An article from chronicle.com discusses one Michigan State professor’s effort to not use technology for one day. She does end up using her telephone because she was at work for the day, and to not use a telephone at work is probably impossible.
I think Rewire Your Life Day is a genius idea, and it really goes along with one of my previous blogs where i talked about how some of my friends, and people everywhere, aren’t hopping on the digital bandwagon as much as others of us are. I think this would be a great way to help people recognize how desperately dependent we are on technology. Personally i feel like every generation after mine and including mine is probably horrible at spelling because of spell check. There are really thousands of examples of how dependent we are on technology, and it’s sort of frightening. As a kid my parents used to make us have an occasional TV Free day, where we wouldn’t watch TV at all because they wanted Me and my siblings to get outside and do something with our lives. A Rewire Your Life Day would be a great way for people to really step into the past and experience human interaction as it has never been before.
With the abundance of e-mail and cell phone conversations we have it’s remarkable that there is anyone with real people skills anymore. That’s why, in a sstrange way, i’m glad that i’m not the best at talking on a cell phone because i never get a complaint about not being heard or being misunderstood when talking to someone in person. People skills, as i’ll call them, are still very important in this world, but how can we expect people learn these skills when instead of learning how to better communicate your ideas in person we are finding new ways to communicate digitally.
I think that technology is really a good thing and i’m as dependent on it as anyone, but what i’d like to challenge people to do is to not use a cell phone for one day. I’ve done it for a week once when my cell phone broke. It’s a very strange feeling, not knowing where your friends are, or if there is going to be anyone at home when you get there; but it is also liberating to go a day with only being concerned with your current situation rather than being constantly connected with others and their current situation.
