For about two hours today, Twitter was down.. For almost all casual users of Twitter, this isn't a big deal. But let's push it to a more "extreme" situation: What if you didn't have any Internet access for a day or two? For many that would be called a vacation, but for a growing part of the population, that would be catastrophic.
It isn't just that the Internet is a source of entertainment, it's that it's "social", and as such is not only addictive but also dangerously tied to our identities. The effect could be similar to being suddenly ostracized in a social environment due to some technical cause. With your social persona being unable to express yourself, you're essentially stuck with your own boring self, fearful of self-awareness.
Solitude has its advantages for introspection, so I think it's a bit healthy to turn off WiFi, 3G and LTE, and simply not worry about not evading each and every post in your Twitter feed. As long as when you come back you don't binge on social media to make up for it...
Published on July 26, 2012 at 21:05 EDT
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