Evils of iPod
People’s relationship with technology has been an odd one, and with the pace of technological change apparently faster than ever before in human history, we’re apparently experiencing some growing pains. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen articles on technology that are misinformed and/or alarmist. Hence we get articles about how the Wii and PSP are “Portals to Porn!” (i.e., devices with internet access).
The main thing that gets on my nerves is when people try to convince us that technology is going to eat away at the fabric of society. iPods, video games, and the internet all (supposedly) get people to socialize and exercise less than they used to. For me personally, this is kind of stupid. If I didn’t have any of those high-tech toys, I’d be reading books instead. I do, as they say, use my iPod to create a personal space within a public space, but that’s just allowing me to be the way I am naturally more effectively. And more importantly, I have a hard time believing that it’s preventing me from having conversations with random strangers on the train, something I normally dislike in the first place. If I were to decide that listening to my iPod is more important to me than talking to a longtime friend who’s sitting right next to me, that’s a different matter. Similarly, it’s not that I’m playing video games instead of exercising. I know I don’t exercise enough, but there are personal, social, and medical reasons for that that have absolutely nothing to do with video games. If anything, DDR whatnot get me to exercise a heck of a lot more than I would otherwise.
I can’t remember the exact quote, but Douglas Adams basically said that if something is around when you’re born it’s a natural part of the world, if something comes about before you turn 35 it’s exciting and new and hopefully you can get a job involving it, and if it comes about after you turn 35 it’s an unnatural abomination. (Assuming we’re smart enough to take this as an insightful analysis and not a statement of literal truth) Adams is definitely on to something. The people who are critical of video games are pretty much uniformly over the age of 35, to be sure, some more emphatically than others. This creates another situation where there are people talking very loudly, but we can’t really rely on them as a source of information, even though the issues they raise are potentially important. Some of it no doubt is “technophobia,” but there are literally people who’ve died from playing MMOs for too long at a stretch. (I’m trying very hard to avoid getting into ranting about MMOs, which I find thoroughly unappealing, much less the likes of Jack Thompson).
Technology has always had the potential to redefine how we live. Automobiles and telephones brought about enormous change in terms of how we live, and how we can structure our civilization. Today America in particular is largely designed with cars in mind. Depending on the area you live in public transportation ranges from tolerable to awful, and if you were somehow restricted to walking and/or bicycling, it would become virtually impossible to maintain any sort of lifestyle in many places. The internet is giving us new ways to connect and socialize, and I don’t think we can definitively say that it’s better or worse than the more conventional forms of socialization we had before. More often than not I contact people via my cell phone or IM, and admittedly my misanthropic tendencies are a factor, but I don’t particularly see anything lacking in these, especially when they’re part of an overall lifestyle that still includes face-to-face contact. For some the internet is enabling people to do just that. Online communities will deliberately organize real-world events, and real friendships are forged.
I’m not sure where I was going with this, but the point is, the relationship between people and technology is complicated and symbiotic.
