Technology at Home
Things have changed. And it’s not true only in the world outside. The change is noticeable even in the home.
One family. One room. Several screens. Different individual realities.
It may look like a scene in a sci-fi movie. But, no, it’s actually taking place in most of today’s homes. Families share a common physical space, but family members are plugged into separate, individual planes of existence – thanks to modern technology.
Today’s homes are becoming less like a haven for shared activities. Each one exists in his or her own cyber-cocoon. There’s no more need to even huddle in the living room and watch TV together; there’s a personal screen in everyone’s hand.
Technology is now very much a feature of pop culture. The internet has always been a very interesting novelty. More so in the advent of wireless technology and more affordable gadgets.
With better capable smartphones, people are more glued to their screens – what with media companies jumping on board, making sure that their content is available at any time, on any device. And so, even when physically together people now prefer to focus their attention on their online engagements. At home, individual family members find themselves contentedly disconnected from one another but connected to parallel worlds online.
As technology is changing people’s domestic sphere, many are alarmed. It’s a profound shift, and no one knows what further change is coming. Technology has become an alien, and alienating, force in the contemporary home.
But that’s only one half of the picture. Technology also helps people to establish emotional intimacy. It’s now so easy to keep in touch with loved ones; it takes only a click of a finger.
True, there is a side to modern technology that deserves an outcry. Yet, in hindsight, 200 years ago there were similar complaints about technological devices. At that time, the devices were books! Same thing, at home family members were individually immersed in reading. Same thing, all of a sudden family members were individually on their own, their minds drifting into “areas that were hard to control.”
And then the emergence of television was viewed with great alarm, too. There was an outcry about how it transformed entire families into TV-addicted zombies.
In terms of family entertainment, modern gadgets are better alternatives to television. There’s no more need to fight over which show to watch. Everyone has their own device, streams their own films, their own media.
And one’s media preference doesn’t have to get in the way of the others’. If some family members watch TV, the others that want to read or listen to music need not go elsewhere to avoid distraction. They all can sit together on the couch, watch TV on their smartphones or listen to music with their headsets on. Those who want to read can do so quietly with an e-book.
Truth is, the world continually keeps on changing. And people contribute to the change by consistently coming up with ways to make things easier and better, and life more comfortable. It is in human nature to seek progress.
Most of the things in life are neither good nor bad. It’s how people deal with anything that determines its effect for them. The intense popular penchant for gadgets can be tempered by “tech-free days,” for example, for families to pursue activities away from the clutter of devices – to be close together, to whisper endearments to one another.
“Truth is, the world continually keeps on changing. And people contribute to the change by consistently coming up with ways to make things easier and ” better, and life more comfortable.