The dangers of the e-mail tsunami
Shashi Tharoor has opted out, saying that the convenience of technology has become a burden
Half a century before the invention of e-mail, T. S. Eliot asked, "Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?" If he were alive today, contemplating an inbox on a flickering computer screen, he might well have added, "Where is the information that has been lost in trivia?"
It is one of the paradoxes of our times that inventions meant to make our lives easier end up slowing us down. When e-mail first entered my life, I was thrilled; instead of letters piling up for months as I struggled to find the time to reply, faxes not going through, and telegrams that cost an arm and a leg, I now had a cost-free means of communicating instantaneously and efficiently. I became an avid and diligent e-mailer.
And how I regret it.
I get over 300 e-mails a day, sometimes twice that. Some are urgent (but not necessarily important) work-related questions. Some are from friends; many are from job-seekers, favour-demanders and petitioners. Some are one-line queries; others are lengthy documents requiring perusal and comment. Many are unsolicited junk mail.
Because they are on the screen, I feel obliged to go through them all, if only to make sure I do not need to read them. And this is a chore that takes more and more of my time - up to three hours. A convenience has become a burden.
When I am at my computer, I find myself neglecting more important matters. E-mails automatically become urgent, because I know that if I do not reply to one immediately, it will soon be swamped by 200 others.
