Humanity in the Information Age

CHAPTER 1: CAPITALISM:  CONSUMPTION How to Live More Wisely Around Our Phones "We are addicted to our phones not because we rely on them, but to the extent that we recruit them to a harmful project of self-avoidance. They do not mean to hurt us. But we may – and probably do – use them to injure ourselves. Addiction sounds horrible. But it is a hard name for a normal inclination: a habit of running away from the joys and terrors of self-knowledge." "Our minds are by nature like mad monkeys, restlessly flitting from one fleeting diversion to another, while all the things we really care about get neglected. But tragically our society and culture does not build us cloisters: it places in our hands ever-open conduits to everything that could possibly divert our minds: real estate, porn, the news, social chit-chat, strident opinion, games, special offers, puzzles, the twelve best hotels somewhere, the weirdest doings of the weirdest strangers and th...

Finishing my degree with independent studies, satisfying remaining electives, was a great opportunity to apply and synthesize my learning throughout the Masters of Social Work (MSW) program. My proposed studies were both focused on the intersection of social work and new technology. In light of choosing the concentration in Policy/Planning, Administration, and Community (PAC) and my interests in new technologies and social media, I wanted to consider macro implications and innovations. Below are some excerpts from the cumulative paper I wrote for my independent studies. Introduction New technologies actively change the face of social work research, education, and practice. In fact, in the United States, there are few societal domains untouched by the information age and digital revolution, which is regularly redefined by emergent technologies. Social media and apps (which intertwine with the devices that animate them) are particularly disruptive innovations that both advance the fi...

Image found on  E-nvironmentalist Attention Economy ? I did "Google'd" it and found this thorough GitBook: Decentralised Attention Economies for Web 3.0 by Maciejolpinski  (updated two years ago) Tristan Harris has this to say: E-nvironmentalist  has two domains (natural & digital) and two authors (Alex Beattie & John Lang); it is definitely worth a look if you ask me. If only for the impressive user interface and well done integration of topics and gaphics. Check out these posts: HOW TO DISCONNECT IN THE ATTENTION ECONOMY: PART I & HOW TO DISCONNECT IN THE ATTENTION ECONOMY: PART II I believe it was Alex Beattie who created this useful google document with tools to assist marshalling one's attention  ...? I found the link via a FB group called "Friends of Time Well Spent"

The  Social Work Podcast  is a wealth of information. In particular, I'd like to draw attention to their February podcast on Death and Grief in the Digital Age: Interview with Carla Sofka, Ph.D. There are a number of points I'd like to spend time with and highlight in this post, as per usual this post is initially in a "notes to self" kind of form... To be updated in hopes it proves useful to others. Consider: Technological advanced directives and digital dust Just as there is sex education in schools, consider death education (see: Tu Nudito ) Dr. Sofka "also recommends including technology assessment in the standard biopsychosocialspiritual assessment" Ding, ding, ding, all these comments excited me as they rang so true... I've been thinking along the same lines for some time now and it's awesome to hear others feel the same. Below is a rough sketch of just such an assessment, I had the idea several months ago and just began actually wri...

Reaching out to two social work groups for which I am a member on Facebook turned out to be very worthwhile. Even though it has only been 16 hours since posting, there has only been one comment made and not expecting to get much more! That's ok. Just the one person made a short comment that opened up a treasure trove of findings. For one, the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) in collaboration with other leading organizations in the field released an update to the  Standards for Technology in Social Work Practice on June 21, 2017 . It has been 12 years since the last edition was released, see  the 2005 version here  if you're interested in comparing. In between this time, the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) did have an international task force that released  Model Regulatory Standards for Technology and Social Work Practice in 2015 , I found this through  Social Work Today: Eye on Ethics . Second, the commenter made me aware of this^ and ...

This past weekend I had a fortuitous interaction with Limell Lawson outside of a grocery store.  I met Limell in 2007 when working at the University of Arizona’s Office of Student Computing Resources (OSCR) as a Multimedia Consultant; she was the Senior Director for University Information Technologies Services (OSCR’s parent department). After I mentioned that my current research focus is on social implications of new technology and namely social media, Limell offered some timely considerations for me. She remarked on the positive opportunities that Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) provide individuals with disabilities and refugees/immigrants. Also, because of ICTs like Facebook, she has been able to enjoy some participation in important family events that she could not attend due to serious injuries incurred from a car accident. Upon further communications (via Facebook Messenger), Limell pointed out that in addition to social networks such as Facebook, gaming pla...