Week 4-Thing #8

As a matter of spiritual sacrifice, my brother and I have given up surfing the internet until Easter. As well, I have given up red meat and heavy caffeine. All of these come with some sense of gray area, what is pork, what about green tea, and what if I am researching a product I intend to buy? Nonetheless, I haven't watched any funny video on the net for over a month, and it was pretty much a daily mainstay before.
I think RSS will be the new news. We'll all have our settings for one thing or another. Personally, I like having Dilbert's Strip o' the Day, delivered daily to my computer screen. However, there is a need to consume carefully, lest we become compulsive consumers of vapid infotainment.
I'll start with a few anecdotes. My department chair and I were talking about one of the mass emails that was sent out to the district. It was one of those vague 'don't-misuse-internet' emails that crop up this time of year to remind us not to reply-all the whole district to say 'vote Quimby'. That being said, there is a certain amount of internalized guilt that many of us suffer from, and we quickly considered 'was that sent out to me?' I was thinking about the time I had wasted researching a product I wanted to buy, time wasted that I could have been working on this, or maybe should have been putting more effort into my teaching (I am proctoring a test right now, periodically making laps). My department chair said he was self-conscious about the time he had spent checking stocks online. Another colleague, coincidently another department chair, said that he spent a ton of time checking the Huffington Post. While my brother was working on his doctorate, he changed the settings on his computer to re-route him to a research site when he looked up the Onion, or college humor.
What I mean to say is that the internet can be used compulsively. That it seems odd, but people are compelled to see what Ford stock is doing, to see the latest moped crash, or perhaps the worst of all, to see what to buy next. The internet is a great tool, but at the same time, a great distraction. The same place that is used to cure cancer, now also delivers Dilbert. If you're a person who gets distracted by that, then you will be. Then, you need discipline, or some external filter to keep from being distracted. I know I can waste some time on the internet, so I choose to avoid it while I am at work. I already click craigslist music 3-4 times a day, I don't need anymore sources for distraction. I think RSS is a useful tool, but I probably wouldn't use it, because I know I use it to much and might simply drown in a deluge of infotainment.