Danny has a great post about TV watching. As always, his writing is great. I like the structure and flow of his sentences. They are layered nicely, with great humor here and there to boot.
My yearly cable TV / broadcast TV consumption is probably less than 10 hours. We got cable TV for free because we live in a condo building. Watching Yao Ming playing basketball takes a big chunk out of it. I do use my Samsung TV set to watch DVDs from Netflix, though. I probably spend on average about 3 hours per month on DVD watching, if that.
On the other hand, I do spend a lot of time on the web. I had my book projects in the summer. I now write my own blogs. With SQL Server 2005 just released recently, I plan to write more technical articles for SqlServerCentral.com. I need to work on a presentation I will give to a user group in December. And I do volunteer work for PASS, currently helping out with the SIG web site.
I think I need to plan better and have more discipline in my web surfing. Like TV addiction, I believe computer/web addiction is not good either, although I would say the later is the less of two evils. Many times I read articles, news items, and blogs and follow links on them that I don’t even remember why I end up where I am and what my original goal is.
So, dear reader, what tools, tricks, discipline do you apply to overcome computer/web addiction?
Hey Danny, if you are reading this, are you in Chicago during Thanksgiving? Do you want to do a meetup?
7 responses to “Overcome Computer and Web Addiction”
Haidong I so agree with you. Since BLogs have become mainstream everybody has something to say and its just more to keep up with. I wish i had an alarm clock on my pc that automatically detects when I’m caught up in a ‘web of links’ and forces firefox to shut down.
That’s a good idea Avin:)
Children. My boys have pleasant ways of reminding me I’ve spent too much time on the computer. Usually it’s by challenging me to whatever their latest favorite video game is. That also tells me how much my eight year-old has been playing the game. If I can win, he just started learning. If he stomps me, he’s been playing it non-stop after school. From those two extremes I can gauge how much based on how close the games are.
If children aren’t an option, a dog will do the same thing. Cats won’t, as they don’t have this capacity to want to play, play, play, play.
Yes, I heard that a dog is good for its owner’s health. I had a dog when I was little. I had 2 goats that I took care of a lot of times when I was in 1st or 2nd grade in the Ji Village.
My first grader goes to bed at 8:00pm. It is after that that I find myself drifting and wasting time away. Got to be more disciplined;)
By the way, after reading your comments on my post on essential software, I downloaded ActiveState Perl. Got to learn that. I sense Perl and sqlcmd can be a one-two punch Lethal Weapon, like Mel Gibson and Danny Glover;)
I solve my computer addiction by surfing the web more. When I tire of it, I watch TV. Sometimes I do both. Ocassionally I have to leave the house, for this I have a pocket pc phone 🙂
Heh, LOL
[…] We currently live in a 2-bedroom condo. As Benjamin is getting older, we are thinking of buying our first house. The person who is really in charge in my household has ordered me to think about what I want in a house, instead of speading too much quality time with my computer. So I am making a list here and intend to modify it as time goes by. Please share your experience or suggestions for first-time house buyers like me by commenting. […]