A Life Untold & Uninteresting

Disconnect Anxiety – Reasons and Prevention

Solution Research Group recently released a report entitled “Age Of Disconnect Anxiety
And Four Reasons Why It’s Difficult to Stay Off the Grid“. The National Post had an article on it on Sunday and the CBC show, Here and Now, covered it yesterday afternoon.

Disconnect Anxiety “refers to various feelings of disorientation and nervousness experienced when a person is deprived of Internet or wireless access for a period of time.” This report found that 59% of internet users experience this type of anxiety when away from internet and mobile devices, they are disconnected. This was 26% who feel elevated and 33% who feel occasional anxiety.

I’d recommend that everyone read the summary. Its an interesting evaluation of why people feel that way they do when they are away from their computers. I want to share my ideas about why people feel this way, and how to avoid anxiety.

People feel anxious because they feel separated from all their friends, they are worried that they are going to miss something important, like a promotion, or they will be unable to respond to an emergency. Is this a natural reaction? I don’t think so, its the 21st century version of keeping up with the Jones. If we perceive that someone else is more tuned in then us, then we will go the next step. The logical conclusion is disconnect anxiety. I do not think it needs to be this way though. Step back and really look at why you use the internet, if you do I think it will be easier to be away from it.

People who rely on social media, IMs and email for all their interaction as opposed to using it to complement their other communication will suffer from disconnect anxiety. The solution to disconnect anxiety is to make sure you are not relying on the internet for all communication.

I love the internet, don’t get me wrong, but I make sure that I take a break from it. I go out and I meet with friends who aren’t as “plugged in” as I am. That way our conversations are about other topics. All this means when I’m back online I enjoy it more and I don’t get burned out by it.

Disconnect Anxiety is real, but so is Burn Out. Everything in moderation.

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London Public Library Free Wifi

I’m sitting in the London Public Library right now and I’ve discovered that they have free wireless internet access. Its not bad access either, and from their website, they claim that it covers the entire building.

The only disadvantage is that its “filtered” But since I’m not the kind of person that wants to look at questionable material in a library that does not bother me. I’m sure personal privacy people don’t approve.

Popularity: 9% [?]

More iPhone in Canada Rumours

I do not want to be a naysayer and constantly pessimistic about the iPhone in Canada, but I want to make sure that everyone realises exactly what is going on and why we don’t have the phone in Canada yet, nor are we likely to get it anytime soon.

Recently I read a post over at Chris Thomson’s blog, entitled March 14th Could Be iDay for Canada. Woohoo! While almost a week old, he recently renewed his claims with a post on More Clues Pointing Towards The iPhone Coming To Canada Really Soon so all this discussion is still relevant.

I’ve posted these comments on his site, but what follows is a more in depth look.

First, Roger’s data plan announcements have nothing to do with the iPhone. If you closely at the fine print you can see that its doesn’t allow for third party browser web browsing. Exactly what is needed for the iPhone. I see you got conned by Endgadget’s reporting on this issue too.Secondly, any redirects may just be a site architectural cleanup. For instance a while back I found a really old iPod site on the South American Apple site. I think Apple is just a little sloppy with their site maintenance and finally decided to update this.

This is also related to the “HTML COMMENT IN GLOBAL NAVIGATION” this is still just sloppy coding. the Canadian store site is probably stolen from the American and just a few changes made. They forgot to eliminate this one though. Also if it was supposed to indicate something why wouldn’t it refer to /ca/iphone instead of /iphone. It is more then just odd Chris, is shows this was unintentional.

Finally, I don’t see anything in your post other then March 14 is a Friday to suggest that this will be the date. Whats wrong with March 7th, or 21st or 28th? Or even March 14th 2012…

Might as well just keep hacking iPhones. At least it keeps some money out of Roger’s pocket.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Weekly Web 2.0 : Remember The Milk

Its time for my weekly review of a web 2.0 service. Today we’re looking at Remember the Milk; an online to do list.

I discovered this service originally through Jott. (Which I’ve written about here). In a nutshell what Remember the Milk (RTM) does is allow you to maintain an online task list of what you need to accomplish over any time period, from today to infinity. You can also set priorities so you know what needs to be done first.

Continue reading…

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Types of Twitter Users

I think its been roughly a year since I joined Twitter and in that time I’ve noticed there are a variety of Twitter users.

1. Some that use it to constantly advertise their latest blog post or appearance on some live cam.
2. Others that are there for socialization and friends
3. Users that somehow follow everyone AND have ongoing communications with all of them
4. People that never comment on anyone elses tweets and seem to live in their own “what are you doing” world
5. And finally, people that signed up and haven’t updated their status since

And you know what is the best thing about twitter? It has all this diversity!

Popularity: 3% [?]

Facebook Ignorance

I came across this article on FoxNews.com today; Facebook’s Death Spiral Has Begun. Reading this article made me wonder if the “reporter” has even used Facebook before. My two cents of the matter are the allowing Facebook user’s to delete their accounts will actually increase the number of signups. People might want to know that there is a way out once they’ve created an account.

Lance Ulanoff’s ignorance is displayed even more when he writes:

“I’ve had a couple of “pokes” on my page for ages. Someone poked me, I poked them back, and that should be the end of it. But the initial poke remains on my page, so I’m never sure if this is a new poke or a remnant.It’s also hard to delete things like mail, so old messages stick around as if they’re fresh. Everything seems more active than it really is.”

There is no plot on the part of Facebook for the site to look more active then it is. Its only as active as all your friends are. Or does Lance think that he’s getting lots of email everyday just because he never empties his inbox?

I don’t want to seem like an elitist, but I miss the early days of Facebook. When it was just a few college kids and we didn’t go around complaining about things. Except when Facebook would go down and we couldn’t access it….

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The Confusing Canadian Copyright Law

Today I was engaged in a long discussion about the current state of copyright law in Canada. Never before have I seen such a confusing and almost specifically designed to be unclear, set of legislation.

After browsing all over the internet and trying to get a handle on it, this is what I’ve established

1. Per-to-per downloading is legal because of
2. The private copying levy, that we pay a “tax” on all blank media
3.  The law surrounding movies is even more vague
4. At least we don’t live in a copyright dictatorship like the U.S.

A lot of what I’ve discovered has come from Michael Geist’s blog.

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Desktop Screenshot

This is my current desktop. Something about this wallpaper just grabs me. Plus I really like Helvetica…

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Apple Announcement: What Happened To It?

So last week and early this week the internet was abuzz with rumours that apple was going to make an announcement at a special event being held on February 20th. Well its February 21st now and it doesn’t look like there was any big announcement.

I mean other then the price drop of the iPod shuffle and the introduction of a 2 GB model.

I wonder if this was all Apple was ever planning on doing yesterday? Apple’s stock has been up the last few days so the analysts are happy with this announcement. I was hoping for something a little bigger myself.

I must admit though, at only $49 for a 1 GB shuffle it is definitely an impulse buy. If I wasn’t so short on cash right now I would probably pick one up myself.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Weekly Web 2.0 : Twitxr

I’ve decided to post a link/review every week of a new 2.0 web service that I’ve discovered. This week I’m going to start it with Twitxr.

Twitxr allows you to spice up your status updates with photos. The site is very basic, minimalist even. Very web 2.0. It allows you to link to both Twitter and Facebook. As if you needed anymore reason to spam every single social media site with the same update.

Twitxr allows you to update from an email. That would be allow you to update from your phone. Take a picture of “What Are You Doing“; email to Twitxr from your phone and its sent to Twitter.

Twitxr is going to bridge the gap between text and photos updates. Its adds some of the features of Pownce with the community and ease of use of Twitter.

Popularity: 7% [?]