we might take a few now and again anyway (we don't take many), and so when people say "oh, bring your pictures!" we bring 6-8. I figure that's enough for people to have made the attempt, and we are better story-tellers anyway.
I think more people should shorten the process. No one is interested in endless photographs of the same rock.
Gathering in our tiny living room to watch slides is one my my fondest childhood memories. It was perhaps the last time we were all together as a family unit - mom, dad, sibs and siamese cats with a big bowl of popcorn.
Like pinkytoe I used to love sitting with my family and looking at slides from our own vacation. Taking a lengthy look at pictures from someone else's vacation is a different story entirely.
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