With this Wednesday’s technology summit at Saint Rose, “Tethered 24/7: Staying Human with Today’s Technology,” I thought about how much technology has impacted my life – both in good forms and in bad. And I’m not just talking about iPads and Twitter, mind you – I’m talking about other technologies that have affected my life, to the point where I make very conscious decisions regarding what I will purchase or what I will download to integrate into my daily affairs.
My belief about technology is that I need to control it, rather than having it control me. It’s one of the reasons why I haven’t flown like all the other lemmings to the Apple Store to get an iPhone or an iPad or an iAnything. If I need a phone, I will get a phone. If I need a knife to cut my food, a plastic knife or a stainless steel knife can do the job just as well as a Swiss Army knife or a chainsaw.
Case in point.
My phone is a BlackBerry 9330 phone. I can make calls with it, I can check my e-mail, I can text with it, I can approve comments on my blog with it, and I can check my Facebook and Twitter with it. Sometimes I can take pictures with it as well. That’s it. I don’t have apps on it for calculating restaurant tips (that’s why I learned multiplication and division in grade school), I don’t need to launch digital birds at digital pigs, and I don’t need to “check in” any place in which I’m dining or watching a movie or whatever.
In other words, my phone is high-tech enough to do what I want it to do – yet low-tech enough so that it doesn’t control my life.
Besides, I’ve seen the dark side of technology.
I’ve seen people use online resources to bully and torment others. And I’m not just talking about kids in school – there are plenty of bullies and demagogues who hide behind pseudonyms and anonymity to harass those whom they don’t like. It’s happened since the days of USENet Newsgroups and Yahoo! Groups; I’ve even seen people get harassed from anonymous trolls and wannabe hackers on Reddit and on Foursquare. If that’s what today’s technology can do for us, then count me out.
Still, I shouldn’t have to explain to someone that I can’t talk to them right now because I’m on the New York State Thruway; at least until they give me a few minutes to “put in the wire,” as I call my wireless earpiece. And don’t even expect me to text them while I’m driving if they text me first. Unless they’d like me to send them a phone-pic of the traffic ticket the nice state trooper gave me for texting while driving.
Perhaps what we’re really looking for isn’t “technology,” but rather “technocracy,” in which science and technology are used for the good of society. Technocracy in using iPads as part of medical research. Technocracy in using Facebook for reunions and reconnection. Technocracy in using GPS devices to get us from Point A to Point B without having to swim through River C.
And I’m not trying to sound like a technology-fearing Luddite. I want the world to advance to utopia, and I want our lives to be peaceful and joyous. But I want it to be our lives, not our iLives.
Trust me. Sometimes it’s okay to turn off the cell phone. It’s okay to leave the portable music device in the house. It’s okay to not check your Facebook status or your Twitter page. It’s not like the world is going to end if you don’t update your status every 45 minutes or so.
But good seats are still available for Wednesday’s technology seminar at Saint Rose. Please click on this link to order your tickets. And I hope to see you there.
At least to “see” you there, as opposed to seeing that you’ve “checked in” there.
Chuck The Writer 
I’ve often wondered if battery companies subsidize everything in this country. Replacing a computer keyboard or mouse in the past did sacrifice some portability, but honestly, how many users are more than the length of the cable away from their PCs?! Yeah, great, you become cable-free (much of it needlessly), but now we have hundreds of thousands MORE things that need batteries.
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