Electronic mail now is available on most campuses and in most businesses across the nation. This convenience is intended to save time, money, and effort and provide easy access to our colleagues and students. If used judiciously, it may do all of these things, but if abused, it presents yet another frustrating burden. Those who have scrolled through several hundred messages via discussion groups can appreciate the diminishing returns of too much e-mail.
David W. Orr contends that we must look more closely at excessive CMC and how it alters our behavior. True, we get more communication, but how valuable is it? Orr says volume alone does not add value, in fact it subtracts value if most of it is trivial or irrelevant. It subtracts from the value of our relationships, if we substitute it for face-to-face communication that offers other intangible rewards. "Not surprisingly, more and more people feel overloaded by the demands of incessant 'communication,'" says Orr, "But to say so publicly is to run afoul of the technological fundamentalism now dominant virtually everywhere" (Speed 5).
If everyone is mutually wired via cell phones, e-mail, fax machines, telephones, we risk being overwhelmed by frantic volume that does not easily discern the important messages from the trivial. Orr says that in many cases ". . .we have mistaken volume and speed for information of substance and clarity" (Speed 5). Not every communication is worth the tax of resources and human psyche that technology levies. In addition, students who spend hours chatting or playing games on-line, may forego the art of conversation, books, or other forms of communication that allow more time for assimilation, reflection, and action. A computer "junkie" may risk losing personal contact that serves to connect people and promote caring. If the net result of elctronic communication is harried, overtaxed, uncaring people, what have we gained?