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Trapped in in the grid [Kuwait Times]
[July 25, 2014]

Trapped in in the grid [Kuwait Times]


(Kuwait Times Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Shakir Reshamwala We have become slaves to social media. Everyone seems to have their faces glued to their smartphones, oblivious of the world around them. I wanted to say we have become slaves to technology or the Internet, but that wouldn't be true. After all, you wouldn't surf the Net for hours on a mobile device. The emergence of smartphones, tablets, phablets and their cousins have made access to your online social world much easier. Your phone is now a hi-res camera and powerful computer rolled into one, and broadcasting to the world how great your existence is is just a few clicks away.



There are also the elements of envy, curiosity and one-upmanship involved – a hunger to know what your friends (some of whom you haven't met personally for years) are doing professionally and socially, and more importantly, how are they ageing. Then there's also the shared links, from irreverent top ten lists to gruesome images of war. In this too, there's a constant battle to win the hearts and minds of users, most of whom now consume news only on social media.

Everybody from your grandpa and his cat to the so-called millennials are on social media, their fingers (and paws?) flicking away at the screens of their smartphones at family gatherings, mealtimes, traffic lights, bus stops, boardrooms, streets, you name it. While walking, driving, commuting, working, eating and even sleeping, as the mobile is the last thing that is seen before hitting the sack and the first thing squinted at after awaking.


So how would it be to drop off social media? Quit cold turkey? A fellow journalist recently did just that – or went off the grid as he put it, because it took up too much of his time. He was back soon, but the break must've been therapeutic, freed from the pressure of constantly checking for updates, posting every detail of your life online and exposure to corny memes, animal videos and dead children. But information is too addictive and narcissism and navel-gazing too ingrained in us to stay away for long.

It seems everyone nowadays has the time to stare – at their smartphones, that is.

What is this life if, full of care, We have no time to stand and stare.

- Leisure by W H Davies (1911) All rights reserved.

(c) 2014 Kuwait Times Newspaper Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (Syndigate.info).

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