Digital Sabbath

[Jiro]

When losing e-mail is like a snow day - CNN.com

A Gmail outage last week left millions unable to see their e-mail, bringing what Bob Greene said may have been a relief for many.
Editor's note: CNN Contributor Bob Greene is a bestselling author whose books include "Late Edition: A Love Story" and "Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen."

(CNN) -- In a long line at an airport security checkpoint, the man in front of me wearily reached into his travel cases and began to unload his electronic gear into the gray plastic bin.

He had his laptop computer, two cellphones, a Kindle reading device and some sort of digital music player, each with its own power cord. He probably didn't need to throw the cords and chargers into the bin with the other devices, but he did anyway.

So, with all the devices and cords piled on top of each other, the bin moved along the conveyor belt. The TSA agent standing watch asked the business traveler to put some of the gear in separate bins. He complied.

I said to him:

"Did you ever see 'Goldfinger'?"

"The old James Bond movie?" he said. "Sure."

"You know that scene where Q, the equipment master, outfits Bond for his upcoming secret agent assignment?"

"Yes," the guy said. "Why?"

"Who do you think carried more electronic equipment?" I said. "You, or Bond?"

He laughed, and then set off to retrieve his digital arsenal.

I thought about him last week, when millions of Gmail users found out that, without notice, they were temporarily cut off from Google's e-mail service.

Perhaps you were one of them -- one of the millions who, for part of last Tuesday (the outage was said to be for more than an hour), were unable to send or receive letters on your Gmail account.

And if you were among them, did you find yourself becoming annoyed, irritated -- maybe, against your better judgment, a little panicked -- or was there a part of you that felt oddly, secretly relieved?

Did it feel like a snow day -- like getting an unexpected vacation from constant digital dutifulness?

Google at first said the glitch affected "less than 2 percent" of the users of the service; later the company revised that estimate: "We've determined that this issue affected less than 10% of the Google Mail users who attempted to access their accounts during the affected timeframe."

Ten percent would seem to be a relatively small portion of users. But it has been reported that Gmail -- which is provided at no cost to those who use it -- is utilized by some 350 million people worldwide. So if 10 percent of them could not send or receive e-mails, that, potentially, could be as many as 35 million people.

It's at times like these that we can stop and think about how accustomed we have become to assuming we can always be reached on every one of the multiple digital pathways we choose to use. That assumption has become, if not exactly a birthright, an acquired right.

And when we are reminded that we really don't know very much at all about how all of this works, and that we can be cut off from it for reasons just as enigmatic and unexplained as are the electronic mysteries that bring it to us in the first place....

Well, once the Gmail service was up and running again last week, this is what the cartoonist Brian McFadden sent out in a Twitter message to his friends and followers:

"In hindsight, gnawing off my foot while Gmail was down might've been an overreaction."

What I often think about when stories like the Gmail outage or cellphone disruptions pop briefly into the news is the World War II guys who, for four years and more, never once heard the voices of the people they loved: their wives, their parents, their children. Four years away from their homes in the United States with only the most sporadic of overseas mail delivery, no phone calls at all, having to accept on faith that the people who meant the most to them were doing all right.

Yet somehow, in the long silence, they made it. Most of them.

There's no reason at all to mourn for the pre-digital days; they were isolating and could be awfully lonely, and the long silence is never coming back.

But today, whenever there is an unanticipated short silence -- cell service goes temporarily dead, e-mail or text messaging or social networks cease to function because of an electronic burp somewhere -- it gives us the occasion to reflect upon how quickly we have gotten used to the new way, with our messages coming in and going out continually and seamlessly, day and night. Providing us the promise of never -- allegedly -- having to feel alone.

Maybe, if you were one of the people who discovered that, however briefly, your Gmail could not come in or go out, you took the opportunity to discreetly celebrate a little bit. There was a "Do Not Disturb" sign posted on at least one door of your life, and no one could blame you for not being available.

A little silence, digital or otherwise, can at times feel like a treat.

Meanwhile, somewhere out there, the tired James Bond business traveler, and all his traveling brothers and sisters, are dumping their electronic sending-and-receiving stations into yet another security-line bin.

Silence -- even when it's welcome -- is ultimately a fickle and fleeting illusion.

are you one of those people who go :Ohno: if internet/email/cellphone goes down?

I am if I'm doing my work or research. or when I'm chilling at home but not :Ohno: ... it's more like an inconvenient because I wouldn't be able to watch netflix or read something from internet. but when I go out, I'm on digital sabbath.

I can never understand why a lot of people with smartphone feel a need to stay connected to social media when they're outside. it must be very stressful. I do have FB/twitter apps in my iPhone but I disable its notifications. My iPhone is an information tool... not an extension of my computer just so that I can stay connected anywhere, anytime. I simply do not care if somebody made a comment or posted a picture or tagged you. It can wait till I get home or when I'm bored and waiting in the line.

I find it quite annoying when friends constantly check their smartphones. is it really that important to check FB/twitter/etc every few minutes? It's impolite. I only check mine if somebody is txting me but I don't check it when I'm in conversation. When it gets annoying enough, I scold my friend and sometimes I say - "so do you want to go home or what?" They get :Oops: and admit that they just can't help it.

 

[Bottesini]

In the storms last week, we were without power for thirteen hours. I trembled with anxiety as I watched the power bars on all my communication devices diminish...

 

[Frisky Feline]

LOL im at home my pager is right next to me.

 

[KristinaB]

I admit to going slightly frantic with boredom when my internet is down, but I am getting more games on the PC to make it bearable.

 

[Jiro]

In the storms last week, we were without power for thirteen hours. I trembled with anxiety as I watched the power bars on all my communication devices diminish...

me too :Ohno:

I hope I'm in decent shape to recharge my cellphone with my makeshift bicycle power generator.

 

[Bottesini]

me too :Ohno:

I hope I'm in decent shape to recharge my cellphone with my makeshift bicycle power generator.

I am going to have to mention that to my husband!

 

[SneakerNet]

Whenever this happen, I just grab my knife, my soft wood, and my fav folding chair. I'll walk out of the house and set the chair in the middle of the lawn. Ahh..what a sight.. the beauty of landscape.. the woods.... me carving it away... turning this wood into iPhone....

 

[Bottesini]

Whenever this happen, I just grab my knife, my soft wood, and my fav folding chair. I'll walk out of the house and set the chair in the middle of the lawn. Ahh..what a sight.. the beauty of landscape.. the woods.... me carving it away... turning this wood into iPhone....

 

[Reba]

me too :Ohno:

I hope I'm in decent shape to recharge my cellphone with my makeshift bicycle power generator.

Like hamster wheel power?

I have a small solar power recharger for my electronic devices.

 

[GrayEagle]

. . .

I find it quite annoying when friends constantly check their smartphones. is it really that important to check FB/twitter/etc every few minutes? It's impolite. I only check mine if somebody is txting me but I don't check it when I'm in conversation. When it gets annoying enough, I scold my friend and sometimes I say - "so do you want to go home or what?" They get :Oops: and admit that they just can't help it.

I don't interrupt my social time w/ others to check on my phone; they're more important. I even put my phone on silent no vibrating as I don't want to be interrupted. Unless a question comes up in conversation... Like last night we were playing Scrabble, and had hard copy dictionary as well as pulling up a dictionary on our smartphones, when challenging someone's word. I have gmail as set up on my cell with the data only plan from Sprint Relay, but had no outtages last week. We've had occasional, though rare, issues with reception or Internet, either on the desktop or me on my Android, but hey, we just find other things to do, you know? Life goes on... :P

 

[Reba]

My Blackberry is always on silent running--no ringtones, no vibrate. I check it when I can.

I don't use it for FB. I check my FB rarely, usually only if someone tells me to look at something special.