John Freeman has written a wonderful manifesto about slow communication. He talks about the blessings of the Internet age, but then changes the perspective and reallly makes you think differently.

He starts with a quote that might has well been taken from my book (same subject / anecdote):

“My friend has just had his PC wired for broadband,” writes the poet Don Paterson. “I meet him in the café; he looks terrible—his face puffy and pale, his eyes bloodshot. . . . He tells me he is now detained, night and day, in downloading every album he ever owned, lost, desired, or was casually intrigued by; he has now stopped even listen­ing to them, and spends his time sleeplessly monitoring a progress bar.

In my book I point out that more isn’t the same as better. Just because Google has 3 billion results for your query, that doesn’t mean that you are obliged to look at all of them. Freeman poses the same question about email. Just because you can do 3 messages per minute, that doesn’t mean that you should.

It is time to launch a manifesto for a slow communication movement, a push back against the machines and the forces that encourage us to remain connected to them.

Freeman continues touching subjects of my book, stating that “The Physical World matters“. Visiting a cafe for coffee isn’t what it used to be. Instead of a pleasant place for conversation, these have turned into places where you hear the con­tinuous, insect-like patter of typing on keyboards.