I probably shouldn't grouse about technology as that's how I make my living (for the time being at least), but I can't help wondering if it's really a good thing. I'm not talking about advances in medicine that allow heart transplants, or better surgical techniques, but the day-to-day kind of technology. The time management systems, and office applications, and email systems that all of use on a frequent basis. For those of us old enough to have parents who worked in offices that would say “Inter-what” if you said the word “Internet”, do you remember what that was like?
There was a phone on the desk with a real bell inside, not flash memory with an mp3 codec so that it could play quotes from “Pulp Fiction” on receiving a phone call. Reports were done on actual paper and passed around the office, rather than a shared document that everyone collaborated on. If you needed something from the guy down the hall you would get up and walk to his office, or call him on your phone, rather than sending an email or opening a chat window. If someone sent a request, they didn't panic and start up a storm of emails after five minutes if they didn't get a response (mostly because email wasn't practical for every day use yet).
Things have changed significantly. Now we are always connected, and in the "gimme everything now" universe in which we live, responses must happen in moments and your time can be monitored down to the second. Business is increasingly conducted in an impersonal manner through email, IM, and business work flow management software applications. This doesn't seem to be an improvement. That said, there's no reason to give up the ability to communicate with a partner or client in London instantaneously (or the next best thing to), or coordinate with your Asian office in real time. It seems the solution is to strike a balance, or find the middle ground. With the mass communication genie out of the bottle, and the Internet becoming a way of life, it is now very easy for our worlds to be reduced to twenty wide-screen inches of glowing LCD.
One solution may be stepping away. Just getting up and walking away from the monitor and keyboard for a moment. Going outside, breathing the fresh air (of debatable merit in places like Los Angeles), and reminding ourselves that the world is larger than the three-thousand square feet that comprise our office existence. Instead of using email or instant message to say "good morning" to the pretty/handsome co-worker down the hall, get up and walk away from the desk so you can look him/her in the eye and say the words yourself. Social networking is no substitute for actual connection. As the world becomes more and more wired, it also becomes increasingly important to remember the flesh and blood person at the other end of the chat window.
