Back Channel This!

This recent New York Times article has actually got me thinking in a more alarmist fashion than I usually do. The writer admits to being a techno-addict who recently forced himself to go without any form of computer technology for 24 hours, just because he felt he may be in danger of becoming a techno-addict. Of course, I don't need to do that. I can stop any time I want! I'm nowhere near the kind of hypothetical conference attendee described in Will Richardson's blog post of February 29 who spends the entire time at a conference live blogging and having back channel discussions with people in the room and across the world while the speaker is talking, even beaming reaction shots of people in the audience over Ustream. (But what are they reacting to--the speaker, or their laptop screens?) One respondent to that blog entry said he had recently been at a conference and missed half a session he wanted to see, because he was lost in an online conversation he was having about the session. (Of course, given a lot of conferences I've been to recently, I can't blame him.)

It reminds me of one of my favorite films, Being There, in which Peter Sellers plays a character who only experiences the world through the medium of television, and even carries his remote control around with him, once he gets out of the house, so he can change the channel when real life becomes unpleasant. Are the new media turning us into people who are hooked on the experience of reacting, rather than acting? Wow, it is such a relief to be blogging about this.