Are we too connected?

WHO TV (Des Moines) aired a special report, Are we too connected?, on last night’s news broadcast. Among others, they interviewed me and Dr. Michael Bugeja, Professor and Director of Iowa State University’s Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication.

I have interacted with Michael a couple of times. He’s a very good guy and a fun guy to talk with, but he’s also a nationally-visible technology critic who is interviewed often by the media. His technology skepticism is probably understandable given that his entire profession is struggling to reinvent itself because of the impacts of these new digital tools, but it’s also at least a little ironic given that he utilizes multiple web sites to publicize his work. He and I often fall on opposite sides of technology issues. I really need to read his book, Interpersonal Divide: The Search for Community in a Technological Age.

Here are a few quotes from the special report:

All this really does is send a message that someone somewhere else is more important than the place we are and the person we’re with. [Bugeja]

That’s not a loss of connection, that’s a gain of connection compared to where we were before the technologies existed. [McLeod]

There’s a time and a place in society for all manner of communication. Former platforms define those areas with real boundaries. But this has no boundaries. It blurs the boundary between home and work, between school and home, between church, temple, mosque and school. It blurs everything. Why? Because it’s programmed for revenue generation. ‘We want to make money off you at any time of the day.’ [Bugeja]

Happy reading!