Experiment Cuts Off Online Junkies from Internet

Ant (an Internet junkie) writes "An article from The Register reports one begins gibbering uncontrollably because he/she can't get a fix without internet access after two weeks. That, at least, is according to an 'Internet Deprivation Study' carried out by Yahoo! and advertising outfit OMD. Participants in the human experiment were deprived of the web for 14 days, and found themselves quickly succumbing to 'withdrawal and feelings of loss, frustration and disconnectedness.' The reason for the rapid collapse of their universe is - say the researchers - because 'internet users feel confident, secure and empowered.'"

What I miss

[Anonymous Coward]

I miss most of all google and imdb when I'm disconnected. The daily blogs, where I spend most of my time on the net, not so much.

It all depends on where you are...

[vilain]

I was in a class for 12 days in Hawaii and didn't miss my net access at all. If I hadn't been with the instructor who wanted to check her email during a day off at a nearby Internet cafe, I wouldn't have bothered. All I had was 132 spam messages anyway.

Now, taking away my books for two weeks would be another matter...

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

When I'm online...

[slumpy]

I feel confident, secured, and empowered.....if only this translated to real life.

Interesting

[I7D]

I can relate. Freshman year of college (4 yrs ago) I could't have the internet for historical preservation reasons. I'd been addicted to it before I had to lose it, so it sucked at first. I got better grades, got more work done, made a bunch of friends, went out..., but when I got the net back, even though i was sort of better off without it, mentally I was like "ahhhhhh, i'm connected again"

Re:If only I could.

[DMUTPeregrine]

Vacations are great. Go into an area without net, get away from everything. Hike. Canoe. Whatever. I'm a net junkie, but a break is still a good thing.

Re:Strange

[linzeal]

I would rather mine said mountain from a remote location like coastal oregon in a reclaimed victorian hotel turned into office space, but to each his own. I get enough exercise walking to and from the bus station when I am commuting. 2 miles a day is enough, right?

Re:If only I could.

[NanoGator]

"Honestly, I would give anything to get away from the Internet for two weeks. A disconnection, though probably disorienting for a couple days, would be so pleasant.

Unfortunately, since all my work (read: paychecks) come from the computer, I can't do that."

It kind of bugs me that the term junkie has reared it's ugly head. I think about my own reasons for using the net a lot, and it occurs to me that there really isn't anything 'bad' about it. I participate on a 3D art community. Staying in tune with that has been quite beneficial to my career, plus I've made good friends out of it. If I had missed those key moments, I wouldn't have what I value today.

It's a little different, like in your case, where the internet creates work for you. When I had a tech support job, I wanted weeks away from a phone and email. Why? Because when that stuff arrived, it was more unpleasantness. But what about when it's all good? What if my phone rang with freelance job offers?

I think about others out there as well. Some people are looking for love. Some people are looking for information about their particular interests. All good things.

Eh. I guess I'm only responding because of what Slashdot's summary of the article said. Yeah I wanna be on the net constantly, but gimme a break, if I hadn't done that I wouldn't be at the job I love right now.

Re:Strange

[mirko]

I personally ride my bike to work : 20km per day + fitness.
Your brain needs oxygen to work a more efficient way.
Your bloodstream carries oxygen to your brain.
Your heart manage your bloodstream.
Sport improve your heart pumping.
Do the math.

(BTW, exercising everyday turned me in some endorphin junkie but it still costs me less than when I was still smoking)

Re:So...

[Thiarna]

Didn't you see big brother UK? Ok so it was only one week, there were two in the room, and they were both prone to gibbering beforehand but they were much worse at the end.

Re:So...

[Viol8]

Not sure if you're trying to make a wry comparison , but going without internet access hardly constitutes going without human contact. In fact in a lot of circumstances it leads to it! When I say human contact I mean face to face , trying stuff into an IM or email client IMO is not human contact. Anyway , I suspect if these people weren't addicted to the internet they'd be addicted to something else whether it be drink, drugs, adrenaline sports , whatever...

Re:So...

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. I wouldn't know what to do if I didn't have net access, because almost all my friends are online, for most of them I don't even know their phone number. It's not the lack of the net connection itself, but the fact that I would be very alone without it. "Go outside" you'd probably say, and I already do that. But after a while, doing stuff outside all by myself gets boring, and I want to do something with my friends.

Indeed, cutting off the net connection would be like cutting off a "normal" person from talking in person to the people he knows.

Quite the same here

[Jesrad]

During the summer I generally go spend some time (up to two months, generally three weeks) away from cities and all internet accesses. The only thing I miss then, is the quick and convenient access to detailed information about any subject, so instead I go to the closest public library.

The daily comics, blogs, news, discussion forums, I don't miss at all, even though I tend to spend hours on them.

Re:It all depends on where you are...

[JiffyJeff]

Funny that you mention Hawaii and not having net access...

As a software engineer in Maui, I find that Internet access is easier to get here than just about anywhere else on earth (except maybe San Fran). Sure we have some "dead" areas, but if you were taking a class then I'm pretty sure you were in an area with at least a few sources of broadband connectivity.

Hawaii is a hub to several trans-pacific fiber-optic connections. If you call Australia from California, you're probably talking through us.

I did my own experiment

[Anonymous Coward]

Last summer, my Linux firewall got 0wn3d when I neglected to update my WuFTP daemon. As a result, I had to bypass my firewall box and plug my main machine directly to the 'net. Well, I was too lazy to fix the Linux box, and lo and behold after a couple days my Windows box was 0wn3d too, this time with a spam trojan. Shaw Cable disconnected my modem due to the spam, and I was left trying to figure out a way to get updated virus tables on my box with nothing that would reasonably connect to the internet.

During that week, I was without the internet that occupied me some 12 hours a day. I didn't become incoherent, or babble, or anything. I became productive. I made myself breakfast every morning. I cleaned my apartment for the first time in a year. I even organized my tape collection, went through my old papers, and finished a model starship that had spent 7 years in drydock.

So it isn't as serious as this study leads it to believe. Likely they didn't get people who had internet COMPULSIONS (they aren't addictions, which require actual physical or chemical dependence) like myself, but rather people with out-and-out internet PATHOLOGIES. There's a world of difference between something you like so much you don't usually give it up (X-box, internet, TV, sex, rebuilding an engine) and something that you irrationally can't live without.

diversify your income

[KalvinB]

I run a very reliable (see netcraft result) [netcraft.com] web-server that I can and do happily ignore for long stretches of time.

While I'm stuck working part time as a programmer to pay the bills (a nice gig that allows me to make my own hours while I'm going to school), I've got a web-site that is beginning to show promise as a way to get a decent amount of residual income. The sections that bring in the most revenue are the sections I havn't touched in months. So it's not something I must do constantly.

I'm also making money on the stock market. I'm not getting rich yet, I'm young enough to do proof of concept and risk hundreds of dollars to learn. Once I get financially situated in a real job then I can drop more money on the market to try to increase that income stream.

And when I get out of school, I'll be a high school math teacher making me as free from computers as I want to be. It'll be a hobby and a teaching tool (math demonstration scripts, class sessions in MP3 format, notes, homework assignments, etc) but not a necessity. It's the not being a necessity part that keeps programming interesting.

The trick is to either maximize residual income (so you can work less at a real job) or focus on shifting careers to something that doesn't require a computer constantly.

It's just a matter of figuring out where you want to be and figuring out how to get there.

I don't want to spend my life in front of a computer so I'm not going to.

Ben

Depending on activity

[Random Web Developer]

The withdrawal symptoms from being disconnected depend a lot on what else you can do at the time.

If i leave on a holiday for 2 weeks I always leave my laptop at home, and i never miss it because i am in a totally different environment.

If I get disconnected on a rainy sunday on the other hand i'll be running around the house not knowing what to do

very unscientific

[Anonymous Coward]

This study didn't take into account all the possible factors that might be affecting their numbers. They blame the internet itself when the underlying cause might merely be something the internet provided them an abundance of.

For example, deprevation of pornography, I'm not trying to be funny here. The lack of this by itself could be contributing to some of the psychological distress these participants felt.

Lack of the extensive socialization the internet can provide. Some people are more social online than they would otherwise be in real life. And, if you consider the sheer numbers of people you might converse with online, the internet can be said to provide a far more diversified and abundant social experience. Forums, newsgroups, IRC, chatrooms, blogs, instant messenging, etc.

Much needed play time, which participants might not be experienced (due to a lack of attempting to find other things to do) in finding elsewhere.

And, computers in general can provide the instant gratification that human beings seek in their environment.

We can count out the last two because they were allowed to continue computer use without internet access.

There may even be physiological variables at work here. Such as what sort of monitors they were using, LCD or CRT? If they were using one or the other that might affect the results. Other possibilies are similar addictions that have been observed with television, how are these related?

At any rate, my point is that this study is far from conclusive about the effects of internet deprevation. Take it with a grain of salt. There are many factors here that weren't even considered. And, there is a lack of a control and experimental group. This study is simply not scientific. They seem to be treating it like a poll instead of a scientific study, but then they try to present the results as scientific evidence. It is foolish, don't buy in just yet.

That isn't to say the observations aren't material, but their methods and resulting assumptions are suspect. Was there even a hypothesis formulated? Where are the statistics?

Cheers.

Re:Pff.. They're talking about 14 days?

[Hank Chinaski]

i go sailing for one week each year, without internet or cell phones. even without radio or tv. very nice, i can live with that.

flabular girlie men and sissy girls

[dotmax]

Yet more support for the idea that geeks should be treated as poorly as possible, as often as possible.

Frankly, there ought to be a test before you're allowed online. Y'know, ride a bike 100 miles, juggle, kiss a member of the appropriate gender, do somethig like they do on This Old House, demonstrate the ability to speak extemporaneously in front of 1000 people, 5 and one, for periods > an hour, and sit quietly in a room for a week all alone.

Compared to the people in the study, Comic Book Guy is a regular reniassance man.
. .max
where's my cattle prod?

Re:Pff.. They're talking about 14 days?

[shufler]

I experienced this exact phenominon during a month's vacation I took to British Columbia. I would be up at dawn every day, feeling refreshed, and ready to experience the playground that is the world. I had some of the most restless and relaxing sleeps ever.

After a while, I did have access to the Internet, but only checked it due to it being the only method of communication with respect to a party in a forest one night.

I never felt the need to use the computer, and I never felt like I was alone, or out of the loop (in fact, I felt I was IN the loop, as most of my friends were not there experiencing the greatness I was).

That said, I returned and fell right back into my self-appointed claim for the title of King of the Internet(TM).

Haven't we all been there?

[mrph]

Not that I think I would react in such an extreme way, but of course I recognize the feeling of being "detached" every time my DSL goes down.
Even when there isn't any real activity, I feel strange when I can't see what is (or isnt) said on IRC, how many spam e-mails I have or haven't received, what news have or
haven't shown up twice on slashdot and so on.

The connection simply needs to be there and active. My network being disconnected makes me feel disconnected too. Just knowing that it isn't connected feels like an itch,
and I have a hard time really concentrating until the connection is restored. Even if I'm not using it, or even if I'm not at home.

Re:So...

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure if you're trying to make a wry comparison , but going without internet access hardly constitutes going without human contact. In fact in a lot of circumstances it leads to it!

No Internet access means no Google though. I couldn't imagine going a single day without access to Google. It answers all my questions about anything that comes to mind during the day. This past hour I've already learned about Knute Rockne and where that "Win one for the Gipper" quote came from as well as researching Tom Landry. Did you know he coached the Dallas Cowboys from 1960 to 1988, the second longest head coach in the history of American Football?

No thank you. You guys go watch your TV and drink your beer with your alcoholic buddies, I'll be right here waiting for you to wise up.

I lost connectivity

[Anonymous Coward]

I had this forced upon me during my second year of college 2x. I was running an Asus mobo that liked to burn out after a hard reset. (I had a slight virtual memory issue casued by an infinite loop...oops ;)) The worst part was that I needed to ship it back to the place where I purchased it which ended up taking about 2 weeks.

Anyways, it did suck, not only was I deprived of entertainment, but I was also deprived of my toolbox and manuals, my information center, and my portal to network with my colleagues, etc.

I realize that most of those things have been around since before the "interweb" but come on. The connectivity we have today facilites all those things. It doesn't create it, it's only nurtured and encouraged it.

My point being, there are some people who view the internet as more than a source of pr0n and shits and giggles. Some of us actually view the internet as utilitarian.

So my question is, who were they polling? Some script kiddies or Everquest people? Or people like my mom who uses the internet to check her mail and play the occasional game of Mahjong? Or people who actually make a living off of internet and internet technologies?

Just a though...

Re:Light

[lonesome phreak]

I try to go hiking every once in awhile, and am having a harder and harder time of getting out of cell phone range...

My personal experience...

[oneiron]

When I was 17-19 or so I had a few hardware mishaps that cut off my access to the internet for a period of about a month each time... Rather than feeling withdrawals, I actually felt a feeling of relief during that time. I've come to view my computer as a life-sucking beast that I am uncontrollably drawn to. When I'm given a break from it, it makes me very happy.

Re:Pff.. They're talking about 14 days?

[Zelph]

I came to that same conclusion, and, in my senior year of my CS degree, switched majors. I graduated a History Major, and will be going to grad school soon. What prompted this change? I realizd that I have to like what I do. I love reading history. I don't like sitting on a computer looking at a screen with a bad refresh. Still, I get my Slashdot fix everyday, and keep up on the computer technology I'm interested in. Oh, and one more thing: I know what it's like to go without the internet. I started in 1990 before, BEFORE AOL and all the rest had a web portal. I went on a 2 year mission for my church. No computers, no internet. This was in 2000. I survived. And I came out a better person too.

Interesting concept but flawed...

[Apollo Jones]

Well, neat article in concept. But at risk of stating the obvious, this is not a scientific public health study. I would place this into "pulp science" or worse a marketing tactic by Yahoo and a marketing firm. While I would be willing to think that there is such an addiction as being addicted to the internet, that can be said of anything. Especially so for people with addictive personalities. I believe that there have been studies showing computer gaming is a severe form of addiction. For a parallel lets use game addiction. This form of addiction, like many, has to do with levels of your brain chemistry being stimulated by playing a video game. To over simplify, when you have a positive action in a game, your brain will release a "good feel" chemical. The better you do, the better you feel. Now, if you play occasionally not a huge issue, after all you can get this stimulation from any number of sources in daily life. However, when you begin to play a lot of games (no, I don't know the threshold for alot) you get your brain chemistry needing more of the source/trigger of the chemical. In other words you are addicted. Given this very crude description of addiction, you can see it is possible to get addicted to the internet. Though I would guess you need to work on it. You could design a study to test this. Identify a few hundred people and baseline their use of the internet and their views and any psychological or physical existing dependency on the Internet. Then, basically, if we were unethical you could subject people to hours of using the internet for a few weeks straight (insert p0rn joke here). Then strip the internet away and see what happens. Thus gathering insight into too much internet use and then removal to see if people do exhibit addictive withdrawal symptoms. IMHO, this article's value is getting us to consider the possibility of an "internet addiction," but in no way makes the case for it.

Internet is a part of life

[bahwi]

It's not really just another luxury anymore. A lot of people have the same withdrawl when fast food is taken away for two weeks(not to mention chemical withdrawl!). If telephone and IM/Email are taken away. If the stove was taken away. The internet's not new anymore. It's a means of communications, it's a mean of information retrieval. It's not just an extra for a lot of people anymore. I know a lot of people will say Internet is not Human Contact, but it isn't a computer on the other end(well, most of the time [imaginarygirlfriends.com]). It isn't this exclusive thing only a few geeks know about anymore.

It's not necessairily and addiction, although lots of people have an addiction, but it is a necessity. Ask me what movies are playing and I'm on Yahoo in about a second. If not that, then Movie Phone. I've never, in my life, used the Newspaper to look up movies. It's just a new things, and the way the tide is going.

Just like Microsoft...

[MoonRug]

Yahoo of all companies saying "See? You can't live without the internet." This is like all the Microsoft "studies" saying Windows TCO is lower than Linux.