[Oneshortsleeve]

No mention of Crackberry?!? Article

[jlsparks]

I bet there's a nearly identical article bemoaning the infiltration of the fax machine into our offices. Used to be you could drop a letter response in the mail to opposing counsel and put the file away, knowing it would be a week before you got a letter reply via US Mail. The fax put an end to that, as the expectation turned from a one week turnaround to a one day turnaround. Now, thanks to smartphones, we fill "downtime" at court or in mediation by creating or answering emails sent moments before. Look at the threads complaining about the 15 minute poll on BIS-E for non-preferred mail servers. Now 15 minutes is too long to wait for that email.

Clients now demand a response on weekends, evenings, and holidays in a prompt manner. We're sending mail from the time we wake up until we fall asleep in bed next to our BB. Paradoxically, though, this increase in availability, and intrusion into what - biologically - should be our personal downtime, tends to have the opposite effect. In a rush to reply to an email we may inadvertently send to the wrong contact. In that same rush, based on a perceived (but not real) need, each email becomes, in our minds, a crisis situation demanding our immediate attention. The end result may be an increase in billable hours, but at what personal and professional cost? I'm not anti-smartphone, and I'm a total addict, but there's no question that the largely American "gotta have it now" mentality has impacted all facets of our lives. And not always for the better.