Connection and Disconnection
Media technologies rapid surge into everyday life with the aim of connecting people has brought forward the idea of ‘digital detox’. Digital detox — “Disconnect to Reconnect” is a way that enables people to opt out from the digital age and redefine the meaning of connectivity for us and the future generations (Digital Detox, n.d.).
Nathan Jurgenson calls the time before the digital era as the golden age. Jurgenson believes “the golden age was the time when people were actually true to themselves rather than hiding behind social — media profiles trying to grab attention” (Jugenson, 2013). He further states that the arrival of internet took off the real conversations and identity and slowly spoilt the flavour of interactions. To further expand on this, Jurgenson calls the internet era as the second life in which by the help of “digital detox” there is a hope where people can relive and reconnect to the way we lived before the media technologies took over.
Worthy of consideration is whether media technologies has been beneficial or its impact has caused negativity. Boyd states that it is up to the users of media technologies/social media to decide if the digital era is improving the society it operates in (Boyd, 2012). The change that has been brought in use as part of the human development it cannot be beyond our control (Boyd, 2012).
There are many complexities that highlight the world of connective media. For the ones who are the users and part of the digital world seem to be controlled by the media technologies and find it difficult to opt out from socialising where as people who choose not to participate in the online world feel excluded from many things that goes around them. José van Dijck in his book ‘The culture of connectivity’ develops new frameworks that helps in understanding social media and states that once if a person is connected to the online world it gets difficult to pause or stop (Dijck, 2013).
References
Boyd, D. (2012, 04 21). Whether the digital era improves society is up to its users- thats us. Retrieved from The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/apr/21/digital-era-society-social-media
Digital Detox. (n.d.). Digital Detox. Retrieved from Digital Detox: http://digitaldetox.org/
Dijck, J. v. (2013). The culture of connectivity. Netherlands: Oxford.
Jugenson, N. (2013, 11 13). The disconnectionists. Retrieved from The new inquiry : https://thenewinquiry.com/the-disconnectionists/
