Shut Down Day Tomorrow: Are You Ready For It?
by Bonnie Alter, London 
on 03.23.07
World Shutdown Day is tomorrow—can you do it? Advertised as one of the “biggest global experiments ever to take place on the Internet”, the idea is to find out how many people can go without a computer for one whole day. What will happen if we all participate? If we really do keep off the computers for 24 hours tomorrow, all Emails will go unanswered, and blogs won’t be updated. During lunch breaks, people might talk to their co-workers or go for a walk outside, or buy a newspaper. At home, computer games will cease and instead we will have lunch together and talk about the world. And then read a book in the afternoon. But the real issue is how addicted are we all to our computers? On the Shutdown Day site at last glance, the running tally is 51,635 claiming that they CAN go without computers, whilst 8,075 have admitted they cannot. The site, in 13 different languages, charts people’s reactions from around the world on what they will do instead… National differences abound: in the UK: masturbation, playing the piano, Canada: smoke dope, hang out with my family, the U.S.: read one of those flappy things with the paper screens and from Sri Lanka: this is a disaster. Some of the YouTube responses are quite clever such as one depicting the smashing of computers. But never mind that, the question is: can treehuggers do it? :: Shut Down Day via :: PFSK
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Will treehugger be shutting down their server?
I am usually on the computer well over 10 hours a day, and for some reason the concept of being off of the computer for 24 hours sounds more like a punishment than a break. What a crazy place my head is in...
I tried to get onto the Shutdown day link and it didn't work! But it's still only 23rd March...unless it's run by Kiwis???
Well I have an assignment due on Monday, so I'll be working on that today and tomorrow and its got to be typed.
I don't leave the computer on when I'm not using it, I unplug it when its off, so I don't really see the need to artificially reduce my use for one 24 hour period.
Sure my computer will be off, I'm going drag racing! :-) (on a track not the street)
I will definately kill my pc for one day. I wasn't born with it nor did I have it for the first 35 years of my life & I seem to remember having things to do.
lets get this sucker on the front page of digg.com
Nine o'clock and I'm leaving this comment. I guess I blew it already. But it's Saturday,which means we're taking our son to his swimming lessons,then to the library after lunch.Then we'll go grocery shopping, and maybe out for dinner. So it's not like I'll spend that much time in front of the computer anyway.
Besides, it's a rainy day here. So, there's not much to outside...
I only just read about this right now (10:15 am for me). I guess I'll try turning my computer off until 10:15 tommorrow, for a full 24 hours of real life!
Yay!
Bye!
I know this is way after the fact but... I would think that the amount of electricity used by a pc ( which is not that much, as compared to a printer) would pale in comparison to the printing of a newspaper or book or the amount of gas people will use if they don't have to sit at a desk and work. Perhaps a 2 hour shutdown would be more practical- kind of like a rolling black out -
I just googled "national power down day" and I came across this article.
Why hasn't there been a suggestion to shut everything down - right down to the lights? (okay, maybe not the fridge)
Cheers,
Al