Addicted To Our Computers

Addicted To Our Computers
Finding balance in our lives
January 1996

At the publisher’s request, this article is about Internet and computer addiction. Many of my acquaintances are online for more than 4 hours each day. It’s at that point of daily activity that I become concerned for personal well-being..

At the worst, many young people use the Internet and other online services, including free public bulletin boards and the commercial information services as an surrogate for face-to-face interaction--some to the extent of over 20 hours of online activity per day. At this point, professional help may be needed to return to more typical activities and a healthier lifestyle.

But many of this paper’s readers border on being computer addicts. And our Internet activities are only one of the venues of our overly active cyber-lifestyles. Here are a five short questions to help you evaluate your cyberactivities. For each of these questions, consider your average daily activities; some days may be higher, and some may be lower.

Do you spend at least 2 hours at your computer for pleasure?
Do you spend at 10 hours or more at your computer in work-related activity?
Do you have more than 50 acquaintances online that you haven’t met face-to-face?
Do you look first to your computer for release from tension or as a point of respite from daily pressures?
Are you more likely to play at your computer than watch TV or read a book?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, I think you should evaluate your use of the computer.

After the work day, when we must use our computers, I think we need to put this tool in perspective. The personal computer was designed to be a productivity tool for businesses. Even so, most of us bought our PCS and Macs for emotional as much as logical reasons. We need to use spreadsheets and word processors, but games and the Internet can be so much fun!

I encourage my coworkers and friends to use their computers with care. As great a benefit as they are, they can also be viciously addicting. Newsgroups, email lists, websites, bulletin boards, and games all compete to attract us to the keyboard and screen. It’s bad enough that most of us watch an average of four hours of television each day. Now we’re going to add an other couple of hours of computer time? Where are the people for whom we really live? Are they at the other end of our modems?

I read a neat tagline at the end of an email message on Christmas Eve. The author, writing in to a subscription list for Internet providers, reminded us all to hang up and spend some time with the people that really matter to us. It was ironic, this list receives a few hundred postings each day...one of the more popular lists, and still a member had the presence of mind to keep it in perspective. Kudos to her!

Before I was married, it wasn’t uncommon for my roommates and me to turn on our computers after work on Friday and play strategy and word games well into Sunday morning. But hey, back then no one ever accused me of having a life!

Now, my business is “computer use.” And, I get personal enjoyment from visiting with people in the virtual communities to which I belong. I even belong to an online Rotary club!

But, I try to use my computers as I need them to meet my business responsibilities, and after that, I carefully monitor my “personal” time at the keyboard.

When I do slip in to my bad habits, I find myself justifying the midnight excursions onto the World Wide Web as “a learning time” or “professional development.” Yes, some of my fun activities lead to my learning something new, but unless I have a specific goal in mind, I will probably end up losing myself in cyberspace.

I have an agreement with my family that precludes my using the computer for any fun activities until after everyone has gone to bed for the night. Before then, if I’m at the keyboard, I’ve promised that it will be because I’ve got some additional business work to do. I try to log off by 2 a.m. each morning, and even at that, I honestly work for most of each evening’s sessions. All you entrepreneurs and business leaders know that the work never ends for a small businessperson. We’re never really done, we just stop for the night.

Back to the five questions. Answering “yes” to any one of these is not a guarantee that you’re an Internet or computer addict, but it indicates that you spend more time at the computer than the average person. If you answered “yes” to more than one of the questions, I think that you should look honestly at what true benefits you get and what costs you incur from your computer time.

It’s great to have a computer at work, and it can be a blessing to have one at home, too. But keep it in perspective, life online is just that...life online. It’s just not a real life, and I’ll bet that you, like I, get more enjoyment from our close friends and families than from those we’ve met online.

David Stephen Murphy is President and CEO of Damar Group, Ltd. which presents computer training classes, publishes computer learning guides, and helps organizations do business on the Internet. The website is http://dgl.com, and Mr. Murphy may be reached at dave@dgl.com or 410.567.5366.

updated October 22, 1996
http://dgl.com/tbm/tbm9601.html