Peter McFeely

I recently spent a few weeks travelling around New Zealand, a country apparently entirely devoid of wi-fi or non-coin-operated internet kiosks. Yet I survived. I still knew what was happening in the world. My clients didn’t resign. My bank account didn’t automatically close. I wasn’t the victim of a mass unfriending on Facebook or Twitter (at least not to my knowledge). It made me think – do I really need perpetual online connection?

A little disclaimer before I get started – obviously, click-bait titles aside, the internet is very important. It has changed the way we do business and the way we learn. It has opened up new resources, increased the speed and efficiency of communication and streamlined many processes. The internet is a good thing. Without it the world would regress. But, outside of work and school, it has also made massive changes to the way we conduct our personal lives. From the way we get information, to the way we interact with other people, right through to how we choose to spend our spare time, the internet has transformed society. Going cold turkey for two weeks highlighted what I would call ‘online overdependence’.

In the few weeks I was offline I was still up-to-speed with the latest news. In fact, I probably knew more about more things than when I’m plugged-in. I didn’t watch much TV, but when I did, I didn’t just watch mindless entertainment programmes and sport. I watched the news and current affairs programmes. I even read newspapers, some from cover to cover. I watched and read reports from all the sections, not just those on the front page of a website or in the most read and most shared sections. Yes, Twitter gives me bite-sized information on a wide array of topics but its usually running in the background while I do something else. Reading a newspaper needs your devoted attention.

To get in touch with friends and family I used a telephone. In truth, I didn’t even use it that much – I sent a few messages to my parents back in Northern Ireland but when connecting with friends in New Zealand it was generally getting in touch before meeting up. We arranged a meeting point and met there, without constant communication. Old school. I focused my attention on the people I was with and didn’t need to check-in anywhere to enjoy myself. Without the distraction of logging-on or checking updates, we all had a lot more conversation and enjoyed the moment without pausing to post a picture which somebody on the other side of the world, who doesn’t care, won’t look at.

I didn’t even think about work. As I mentioned above, New Zealand doesn’t really do wi-fi. Especially as I was in some very remote places. As such, New Zealand didn’t really even do phone networks. It drives me mad when colleagues and clients send emails when they’re supposed to be on leave. The only thing that annoys me more is when they send me emails when I’m on leave, expecting a reply. Thanks to the lack of connectivity there was simply no way for us to get in touch with each other. I rediscovered my love of the great outdoors (the fact it wasn’t 30-odd degrees or 90% humidity helped matters along nicely) and spent most of my spare time outside, being active and enjoying myself. No checking of emails late at night. No persistent Facebooking. No casual internet browsing. Just pure unadulterated offline fun.

I don’t think it was a coincidence that being entirely offline coincided with one of my best ever holidays. I have become over-dependent on the internet. Not having it meant that I only did things in which I had a genuine interest and only spoke to people with whom I actually wanted to talk. No killing time from site to site or bumbling along different social profiles. It was great.

So does that mean that, socially, the internet isn’t important? Of course not. I’m not going to close any of my social profiles as a result of my trip (even if it weren’t part of my job to have them I wouldn’t shut them down). They still let me stay in touch with friends around the world and get information from sources to which I wouldn’t otherwise have access. I also don’t think my employment would last too long if I permanently refused to answer emails from clients or colleagues.

More to the point, without the internet, I couldn’t have had the holiday I enjoyed. From researching, to reading countless reviews of accomodation and activites, to making reservations and completing bookings, the internet was integral to the planning. We had printed driving directions and maps for every leg of the journey. We had an iPad loaded with an interactive map of New Zealand’s major cities, as well as downloaded  TV shows and movies – a godsend on a long-haul budget flight lacking personal entertainment.

So I’m not going offline permanently. But I am going to be trying to reduce my dependence on the internet. I won’t be reaching for my smartphone every 15 minutes (starting to wear a watch again has already helped that!) and I’ll be proactively managing my social media engagement to ensure I never become one of those people who tweets photos of their takeaway coffee. In short I won’t be letting the internet dictate everything I do.

The internet is incredibly important – but I’m beginning to think it’s not really that important.