We live in a world of ever increasing immediacy. This tends to change significantly the way we behave. We can’t spend a few minutes without watching our devices!
In social networks, our posting history is soon unavailable, after a few days at most. It is difficult to search for past posts. Even in the case of emails, data shows that people tend to forget ever sooner those emails that are not on the top of the pile (see “Is Email Open Rate Decay Increasing?” blog post by Christopher S. Penn). A reason might be increase in the use of mobile devices with a much more limited screen and usability of scrolling down!
The curve above suggests that for marketing purpose, tweets should be sent many times per hour!
In the same time, tools that allow to read content in an asynchronous manner like Google Reader are being discontinued by their producers.
So, are we supposed to be permanently hooked up to our devices so as to not miss the latest update or news? Isn’t it a conscious strategy by marketers to push us to remain hooked in front of our tiny screens? Does that really correspond to a need?
Every time I disconnect, or I stay in a situation where I can only connect once a day or so, like during holiday time, I feel like it is enough. Not so much changed in the meantime.
One of the skills in the Collaborative Age will be the ability to manage time. To resist to this behavior expected from us to remain hooked to our social network feed.
Will you use these holidays to get off the hook and disconnect for a while? Practice your time consciousness?
