Last week (April 28^th) I attended infosec 2010 at Earls Court. One of the talks I went to was the ‘Infosec Hall of Fame’ where Ed Gibson, along with Lord Erroll, Stephen Bonner and Eugene Kaspersky were inducted.

For those of you who have no idea who I’m talking about, Ed Gibson is the former Microsoft UK Chief Security Officer and had previously spent 20 years as a special agent in the FBI.  He’s a very well respected member of the security community and a very deserving entry to the Infosec Hall of Fame.  I wanted to be clear that this article isn’t intended to reflect negatively on Ed, but rather a specific point….

…This post contains my perpective on a topic that generated some interesting points of view at Infosec last week.  Specifically, the Hall of Fame session has a large audience Q&A component, with one of the questions leading to a discussion on smartphones and their impact on society.

I can’t recall the precise words, but the premise from Ed was that in today’s society, we’re too engaged with our smart devices and ignorant of the world immediately around us.  Stephen Bonner (Barclay’s) suggested that these people were interacting with a non geographically bound community. Stephen’s perspective is far more aligned to my own .

So why do I think that  Ed’s  wrong?

Using a smart device and engaging in the world immediately around us isn’t a mutually exclusive activity.

I’m going to use a completely non empirical example.  I use my iPhone an awful lot, however, it doesn’t prevent me from having pleasant conversations with a wide range of people. Here’s a few recent-ish examples.

a)      I’ve struck up a great rapport with a lady called Helen (Hi Helen!) who staffs the fish counter in the local supermarket.  Helen (bless her), was a major help in providing hints and tips for buying and preparing a turkey for Christmas last year. Yes, I know, a turkey isn’t strictly sea food, but the point is that through a good rapport she brightens up my trip to the supermarket.  FWIW, I found her to be a incredibly knowledgeable about all sorts of things.  I always make a point of seeing whether she’s in, regardless of whether I’m buying fish or not.

b)      I was out for a walk with my son recently; he was asleep in his pram (stroller) and I was enjoying the sun and uploading pictures of the blue sky to facebook (such was my joy). I happened across an older gentleman walking his dog. I immediately mentioned the lovely whether and ended up in a 20-30minute natter with a complete stranger.

c)       This one’s a bit strange in today’s society, but I know everyone on our small street and we all get together occasionally for drinks and/or food.  It really is a very supportive and fun street to live on.  30 years ago, this would not have been news (strange or otherwise).

d)      A year ago I was in a <insert airline> lounge at LHR and randomly got chatting to a guy at the hot food section. Turned out this guy was a poker player. He was only too happy to show me the money he’s won… Let’s just say it was a lot of money.  I had a fascinating chat with him about the amount of money you could carry on and his life as a pro poker player.

e)      I got chatting to a lady on a plane who’s packed her book in her suitcase, now safely in the hold and was missing the opportunity to read, uninterrupted for 9 hours.  I lent this lady a spare book  I had (Breaking Vegas by Ben Mezrich) , which she particularly enjoyed.  While we both read for most of the flight, we also spent time discussing other books we both might enjoy.

f)       I spent a couple of summers living in Boise, Idaho.  My excellent work colleagues aside, I had a lovely neighbor with whom I enjoyed Sunday lunches while watching NASCAR (note, I’m not really a fan of NASCAR, but I enjoyed the company). We had nothing particular in common, yet shared a number of enjoyable Sundays watching the racing.

OK, these are a small number of examples, which Ed could well argue are “corner cases”.  However, citing smart devices as the causal link to people not interacting is equally flawed.   Let take a look at some other factors.

People were “ignorant” before smart phones.  

Consider if you will….

a)  A great number of people travel increasingly large distances to work every day.  Here’s an interesting article “Workers spend nearly 22 million hours commuting every day“  .   This isn’t unique to the UK.

b) Workers leave their homes early in the morning, commute to work and travel back late in the day, often 6, 7, 8pm.  If these people cram in cooking, eating,  ironing and house maintenance, then my guess is that they only have time for sleep left. Ed cited he often worked 60 hours a week. That, for most people, doesn’t leave a whole lot of time to actively engage in the community AND the family.

c) Let’s ignore cars (often populated with just one occupant) and focus on trains and buses.

I commuted well before smart phones came out and people were equally “ignorant” back then (late 80’s).  Of course, they were not ignorant, they were in their “bubbles”, blocking out the world and so was I (blame the Sony Walkman).   Just look at the people reading books or newspapers?  Could this have more to do with the fact that for a great number of people, conversing with strangers is an incredibly stressful experience?  You (like me) might be an extrovert chatter box, but for every extrovert, there’s an introvert who simply doesn’t feel comfortable talking to strangers. Compounding this, even as an extrovert, I’m certainly not a morning person, so I’m unlikely to want a chat on the 7.15 to London.

d) People appear to be more transient, often working in a town different to that in which they grew up. People simply don’t know each other as well these days and have little time to get to know each other.

e) People could simply be having a bad day.  One of the first points I learned in Psychology (A’Level) was not to judge anyone on the first meeting and possibly other meetings. You have no idea what people are going through in their personal lives.

 

Conclusions:

#1. So, are smart phones to blame?  No.  At least in my equally non-empirical observation, the problem is much more complicated that smart phones being causal.

Take a look at the following information/links of community building, in particular the 1986 study by McMillan and Chavis.  Community is a non-trivial thing to build.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sense_of_community#Primary_theoretical_foundation:_McMillan_and_Chavis

 

#2. Rather than isolating people, I’d argue (which Stephen Bonner did much more eloquently)that Smartphones have enabled people to engage in communities despite geographical restrictions. I personally have met (in person)a large number of people through my engagement in the Twitter based Security community. I received free help on the stuff I’ve talked about here and provided free help to others… further more, I’ve had a real laugh along the way.

Facebook.  Yes I know it’s a privacy nightmare, however, it enables me to keep in contact with everyone that I’ve enjoyed meeting. I love seeing people’s updates, and sharing some online banter, support, jokes etc.   I might not have time for calling everyone, but I do have time to put a quick note on their posts or post something of my own life.  I can do this very easily whilst walking from the supermarket to the car in the car park.  My rationale for putting stuff online?  well, that’s for another blog post.

 

Recommendations.

So, what could Ed have suggested that might make a bigger impact on getting people talking? 

Well, he could be encouraging people to leave work an hour or two earlier.  He could be encouraging people to put the work laptop away at the weekend.  He could suggest we seek to work closer to home. He could suggest we all seek to work from home a few days a week. He could be encouraging us to not focus on having more and more (which often necessitates working longer hours, further away).

By perpetuating societies fixation on “work = money = happy” we’re losing sight of what’s truly important.  Senior leaders such as Ed are in a unique position to recommend (and lead by example) that most people are paid for 40 hours  of work a week and should do exactly that.  i.e. 60 hour weeks should be the exception, not the norm in society*.

Have a read of the following books. “White Collar Sweat Shop” highlight the impact of work on society and how many of us are sucked into the rat-race. “The 4-Hour Workweek” (on the other hand) provides some useful thoughts on escaping that very same rat race. The latter is worth a read even if you only want to get down to a 40 hour week.

 

 

Finally:

If you see Ed and point him to this article, I’d be delighted to post his response or correct anything I’ve misunderstood.

Ed’s a very worthy entry into the Hall of Fame, but on this point, I think he’s over simplfying a very complex problem which has been brewing for years.

PS. You should consider following @StephenBonneron Twitter. It’s great to see people in his position embracing social media in a non-stuff way.

 

* Yes, I know, some people will want to work 60, 70 + hours a week. This should be because they truly want to. They should not expect that of their employee’s unless it’s contractually obligated and understood by the employee(s).