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Young, K. (2004). Internet Addiction: A new Clinical Phenomenon and Its Consequences. American Behavioral Scientist. 48:402

a. Although this is a psychology article, it poses an important concern over the rise of internet addiction in connected populations. This article is relevant to this course, as it relates to the notion of critical consumption; some users are unable to filter information effectively, which should be recognized as a concern. Young states many statistics from educators and researchers discounting internet use in the classroom as it is far too distracting and the loss of productivity (in both students and the workforce) is immense.

Some might argue that this article shows the downside of connected learning and e-resources, however this is not the case. Certain web activities mentioned in the paper such as chat rooms, social media, and video games are not the focus of this course. Open Knowledge deals with the light side of the internet, which is the interconnectivity, the accelerated learning, and the ability to publish ones own content. The internet can definitely be misused, but not every web activity is "junk food". If someone obsessively became a mathematician and ultimately ended up being the best mathematician in the world due to "addiction" people would call him or her a genius. The trick is to filter which content and activities one engages in.

why you are addicted to devices and the internet, not the reward, but anticipation of reward--oh yeah, and designers know about your cognitive psychology and are trying to exploit it for profit! "In the 1940s, two researchers named James Olds and Peter Milner accidentally uncovered some peculiar properties of a special area of the brain. The researchers implanted electrodes in the brains of lab mice that enabled the mice to give themselves tiny electric shocks to a small area called the nucleus accumbens.

In the whole article, there's one quote from Clive Thompson got my attention, "Twitter is the place where you could be like 'here's my one thought' and then link somewhere. I no longer needed to write a one-paragraph blog post about it, and Twitter scratched that itch and gave it a larger audience than it might have had." While people addict to twitter for fun, the fact is Twitter is actually a very good platform to share and learn knowledge.

This study conducted by the International Center for Media & the Public Agenda (ICMPA), documented the experiences of 200 students at the University of Maryland as they "unplugged" from all media for 24 hours. The results were simultaneously astounding and totally predictable. Their top five findings were: 1. Students use literal terms of addiction to characterize their dependence on media. 2. Students hate going without media. In their world, going without media, means going without their friends and family. 3. Students show no significant loyalty to a news program, news personality or even news platform. Students have only a casual relationship to the originators of news, and in fact don't make fine distinctions between news and more personal information. They get news in a disaggregated way, often via friends. 4. 18-21 year old college students are constantly texting and on Facebook-with calling and email distant seconds as ways of staying in touch, especially with friends. 5. Students could live without their TVs and the newspaper, but they can't survive without their iPods.

An alternative perspective on "openness".

The argument will be with us for a very long time. I think this is based on the side of the fence that one is sitting on. It is just like a case of what came first a chicken or an egg. The fact is Open has place to occupy in our learning space. The jury is still out there.

Thanks for sharing this well presented write up. Big question put forth is are we really getting the outcomes expected from the open society. Open vs. quality is a big issue. At times restricting access helps a great deal.