Wanted: A Name For High-Tech Grief
A rapidly spreading kind of trauma now affects millions of people every day, but the English language hasn’t yet been extended to deal with it.
Well-known neologisms like
jet lag' androad rage’ describe well-known phenomena. But what do we call the combination of helplessness and agony that affects us when our computers or computer-based appliances do inexplicable things, for which there’s no apparent workaround?TG Daily – Man throws his computer out the window, police sympathize
I’ve often seen secretaries in tears when they’re trying to cope with name-brand operating systems. My computer-savvy friends tell me that their vacations with relatives tend to be occupied mostly by the need to fix hardware and software glitches. I myself have often cried out for help to colleagues who have generously made house calls, in order to unwedge my highly customized Linux system.
Recent discussions with friends have led to several good suggestions, including:
- cyber despair (David Eisenbud, Talin)
- technitis (Chuck McManis)
- compu-terror (Steve Diamond)
- cyber burned or cyburned (Betsy Zeller, Dave Marvit)
- digital dread (Aza Raskin)
- techno angst (Jono DiCarlo)
- irritable bit syndrome (Charles Merriam)
In a few random conversations I found that the first of these was most likely to provoke instant recognition and a lively response. But my sample size has been small.
What to do? I suggest that, the next time you’re attacked by this malady, you run through the list above and see which term best characterizes your feelings. Then blog about it. The best term should soon rise to the top, and become integrated into our common vocabulary.
I like “cyber despair” (or more generally, techno-despair), especially I am going through two instances of it right now: a flaky wireless router and an annoying communications problem between my TiVo and the Comcast cable box.
Having had to support 35K users plus a few dozen relatives, I’d like to add the following (I like the last the most): bit fit… cyber-dependent… (where technology is the abuser) cyber-strife… a dysfunctional relationship with your hardware… cyber-tragic comedy (some laugh instead of sobbing) cyber-panic…
I’ve been calling something along these lines “Donald Duck Syndrome” for years now. Seems that when the dust from the inside of a computer mixes with sweat it turns into some horrible thing which increases frustration and acts as a huge multiplier on Murphy’s Law to a cruel degree.