Living Without the Internet

 

One way to introduce computer-mediated communication and its role in our everyday lives would be to identify important lifestyle habits that we’d be willing to give up as long as we could keep our Internet connection. It would be interesting to poll a class on this and compare the results for different age groups, for men and women, and even for academic major. Here, for example, are some interesting statistics, reported in the Harvard Business Review (October, 2012, pp. 32-33), on the percentage of people in various countries who would be willing to give up an important lifestyle habit to keep the Internet:

·         89% of those in Indonesia and 65% of those in the United Kingdom would give up alcohol instead of the Internet.

 

·         91% of those in the United Kingdom and 67% of those in India would give up fast food rather than the Internet.

 

·         56% of those in Japan would give up sex rather than the Internet but only 12% would in Brazil.

 

·         56% of those in China would give up driving a car (but only 10% in South Africa) instead of giving up the Internet.

 

·         86% of those in Japan and 59% of those in Brazil would give up chocolate rather than the Internet.

 

·         85% of those in China and 55% of those in Germany would give up coffee rather than the Internet.

 

·         78% of those in Indonesia but only 5% of those in France would give up showing rather that the Internet.

 

·         60% of those in Japan and 42% of those in France would give up exercise rather than the Internet.