Digital distractions

Imagine you are sitting in your living room, looking at your friend's new photos on Facebook. Old friends start to send instant messages, and you have your email account open on a different window. Other links are also open, where you are browsing for information. Your television is also switched on and your cell phone rings, you pick it up, and while conversing, you try to read and send a text message. Looking obliquely from the corners of your eyes at the computer screen and someone enters your room and you finish your important family talks.
You must be thinking that this is exactly what you do. It doesn't take much imagination to conjure up this scenario, because in this era of technology, all of us go through this situation. But a growing body of research suggests that people are paying a mental price for their addiction to electronic gadgets.
Today's office workers face a lot of distractions. There are some with a Facebook obsession and others who check multiple e-mail accounts throughout the day. Inside office cubicles, workers can surf the web or text without worrying about whether anyone is looking over their shoulder.
It is also common for students to browse the internet with their cell phones in classrooms and while riding CNGs three-wheelers or rickshaws.
Digital distractions are everywhere.
We have so many ways of communicating that it's nearly impossible to simply answer a call, research something online or jot down a note without transitioning to other tasks.
PC World recently published an article saying the biggest digital distracters are calls and texts from our cell phones, emails, instant messages and social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter.
The article is great because so many of us don't realise how much time we drain on these forms of remote communication. They've become so deep-seated in our day to day lives that, for some of us, it's hard to imagine what the world would be like if we didn't know whether someone has changed his/her profile picture or not, or what your cousin and friends abroad are doing.
In 2009, David McCandless, a writer, conducted a survey, The Hierarchy of Digital Distraction, to spot the attention-grabbers. The iPhone and e-mail topped the list.
The hierarchy showed the entries at the top of the pyramid wins attention over the lower levels. Landline still has a place, but it is thoroughly trumped by anything coming in on your iPhone.
Facebook makes a surprisingly low showing, occupying only the lowest two levels of the hierarchy.
At the very top of the pyramid is the ultimate arbiter of them all: significant other closing the laptop lid on your fingers. At the very bottom? Any kind of actual work.
Nevertheless, we cannot controvert the fact that rapid advances and continuous innovation in technology have made the world a smaller place. The internet has made it possible to access information and communicate free of charge with a person sitting at the other end of the world at the click of a button.
It is amazing how technology has slowly entered our lives and become a part of our daily activities, even without our conscious knowledge.
When using technology, we should keep in mind the best and worthy use of it. Our goal is a harmonious balance between our daily productive lives and feeling like we are still clued in on the world around us being completely digitised.
Let us see whether the points below can help us come up with ways to take away the distraction part from the equation.
Schedule your surfing -- Give yourself a block of time to catch up on all your Facebook contacts, personal email, and news feeds.
Create a schedule that allows you to check in with your inbox, friend's list and social networking friends on a reasonable basis.
Limit yourself to one email account, Facebook page and instant message screen name.
If you are constantly refreshing a favourite site or pressing send/receive on your mail client, then you are not actively engaged -- you are probably avoiding your long-term priorities, which show you are wasting time and energy.
While you are trying to read something online, do not log on to social networking sites. Stick to that very topic, do not open more than four or six links on different topics or else, you will end up remembering nothing.
Settle on a schedule that works for you. We all have different priorities, commitments and levels of activity. Determine how much time you can comfortably spend “plugged in” to these digital distractions and work from there.
If possible, make more time for people, not people's emails, status updates or instant messages. When we engage with people face-to-face, we're able to dive a lot deeper into conversation, resulting in a pleasant experience for both parties.
Limit the number of times you check your phone while you are really working on something online.
A break from work should be a restorative action, chatting with a friend online about your project isn't a break. It's a distraction.
Distractions exist because we allow it. It's human nature to wonder what we're missing and we want to be the first to receive an update from a loved one or a piece of gossip from a well-placed source. E-mails, text messaging, push updates, and chat sessions may make us more productive than we've ever been -- in fact, they may be vital in helping us do our jobs, but for many, it may reduce the ability to focus on a single task for more than a few minutes at a time. Rather than multitasking, we are being distracted.

Information centres at UPs by Dec next

The government is set to launch service and information centres in all union Parishads by December next aiming to materialise its vision for digital Bangladesh.
It will also start introducing Bangla 'unicode' in all ministries and conduct a digital innovative fair by December.
The Prime Minister's Office (PMO) in a review meeting of 'digital Bangladesh initiatives' taken the decisions.
Access to information, a UNDP funded project under PMO, arranged the review meeting Saturday.
Secretaries of all ministries and key persons of e-governance attended the meeting in PMO.
The meeting has decided to facilitate all government offices in Upzila through installation of computer and internet for ensuring e-service, a press release said.
A total of 30 quick-win strategies set in the meeting to make digital services of different ministries and departments available at doorstep of people.
The meeting has urged the ministries to present the outcome of those quick win strategies at the digital innovative fair.
Experts at the meeting also discussed implementation of cyber security and ICT policy-2009.
HT Imam, adviser to the PM on establishment and administrative affairs, urged the secretaries to ensure cheap and fast service by adopting the digital technology.

Young Cyber generation needs assistance for building Sonar Bangla: Yeafez

State Minister for Science and ICT Ministry Architect Yeafez Osman has said the present younger generation is a cyber one and needs only patronization for realizing the dream of building a Sonar Bangla.
The heroic Bangalee nation achieved its independence at the call of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and will definitely build a digital Bangladesh soon as envisioned by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, he said.
He was launching the first ever `Chakrail Digital Village' in the district of Naogaon under Badalgachi upazila at a gorgeous ceremony arranged last night on Chakrail Government Primary School ground as the chief guest.
Chaired by deputy commissioner of Naogaon Dr Nazmunara Khanum, the occasion was addressed by director of Agriculture Information Service of the DAE Dr Nazrul Islam, director of RDA Abdul Matin, executive director of BMDA Abdul Mannan, Police Super Mofazzel Hossain addressed as the special guests.
Member of the Parliament (MP) from Naogaon-3 (Mohadebpur-Badalgachi) constituency Dr Akram Hossain Chowdhury delivered the welcome speech and moderated the ceremony that was followed by traditional `Gambhira' cultural function till midnight last night.
After launching the digital village, the State Minister said the present government led by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has been working hard for ensuring all rights of the people through providing information using the latest digital technologies.
He told the huge audience, including a large number of farmers, students, women and common people from walks in the society, that the people will now get all their respective necessary information for quicker developments of the village.
At the call of Bangabandhu, the common people and farmers took arms in their hands for achieving the independence in 1971 and now, they will take computers, laptops, and other digital devices to change their fates and building a developed Sonar Bangla.
The grassroots people will now get online services and facilities like different government forms and information about agriculture, healthcare, education, admission, legal aid, human rights and employment for their development, he said.
The people of digital Chakrail village now also have facilities like composing, printing, photo, scanning, email and internet browsing, and sending e-mail to Prime Minister and even to talk to her.
The government has been working sincerely so that the people from all strata could soon attain all set goals and indexes in making Digital Bangladesh, Charter of Changes, Vision-2021 and MDG programmes successful throughout the country, he said.
The state minister urged all concerned including senior citizens of the locality to prevent corruption and drug addiction with a view to bringing up their children with stronger moralities for quickening the process of building a digital Bangladesh.
"We now hope to get huge successes in agriculture, health, family planning, public services, socio-culture, law and order, producing skilled human resources and preventing corruption, eve-teasing, drugs, dowry, etc," said Yeafez Osman.

Bangladesh-Morocco sign agreement on science, technology cooperation

Bangladesh and Morocco today signed an agreement to extend cooperation between the two countries in the science and technology sectors.
Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco to Bangladesh Mohammed Houroro and secretary to the Ministry of Science and Information and Communication Technology Md Abdur Rob Howlader signed the agreement on behalf of their respective sides.
Acting Foreign Secretary Mostafa Kamal and other high officials of the government were present in the agreement signing ceremony at the state guesthouse Padma here.
The agreement will be in force for a period of five years and could be renewed and scrapped with a six-month prior notice from anyone of the signatories.
The accord will further strengthen friendly relations between Dhaka and Rabat side by side with promoting cooperation in the fields of science and technology for the mutual benefits of the two countries.
Under provisions of the agreement, both the countries will exchange scientists, researchers, technical persons and ICT experts and jointly organize scientific and technological seminars, symposium, workshops, conferences and exhibitions.
The two countries will share their latest innovation in the fields of science and technology under the accord.

Law needs to be upgraded to combat cyber crimes

The Information and Communications Technology Act 2006, without being amended, cannot help the lawmen to fight against cyber crimes, which are in early stages in Bangladesh, lawmen and legal experts think.
No special tribunal, as envisaged in the law because of the technical features of such crimes, has also been set up to try such offences, said a legal expert.
The lawmen, meanwhile, think they are not trained enough and do not have enough logistics and manpower to combat such crimes while the people who are harassed are not willing to file cases as they might face further harassment during trial.
After the enactment of the law, a cyber crimes unit was formed under the Criminal Investigation Department in December 2008. Rapid Action Battalion intelligence and communications division also work with the unit in fight against cyber crimes.
Illegal intervention in any computer system, hacking, screening face, vulgar and libellous information in electronic forms, fake representation and hiding information and issuing false digital signature certificates are among the matters considered crimes in the act.
CID special superintendent SM Ruhul Amin, who now heads the organised crime department which runs the cyber crimes unit, told New Age late June that Clause 76 of the act says, ‘Offences under the act will be non-cognizable.’ He said law enforcers could not take steps against such offences because of the clause.
‘For crimes such as online dissemination of pornographic contents or online sexual harassment, some offences under the act should be made cognizable,’ he said.
The Criminal Investigation Department at a conference of the police in May 2010 gave a brief presentation on the elimination of drawbacks in the act in fighting cyber crimes. High officials who attended the conference agreed on the issues, but nothing has happened since then, the said.
Legal expert Tanjib Ul Alam, who was involved with the preparation of the draft of the act, late June told New Age, ‘We tried to make offences under the act cognizable but the government refused to do so for shortage of experts.’
He also said the act provisioned for the establishment of a special tribunal to try cyber crimes because of the special nature of the crimes. But no such tribunal has as yet been set up, he said.
Detective Brach assistant commissioner HM Abdur Rakib said in the middle of June, ‘Sometimes we need to use both the ICT Act and the Repression on Women and Children (Prevention) Act in procedures against crimes.’ He said the law had some grey areas which needed to be clarified.
The battalion’s intelligence wing director, Ziaul Ahsan, in the third week of June told New Age that the ICT Act should be amended to cover some more crimes such as piracy of discs having contents in digital form.
The Bangladesh Computer Samity president, Mustafa Jabbar, said financial cyber crimes were still rare in the country but harassment of people using online means were taking place frequently.
Lack of skilled and sufficient manpower with technical knowledge and logistic supports are also major problems in curbing cyber crimes.
Ruhul Amin said the eight-member cyber crimes unit has only one assistant superintendent of police and one inspector.
The unit has computers given by the Detective Branch and the people are being trained, according to the Detective Branch assistant commissioner Abdur Rakib. He said the police had no experts in online matters.
Ruhul Amin said there were no scopes for people to lodge complaints in the cases of such offences over telephone, by e-mail or logging onto some web site.
‘According to the ICT Act, there is no direction for any helpline in the cyber crime units. So we cannot work outside the law’, he said.
A female officer of a bank, who was harassed online on Facebook, said, ‘There is no online complaints system in place.’
Ziaul Ahsan of the battalion, which also does not have any helpline for such cases because of inadequate manpower and logistics supports, said,
‘We encourage people to make calls to our main office for any kind of help, including online sexual harassment.’
When the acting information and communication technology secretary Mohammad Abdur Rab Hawlader was asked about the effectiveness of the law in curbing cyber crimes, he declined comments.
An official of the ministry later said the ministry was yet to receive any communications from any of the law enforcement agencies regarding the problems faced in the enforcement of the act.