CurrentMom

My Kids, Technology and Me

Fatherhood Friday

Did you see the study on kids and technology showing that children ages 8 to 18 spend, on average, 7.5 hours each day in front of electronic devices. Seven and a half hours! And that doesn't even include time on their cellphones. (By the time they're done with school and electronic time, when do they eat?) I admit, I haven't read the study, only the news coverage but, boy oh boy, that's a lot of time in front of a screen.

I like to think of myself as pro-technology, and I sincerely hope my kids have a greater understanding and incorporation of technology throughout their lives than I've managed to have. But - and this applies to my kids as well as me and my peers - that reliance on technology seems to come at the expense of lack of social skills, that maybe only manifests itself later on. 

How many of you have 20-something colleagues who email all the time but don't seem to know how to use a phone or, horror of horrors, speak to people in person. I'm not saying they can't do it in a social setting. But a buddy told me a story the other day about two people at his company who always email each other but have never spoken. Turns out at lunch the other day they were sitting next to each other - emailing each other - but had no idea who the other was! Now, that story may be apocryphal but you get the point.

Jogging Tech

Image by Lyn Millett via Flickr

Technology Thursday

We all look for motivation to exercise wherever we can find it. I wrote a long post over at my blog the other day about my recent foray into the Couch to 5K running program. There are several things I'm using to keep myself motivated, not least talking about it publicly in places like Twitter, Facebook, my own blog, and now here! But one of the things that is helping a lot is technology.

First, of course, is the music.

iPad Booga Booga

Technology Thursday

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Apple has finally announced their long-awaited and well-hyped tablet computer product. They called it the iPad. And with that, dozens upon dozens of women technologists, mom bloggers, and women Mac fans all began to wonder if there was a woman in the room when the Apple bigshots decided on that name. This is amusing on a level, of course. But it does highlight what many women technologists have to point out over and over and over -- insufficient diversity of perspective is not only bad for individuals (who are consciously or subconsciously excluded for not being or looking like the majority in a given field), but it is just plain bad for business. Moxie tweeted that at least it would give the marketing textbooks a new example of oblivious naming to use to replace the Chevy Nova ("no go"). NPR and the New York Times covered various reactions to the name. The Society for Menstrual Cycle Research weighed in as well. Many people pointed to an old Mad TV bit about "iPads" that I think has now been pulled. All of this streamed on over Twitter--increasingly my go to place to maintain some ambient awareness about what's going on in the world. And if you follow my own Twitter stream you already know my 140-character length reactions to the iPad. But here a few more thoughts.

Setting aside the unfortunate name, the new Apple iPad has potential. However as with just about every Apple project, you pretty much know that unless you're obsessed, you probably don't want to buy the first generation.

Good Reads and Helpful Resources

Technology Thursday

In the absence of inspiration for a particular topic for this week's Technology Thursday post, I thought I'd share a few websites that I've found to be useful resources. If there's a common theme for these sites it's that they reside in the same cluster in my (woefully under-organized) RSS reader and that I visit them only semi-regularly. But I always end up looking at them again for one reason or another.

Here we go:

Google's Had Enough of China?

Image via Wikipedia

Technology Thursday

First, my heart goes out to the people of Haiti. The devastation (please note: some of the photos here are quite distressing) there is just heart-wrenching. Everything I've heard so far says that the most helpful thing people can do (unless you're a disaster recovery specialist who can help in-country somehow with relief efforts) is to donate cash. Be smart, don't get scammed, but consider even a small donation. After the big tsunami a few years back I began contributing to Oxfam and the Haiti devastation reminded me to double-check that I renewed my contribution for this year. But there are plenty of other legitimate relief agencies who need support, as well. Google's compiled a list of links and the White House is recommending donations to the Red Cross.

* * *

Now, on to our regularly-scheduled Technology Thursday post. Google made some geopolitical news this week when it announced, in a truly fascinating blog post, that it is going to stop censoring its results in China, knowing that may well result in them being forced to remove themselves from the Chinese market entirely.

Boxes and a Digital Wake

Image by whatnot via Flickr

Technology Thursday

For many of us, technology has become a thread woven seamlessly into virtually every aspect of our day to day lives. This week, however, I was reminded that along with helping with the mundane details of life, technology can also serve as a bridge to the profound.

Brad L. Graham passed away earlier this week. He was 41. Brad was a friend of mine. We were both early, early webloggers and at the time the community of bloggers was small enough that nearly everyone read everyone else.

Resolving to Find Time

Image via Wikipedia

Technology Thursday

2010 is fast approaching, and with it the inevitable drafting of New Year's resolutions. I suspect many of us always have an implicit resolution of finding more time - more hours in the day to get everything done. I'm constantly scanning for ways to add efficiencies to my routines and household chores wherever possible and, of course, technology is often a help in this regard. Here are a few ways technology can be used to save a few minutes here and there as we head into 2010.

First, a mundane but useful tool is auto-billpay. I resisted this for a long time because early experiences (as in, a decade ago) were pretty annoying. But things have come a long way since then, and now I'm auto-paying many more bills than I used to. At some point a few months back I just got very tired of losing significant portions of my weekend to writing checks and licking envelopes.

Online Holiday Amusements

Technology Thursday

Image by dannysullivan via Flickr

Happy Holidays!

For your amusement, here are a few fun holiday-themed technologies to play with.

First, the iPhone Mom has been curating a list of cute holiday iPhone apps. Here's her list of Christmas apps. I'm curious to see how my toddler does with the Match and Learn iPhone app (basically a version of concentration or 'the memory game') from what I can tell.

Second, if you haven't played around with Elf Yourself, it's really hard not to giggle while doing so.

Techie Holidays

Image by Lyn Millett via Flickr

Technology Thursday

I really enjoy Christmas and wish I had more time to get into the spirit of the season. If I had my druthers, I'd spend loads of time baking and decorating and going to Christmas parties and such. Instead, I end up staring at the calendar with increasing horror as the days click by and I have a pile of work that just never, ever lets up on top of regular household maintenance and am trying to sort out gifts, prepare for houseguests, and keep track of my toddler. So, as in so many other areas of life, I turn to technology to help.

Now, technology doesn't help with baking cookies or Christmas parties, but it does help simplify some tasks that I otherwise might not ever get to.

5 Secrets to Success for Work-from-Home Moms

Startup Sunday

Guest post by Bonnie Harris

Photo by cogdogblog via Flickr.

A few years ago I made the switch from hiring salaried employees to using self-employed, work-from-home moms for certain parts of my business. I affectionately call them my 'momtractors.' My company, Wax Marketing, is a marketing and PR firm so we have a lot of research work and online pitching: tasks that can be done at flexible times.  Work-from-home moms are the perfect fit for what I need.

As a creative and not always well-disciplined person, I can be a handful as a client. The most successful work-from-home moms I've encountered over the past few years understand the following secrets:

Your work product is almost always better than expected. From my perspective, moms are all perfectionists. So often, I've gotten a finished task from a mom accompanied by the comment, "This could be so much better if I'd only had more time." I'm not saying to keep a low bar in terms of your own performance. Just make sure you're measuring yourself against the rest of the folks out there, not against an impossible superwoman ideal.