10 ways smart phones hurt writers

By Frederick Lee Brooke

1. Unless you have amazing self-discipline, watch out for that social media addiction.
2. Zap incoming notifications into the trash can instead of becoming a slave to them.
3. Up till the advent of the smart phone, it took a lot more clicks and infrastructure to check emails and surf the net; are you writing as much as you aimed to?
4. Not active but passive consumption is king with smart phones. Reading is active. Watching videos is passive.
5. Zoning out is good if it leads to reflection. At what moments in the day did you used to take time for reflection? Are you getting out your phone and checking stuff during those moments now?
6. Are you constantly switching from one thing to another rather than focusing for a period of time on one thing on your smart phone? It’s the antithesis of what we do when we read a story.
7. Might people accustomed to smart phone entertainment have less patience for long strings of words that make up a story?
8. Are we losing the gift of gab? Sometimes people are glued to their smart phone when they could be talking together. How is real-life dialogue changing?
9. Now smart phones have invaded the bedroom and the dinner table, the grocery line and the office chat around the coffee machine. These are places where we used to tell each other stories. Is the story becoming irrelevant?
10. Did you notice how smart phones bring Google ever closer, meaning we don’t have to remember stuff because we can always look it up? We have access to more memory, but our own collective memory is turning to mush.

“I fear the day when technology takes over our humanity. The world will then be a generation of idiots.” – Albert Einstein

Rant over. Let’s hear your thoughts — do I worry too much?

This post originally appeared in Fred's blog, My Two Cents.

Frederick Lee Brooke is the author of the widely-acclaimed Annie Ogden mystery series, which includes Doing Max Vinyl, Zombie Candy and Collateral Damage. A consummate jetsetter, he was born and raised in Chicago and has lived in Illinois, Massachusetts, Montana, France, and Germany. He has called Switzerland his home for the past two decades, and travels widely throughout Europe (at latest count, he has visited Italy over 50 times!). Brooke’s love of the written and spoken word is vast—not only has he taught English in various European schools, he also knows French, German, and Italian, and dabbles in Turkish in his spare time. This love of language led him to quit his day job two years ago and focus on his original dream: writing fiction. When not writing books, his three kids (and their homework) keep him busy. He is currently working on a new series of thrillers and, once that’s done, he might take some time to visit one of those Swiss chocolate factories (but only for the free samples). He can often be found chopping vegetables in the kitchen, and makes a mean lasagna. 

Homeswapping is like Dating

Having been an old hand on dating sites (in a former life), my experience with a home swapping site took me right back.

As new hopefuls on a home exchange website, my hubby and I enthusiastically put up photos of our house, plus a catchy description together with details about us. We felt like kids in the candy-store: all these great places and houses all around the world up for grabs at the click of a mouse.

We approached desirable potential partners, sometimes we got replies, and sometimes not: “sorry but...or you're too late”. Then we thought we had found the right fit and we started to communicate by email with the prospective swappers.  At the same time we asked a couple of questions about what they were offering on their part. After a bit of research, at last we were ready to commit: “Let’s do it” only to get blown off: We've found somebody else.

It reminds me of Internet dating. After crafting a compelling personal profile, you click though gazillions of pictures and prospects; you wait for responses or actively approach potential partners. You communicate, sometimes slowly; sometimes unexpectedly excited, making quick progress in getting to know the other side. Then boom—you’re blown off and don’t know what hits you. They disappear from the radar or have the courtesy of informing you that they have met somebody else while you were getting your hopes up. Happens all the time. It’s called double timing.

We lost out while trying to cover our backs and avoid being disappointed if things turned out to be different to what they were portrayed to be. 
We are still "virgins" on the home swapping front so to speak, but we learned our lesson: Apparently one has to jump "into bed" here even more quickly than on dating sites.

The above was posted last year when we embarked on this new adventure of "Home Swapping". Our second season was about to start when we were approached two weeks ago by a couple in  Germany in a tempting location we'd like to visit. When we didn't hear from them for about ten days, it was clear to me that something was afoot. As a repeat "dater" we learn more quickly. It was a case of double timing indeed, and we're back to the drawing-board. 

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Siggy Buckley