Voices

BlackBerries for Breakfast: Tech Shakes Up the Morning Routine

Though my own family might find it hard to believe, I don’t generally keep my BlackBerry on my nightstand overnight. I keep it in a bureau drawer, and the few seconds it takes in the morning to walk over there strike me as the difference between an addiction and mere avid use.

Weekend Update, 3.28.09

Another week into challenging times, and the theme for Weekend Update is undoubtedly cost-saving, with a healthy dose of revenue-seeking. On the revenue-seeking side, BoomTown’s Twitter Business Plan Count-Up hasn’t yielded any real keepers yet. There is a real contender, though–since Jennifer Aniston so publicly broke up with her boyfriend John Mayer on account of his Twitter “addiction,” BoomTown suggests offering “Twitter rehab” for those not willing to lose their relationships just yet.
billwoz

Idiot: World of Warcraft Is the "Crack Cocaine of the Computer Game World"

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no more than one to two hours of online gaming per day, so warnings that obsessive gaming might be detrimental to one’s health are not without some merit. But the suggestion that World of Warcraft is the cocaine of the gaming world and its players by extension, a legion of slathering crackheads, well, that’s going a bit far, isn’t it?
wowpark

Hello, My Name Is John and I'm a 'Digitivity Denizen'

Internet addiction disorder may not be a classifiable mental disorder, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a marketing demographic, right? According to an online survey conducted by advertising agency JWT, many U.S. adults feel they can’t make it a week without Internet access, with one in three choosing online activities over sex and time with [...]

Hello, My Name Is John and I’m a ‘Digitivity Denizen’

Internet addiction disorder may not be a classifiable mental disorder, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a marketing demographic, right? According to an online survey conducted by advertising agency JWT, many U.S. adults feel they can’t make it a week without Internet access, with one in three choosing online activities over sex and time with [...]