::Leading With A Limp::

A Question for iPod Users

I ask this question to all of my iPod using friends, and I ask it with great sincerity, please humor me and let me know...

Are you being stubborn, or are you just really bad at math?

Let me tell you why I'm asking this.  I use a Zune form music and video habit, and I do mean "habit".  I download approximately 30 albums a month,and many more videos than that.  I love music, I love it when I'm driving, when I'm walking, when I'm at the gym.  I wish I could sing worth a lick, but I can't.  I still love music.

The radio is pretty much dead to me, I want to listen to what I like, when I want to.  So do you, that is why you have an iPod.  But...is there a point where you are just being stubborn because the Zune isn't "cool'?  My house has three Zunes, used by various members of my family.  We use Zune Marketplace (the software equvilient to iTunes) to download our music and video.  The terms of service state that up to three devices can download music on one account.  One account costs $15/month and I get unlimited download.  Yes, they are DRM protected and if I quit paying my $15/month they all go away, BUT...why would I stop paying?  It's only $15 per month.  So let me do the math for you.

Last month, between the three Zunes, we downloaded right around 600 different songs.  Totally legal, totally legit.  Total cost to me?  $15.  If I were to do that with iTunes it would cost me $594.  Even if I have a slow month and only download 100 measly songs, it costs me $15 and it would cost an iTunes user $99.  Let's take the high and low of these two extremes and compare them.

iTunes user (low downloads) $1,188 per year
Zune user (low downloads) $180 per year

iTunes user (high downloads) $7,128 per year
Zune user (high downloads) $180 per year

There is some content in Zune Marketplace that you can pay extra for, like the videos, and I have done that a bit.  Apple may get into this type of market, but for right now it's just a rumor.  If they do, this conversation is moot.  But if they don't, let me repeat the question

Are you just being stubborn, or are you really bad at math?

New Media Primer: Twitter

Now we're getting into some pretty good stuff.  If a blog is like a roundtable discussion and Facebook is like a scrapbooking party, then Twitter is a cocktail party for text messaging!  Twitter is by far my favorite social networking tool right now for several reasons that I will get into.  I love the premise that conversations can be had with my friends, but they are limited in their size.  Do you know anybody that takes 4 minutes to ask a really simple question that can be summarized in 10 seconds?  I do.  Twitter is the nemesis of these people because you cannot exceed the 140 character character limit.  I love it!  That's even shorter than the standard 160 characters for text messaging!  Before we look at the nuances of Twitter, let's get you signed up.

Step 1: Create an Account

Go to www.twitter.com and click the green box near the bottom of the screen in the center that says "Get Started-Join".  You will be asked for some basic information, like your username, password, email address and verification of a captcha.  This is the trickiest captcha I've ever seen, it took me a handful of tries before I got it right.  Grrrrr.  Regarding your username, some people (like myself) just use a real name.  My username is 'mattsingley'.  Some people get cute with their usernames and go for anagrams and other odd usernames.  Just use whatever you are comfortable with.

Step 2: Personalize Your Account

Once you are set up, go to the "Settings" tab, located at the top of your screen. This will open a window that will contain several tabs.  We'll go through each one quickly, with notes.

ACCOUNT

• Account: Do the world a favor and make your full name your real name, and make sure you have a space between your first and last name.  If you don't do this, you are going to be hard to find via searching.
• Username: You have already set this up, it should be in place.  You can change it if you want, but don't make a habit of this.
• Email:  Already in place.  Change it now if you have an email address you would rather use than the one you signed up with.
• Time Zone: Hopefully you know where you live.
• More Info URL: Put your blog address, MySpace or other domain page here
• One Line Bio: Keep it short!  Only 160 characters.
• Location: Again, I'm hoping that you know where you are.
• Language: I'm tempted to use Japanese, but since I don't know it at all, I'll stick with English.
• Protect my Updates:  WARNING: if you choose this option you have to approve people to see your updates.  I have many friends that do this, but I prefer to remain on the public timeline.
• Make sure you Save your Preferences.  On to the next tab.

PASSWORD

• You can change your password if you want, but you just set up your account, so no need to do that now.

DEVICES

• This is very cool.  You can set up your cell phone so that you can send and receive updates to and from Twitter via text messaging.  If you don't have a good text plan with your carrier you probably shouldn't activate this option.  I have unlimited texting through Cingular, so I do most of my updates via cell phone.  I also have selected to not receive text updates between 10pm and 6am, which is a good thing I think.
• You may also set up options within Instant Messenger.  I'm personally happy with updates going to my phone and via the web only, so I have not activated this.
• Save your preferences and we'll move along.

NOTICES

• Auto Nudge:  This is annoying, don't turn it on.  If you don't realize that you haven't updated in 24 hours then you probably don't have anything good to say anyway.
• @Replies:  Semi-self explanatory.  I have only get @replies from people I am following, you can do more or less.  Twitter has a good explanation here.
• New Follower Email:  Check this
• Direct Text Emails: you get emailed when somebody sends you a direct message.  Check this too.
• Email Newsletter: If you want info from Twitter, check this.
• Save and move on.

PICTURE

• Please, please, please upload a picture so we don't all have to look at the generic brown smiley face.  It can be a picture of you, or as in my case, a picture of an object like the apple I use on my blog.

DESIGN

• This allows you to customize the look of your Twitter home page.  If you look at this page and it seems scary to you, then don't do anything to it.  However, if you want to play around with colors and pictures, go for it!  You can always choose "Use the Twitter default style" to bring you back to square one.
• That's it!  You are now personalized.

Step 3: Post updates

Twitter is very simple in that it asks just one question, "What are you doing right now?"  To answer that question, click on the "home" link at the top of the page and type something into the text box near the top.  Remember, you are limited to 140 characters, so get creative in what you have to say.  In other words, instead of saying, "Since I am an unemployed bum I think I'll stay home with Jack (my three year old) this morning and watch Playhouse Disney on TV with him until my wife gets back from the gym, at which point I will go to the gym myself" (77 characters too long),  you would say "hanging with Jack my 3yo watching playhouse disney, then off to the gym!"  Go ahead and try it, post an update.  What's funny is that most people's first update is something like, "Just trying to figure out this Twitter thing".

Step 4: Find Friends to Interact With

As of this writing I am "following" 131 people and 140 people are "followers" of mine.   Unless updates are protected (as explained above), anyone can follow you, and you can follow anyone. So how do you find them?  First, if the person that you want to follow is a blogger, they probably have a link on their blog page to their Twitter account.  Another way is to go to a person's Twitter page (here is a link to mine) and look at the people they follow.  If you see somebody you know or would be interesting to follow, click on their picture, which will take you to their home page.  If you want to follow that person, click the "Follow" button directly below their picture.  Once you see that you are following them, you can click the box again to expand it's selections.  You can now turn your Device Updates to "on" if you want their updates to go to your phone via text messaging (assuming you signed up for that earlier).  If you don't want that, leave the default "off".

Two other ways to find people on Twitter.  First, at the top of the screen is a small search box.  Just put a name in there and his "search".  You may or may not come up with results.  I find that it's actually quite useful, and I've found more people this way than I thought I would.  The other way is to click the "Find & Follow"button at the top (highlighted in yellow) where you can search based upon email address, or actually send invitation to people.  I got several people to start on Twitter by sending them an email invitation, so don't be shy about sending them out.

Step 5: Enjoy the Cocktail Party!

  Now that you are signed up and you have friends on Twitter, just have fun!  Beyond the fun side of Twitter is a very practical side as well.  There are many large companies (e.g., Jet Blue) that use Twitter to keep in touch with different departments.  For me personally, it's a lot easier to send a Twitter message out than to send several text messages or phone calls.  Of course nothing will ever replace face to face conversation, IMHO, but Twitter does a fine job of keeping me in touch with my friends.  If you run an organization, you can set up a Twitter account for that too!  Before my departure from Bel Air Pres I set up an account so we could send out quick updates about church life. Other people are creative in their use of it, like the LA Weather or even CNN.

As you become more familiar with Twitter I think you'll discover a couple of things: first, it's not just a silly little app that the "young kids" use.  It's an incredibly powerful form of communication that is used across all demographics.  Second, it's somewhat addicting.  There are scores of websites dedicated to all things Twitter, like Twitterholics.  You can go there and find all kinds of different uses for Twitter.

Whatever you use it for...enjoy!  And don't forget to add me as a friend.

New Media Primer: Facebook

**UPDATE TO THIS POST: If you want to see the amazing power of a strong social network in action, check out this group and this group on Facebook.  A young lady at our church got rushed to the hospital a couple of days ago with cranial bleeding.  These pages show how prayer and information can move around very quickly in the new media.  Please pray for Katherine and her family.**

The last couple of posts have been dedicated to starting a blog and following others that blog. We're going to move past blogging now to another platform that is even more interactive than blogging: Facebook.

Most of you have probably heard of Facebook, many of you actually use it.  So what is this medium of communication all about?  Well, if blogging is a roundtable discussion after a lecture, Facebook is like a scrapbooking party with friends and family.  With Facebook you can share pictures, videos, links to blogs and play games.  It's more interactive in the way that you can see and interact with what your friends are doing, but it's also a semi-private venture. Unlike blogging, not everybody can see your information on Facebook.  For that to happen, you must become "friends".  Here is what you need to do to get setup with Facebook.

Step 1: Create an Account

Go to www.facebook.com and set up your account.  This may take a little more time than setting up your blog because it's going to ask you for more information. You don't have to fill out everything right now, but you should put down information that will help others find you, like where you went to high school and college.  The more info you fill out, the happier your new "friends" will be.  You will notice that I keep putting "friends" in quotation marks...I'll stop doing that now, but you may find that eventually people will add you as a friend on Facebook that you do not even know!  These are usually friends of friends.

Step 2: Upload Content

Before you go public with your new profile by letting people know you have it, you need to add some content.  One of the key things is your profile picture.  It drives me crazy when somebody has an FB account but doesn't put a profile pic into it.  You can see from the screenshot of my FB page that you can have some fun with your picture...I have opted for the Matt Singley bobblehead to represent me. A striking likeness, I must say! You can also create photo and video albums for sharing these things with your friends, just look in your left navigation bar for an icon called "photos".  Once you click that you can find the area that will allow you to upload pics and videos.

Step 3: Add Friends

There are many ways to add friends to your Facebook account.  Unlike other things on the internet, nobody can see your profile unless you add them as a friend (unless they are in your network already), and you can't just add friends as you wish...you need to request them.  They will get the request and either approve or disapprove you as a friend. You can go to my profile and add me by clicking here. One way to find friends is to go to the Friend Finder page and submit their email address.  If they are on FB it will show their profile. You can also go to the general search page and search by high school or college (by year as well within these) or by company.  Just keep plugging away, you'll find your friends!

Step 4: Interact

The header (the top of the page) gives you several options.  If you click on "Facebook" in the upper left corner you will be taken to the public timeline.  This is the place where you can see what your friends are up to.  Facebook will pull events and actions from your friends and put them here for you to see.  Among other things, you will notice that your friend's birthdays are linked on the right side.  So when one of my FB friends is celebrating a birthday it's easy enough for me to go to their profile page and write on their wall.  Which brings us to interactivity with things like, "The Wall"

The Wall is a public area within each person's profile that allows you to write messages to each other.  I can go to my friends wall and write something like, "Hey, I missed you at the concert the other night, hope you are okay".  They (along with the rest of the people that are friends with my friend) can see this message.  He can then reply on my wall, or he can send me a private message.

Below each person's profile picture is an area that says "Send (your friend's name) a Message".  This is an area for private messages, they are only seen by the person you are sending them to.  This is a great feature for things that are a little more private in nature.

Step 5: Participate

Facebook has several different ways of connecting with other people in large or small groups. One way is an event page.  Events are usually one-time occurrences that you can be invited to, or if you are the one putting on the event, you can invite others. For example, my friend TJ is hosting a music gig next month, so he created this event page.  This way he can send us information, keep track of who is coming and who isn't, and market the event.  Another thing you can join is a group.  This page shows you what Bel Air Pres does for the church group.

Creating an event or a group is a great way to keep in touch and send information to many people quickly and easily.  For example, my friend Syd has set up a group to pray for a woman from our church that is really sick and in the hospital for brain surgery as I type this.  I appreciate that I can check in and get updates so easily, without expecting Syd to call everybody on the list.  In this way Facebook is making our church community feel smaller and very close to one another.

Step 6: Play

As great as Facebook is for keeping track of friends, it's also a good place to play with them!  I think the most popular application for gaming on Facebook is Scrabulous.  I know many Scrabulous addicts, they just can't seem to get enough.  You can start a Scrabulous game within your Facebook account, but I must warn you...once you start it's hard to stop. There are many other games and activites on Facebook that you can explore, but I tend not to pursue them a lot.  Can you say "productivity killer"?

That's about it!  Of course there is more to Facebook than what I have written here, but this should be enough to get you started.  Don't forget to add me as a friend! Oh, and if I'm leaving out anything that you think is worthy of mentioning, please put it in the comments section of this post so we can all see it.

The next New Media primer post that I write will be about one of my favorite social networks: Twitter!

New Media Primer: Blogging

This is the first entry into a mini-series I am writing about the New Media.  To some, the NM is a way of life, to others it's a foreign concept and to still others it's a threat to the old way of communicating ideas and actions.  No matter where you fall in this, I think this series should be of some interest to you. Today I will cover blogging, how to set one up, and what to do once it is set up.

Blogging has been around for the better part of a decade, although it's really come into maturity in the last few years.  I actually missed my billion-dollar idea about eight years ago when I coded an entire blogging platform by hand, but then never pursued the commercial application.  I thought, "sure, I like to post up my thoughts and have others comment on them, but would this idea really take root in the real world"?  We all know the answer to that question now.  So instead of owning my own country, here I sit in front of my computer in SoCal, telling others about blogging and it's benefits. :) Me? Bitter?  Nah...

The word 'blog' is a shortened version of 'web log', in other words, an online journal.  Most people have kept a journal or diary of some sort at some point in their life, so think of a blog that way.  The difference?  Anybody can read your journal, and not just read it...but leave comments about what they think!  Yes, the New Media is about radical transparency and global information collaboration.

If you are comfortable with the idea of blogging and want to get your ideas out there for the world to see, I'm going to tell you how to get started now.  BTW, as a side note, most blogging platforms can let you set your page to 'private' so that only people you allow or invite can read your blog.  You'll have to figure that part out on your own however, I'm going to tell you how to share your information with the world.

Step 1: Select a Platform

There are many, many blogging platforms (services) that you can use.  I have been using TypePad for about 2.5 years and I love it.  This is a pay service, and it allows me a tremendous amount of control over content and code.  For about $15/month I can do what I want, when I want to my blog.  This may be overkill for the beginning blogger, I'll talk about free services in a moment.  If you want to get started on TypePad, just click here and you will be taken to a page where you can start a free trial.  It should take about 10 minutes to set up, and it's very intuitive, you just follow the prompts and fill in the information that it asks for.

Another very popular platform is WordPress.  This is a free or paid service, depending on which features you want.  I don't use WordPress, but I know a lot of people that do.  A lot.

My favorite totally free service is Tumblr.  It's a very simple platform without a lot of bells and whistles.  I like that!  I like it so much, I started a mini-blog over there a while ago, intended to be my floating thoughts.  I saw a Twitter stream the other day between Kem Meyer and others that involved Tumblr as a destination for some beginning bloggers.  I totally agree.  From sign-up to first post should take you about 2 minutes...if you're slow.

Google has a great blogging service called...well, blogger.  It's free and very popular.  This is also a great option for people to use, and signing up is simple.  You never know who you'll find there, people like my wife and my son. 

Now is the most important part...select one of those platforms (and this is far from an exhaustive list, but I don't want to overwhelm you with choices) and sign up!   Then on to step 2...

Step 2: Know Your Audience

Are you writing your blog for Uncle Floyd and Aunt Mildred in Kansas so they can keep track of the kids, or are you wanting to share your business knowledge with a broader audience?  If you want people to follow you...and keep following you...then you need to know the answer to this.

A personal blog, that is, one that is familial and very personal, can be done very well.  Take a look at my friend Alli McKenney's blog.  She takes approximately 6,430 pictures of her kids every day and then puts the best of the best online for her friends and family to see.  It's very well done! That's an example of a good personal blog. Cute kids, too!

Think you know a lot about your industry?  Then write about it!  Check out VC and marketing guru Guy Kawasaki's blog.  He gets a ton of traffic through here because he is an authority on many things, and people want to know what he has to say.  Same thing with Seth Godin's blog.  He's an author and speaker, and very well respected.  He's an authority, so he writes about what he knows.  That isn't to say that you have to be super popular to have a great blog. Perhaps you like to knit.  Hey, who doesn't? Make a blog about it and share your passion and knowledge with the world.

Step 3: Write, Baby, Write!

Want a lot of readers?  Keep your posts short.  I know, I am totally violating that right now.  Call it creative license.  But do write...and write often!  I lost 500+ regular readers over the last 8 months because I haven't been blogging with frequency or passion.  If you stay regular, and if you stay passionate, you will have people find you and follow you, it's just that simple.  I think if you are putting up posts (the name for an entry on your blog) 2-3 times per week, you'll be just fine.  Of course some people have to post every 15 minutes, but that is more of a spiritual gift than anything.

Step 4: Interact

At the bottom of most posts is an area for people to comment on what you just wrote.  There is a reason that is there...people want to interact with you!  A blog is a platform for you to get your ideas out to others (like a lecture of sermon), but the big difference is that it's also a place for people to respond.  So suddenly your thoughts have moved from a lecture to a roundtable discussion!  I've found that fewer than 10% of the number of people that come by and read actually comment, so if you only get one or two people leaving their thoughts, don't be discouraged!  Make sure you talk back to them!  Leave a comment in your own comment section in reply to them!  One blogger that does this just about better than anyone is Anne Jackson.  Reading through her comments feels like eavesdropping on a fireside chat...it's very conversational, and she often replies directly to those that say things about her posts.  Very cool. 

Of course some people don't want to have comments on, and that's fine.  Seth Godin, who I mentioned earlier, doesn't allow any comments on his post.  This works well for Seth, but probably not so well for start-up bloggers.

Step 5: Share The Love!

Once you start blogging, others are going to follow you (which I will explain in detail in the next post).  You will follow others as well.  When you find some bloggers you like, share the love with your readers!  Create a blogroll.  That's an area in the sidebar where you link to other blogs.  Some people have blogrolls as extensive as a phone book, others (like myself) believe that too much information just makes people ignore it.  On my blog I have a rotating blogroll, so every time you refresh the page it's a different group of people.  Three categories (soon to be four), five people in each category per page load.  Simple is better.  If you want to know how to create a rotating blogroll, check out my post here.

If you made it this far....God bless you for your persitence!  In the next post we'll look at how to follow other people's blogs without clicking through to each page one at a time.  It's easier than it sounds, I personally follow 201 blogs and it takes very little time or effort to do so.

What Is The "New Media"?

There is a lot of talking right now about the New Media.  Most people that are talking about it really have no idea what it is, and so I want to take some time to explain it, as best as it can be explained.  The perception that this new wave of social networking is something for young kids, digerati or geeks only is wrong...this is the new media, the new economy of attention and communication, and I'm pretty sure it's here to stay.

For a better understanding of this new way of spreading information, and for the sake of brevity each day, I'm going to break this up into a few parts, explaining each area with a decent amount of depth, but not so much that it is overwhelming.  I hope that by the time this is finished you will be one of the new tweets or FB users.  You'll understand what that means soon.

Simply put, the New Media is the description given to the flow of information via internet, email and cell phones.  Most of this information is very communal in that it's not a one way conversation...it's multiple venues of conversation, coming at your from every direction.  Overwhelming?  Well, it can be, if you don't factor in one very important thing: you control the information that you want, and you block the information that you don't want.  Some people have described the New Media as "drinking from the fire hose".  Those people clearly don't understand what it means.  Using the same water example, I would say that it's more like selecting a glass and then filling it with water from the tap.  The pressure in the main system is still the same...that is, there is just as much water flowing to a fire hydrant as there is to a neighborhood, but the difference is the control valve.  Cryptic, I know.  It will start making sense soon enough.

Tomorrow I will talk about blogs, the following day we'll look at Facebook and then we'll finish it off with a discussion about the SMS cocktail party called Twitter. 

By the way, some other people that talk about the New Media frequently are good ol' Angelenos like Rhett Smith and Cynthia Ware, go check them out.

Stay tuned...

Internet Church Campus

Right now I'm checking out a live service at the LifeChurch.tv internet campus.  The technology behind this is awesome.  As Pastor Craig was praying, he asked for hands to be raised if you want to be prayed for, and a little icon popped up that would allow me to virtually raise my hand.

For those that grew up in brick and mortar churches, this may seem strange and very un-churchlike.  For the internet generation, this is probably very comfortable.  All I know is that right now, when I want to hear God's word, it's available to me with the click of a mouse.  The internet can be leveraged for bad things like pornography and fraud, but it can also be used for amazing things like sharing the gospel.

New Name, New Feel (Part 1 of 2)

Leading with a limp...

Let me explain the title.  It has to do with my philosophy of management as well as ministry, and it has a personal connection to me on a very deep level. For my RSS readers you should pop over to my blog and see the change so you know what I'm talking about.

First the management and ministry stuff.  I have interacted with leaders of all calibers, backgrounds, statures and vocations in my jobs at church as well as with my previous two companies.  There are as many leadership styles as there are leaders, and if you ask any of them the best way to manage people, they always have an opinion.  Welcome to my little corner of the internet, this is my opinion.

I believe that management, when integrated with ministry, should produce fantastic, excellent and wildly transparent leaders.  This goes against many management styles of the latter part of last century which would tell you that you must appear invincible and somewhat removed from your workers.  But of course, since you are reading a blog (something that has not even existed until very recently), you know that the world has changed since this style was born.  In a world of incredible information and reach, transparency is the new invincibility.  Gone are the days of steadfast separation from the staff and instead we live in times where  management must have a new and intimate awareness of the staff which they serve.  Yes, I said that correctly...the staff which they serve.

I believe that with the Next Generation and with the New Media comes an acute awareness between what is genuine and what stinks.  I am not in this generation, I'm afraid I'm too old now, but those that come behind me are amazing with the ability to sense genuine relationships and intentions.

Which brings us to my philosophy of management: I believe that with this acuteness comes acceptance as well.  Although many are quick to separate the wheat from the chaff, when they do determine that somebody (a person or an organization) is true to what they say, not just in word but in action, they will accept a great amount of variation from the traditional leadership role.  In other words, they will not only accept but actually expect vulnerability in their leaders.  Paradoxically, this usually creates a greater sense of loyalty and faithfulness.

That is not to say that leaders should be faulty or incompetent.  No!  Quite the opposite...leaders should be held to very high standards, and should be excellent and what they do.  It would be a big mistake to confuse vulnerability and transparency with incompetence and ineptitude.  This is where many leaders fail to make the leap, they equate sharing their struggles with their staff to weakness.

I'm proud to say that I work for a man that is not afraid to share himself with his staff or his congregation.  The result is a passion for his vision that people want to carry out, they want to be a part of it!  I believe that as we move through these days of social networking, 24/7 information and sometimes scary intrusion by the New Media, we must change the way we interact.  The rules of society and work are quickly changing, and we must be the leaders that carve the path to great things through transparency, brokenness and inspiration.

In part 2 I will discuss why "leading with a limp" means so much to me personally, and describe briefly the pain associated with this phrase.  So for those of you that like to see me in pain, come back soon. ;)

Domain Changes

It's time.  I'm going to do some other development work with www.MattSingley.com pretty soon, so it's time for me to do some spring cleaning in this little corner of the blogosphere.

Over the next couple of weeks (Easter is upon us, so no guaranteed time lines), I will change the look and feel of this blog.  I've come up with a clever name, too.  Everybody wants a clever domain name, don't they?

Are you excited?  I'm sure the blogosphere is buzzing with anticipation. LOL...see you soon.

Best of the Best: Alltop Aggregator

Guy Kawasaki has been developing a site that I am finding myself going to more and more, it's called Alltop.com.  The premise...take the feeds from the top internet syndicating sites and put them into a category all in one place.  I know, you have no idea what I'm talking about.  Let me explain.

One of the categories on Alltop is "religion" so can go to religion.alltop.com and look at the top feeds from sites all around the world.  Politics?  No problem, politics.alltop.com has everything from the Daily Kos to the Washington Post.

I just sent a note over to Guy letting him know that he accidentally left me off of the top Twitter feeds.  He has a good sense of humor, he replied right away and politely said, "I didn't forget". Ha ha! He also outed himself last year (or the year before?) on his blog as a Christian.  You gotta love that.

Go check out Alltop.com and see what you think.

Addicted to Technology

A recent report shows that people are very easily becoming addicted to technology, especially mobile technology.  Blackberry phones and other devices (I carry an HTC 8525 with Windows Mobile 6), keep people so connected, that very often that connectivity interferes with more than regular life...connectivity to their job can actually cause problems with the job itself! One researches says,

"Those who are addicted will get up in the middle of the night and pick up messages on their PDAs two or three times a night."

Wow, that's pretty bad.  I can't throw stones however, I have to fess up to constantly checking my email when it comes in.  Against the compulsory want to do so, I have forced myself to quit checking in the evenings and early morning.

You can read the entire article here.

How hooked are you?