How much Internet use?

[Cron]

By outside of work, I mean Internet use you don't need to do, beyond looking information up to get something done.

I think this question is different from the television use poll in that it is a lot harder to be aware of how much Internet use you have. People watch TV in big blocks of time and in ways where they are more aware of the time usage.

A lot of recreational Internet use is " a little bit here and there" with all of those little bits adding up.

Every now and then I time myself. It will take me 10 - 15 minutes to write an email that does not have a lot of value to me or my goals. I've had days where that has easily added up to an hour an or more. Then I complain to myself how nice it would be to have more time at the end of the day.

[Henry]

I'm pretty much online all day. I work in a cube.

[tomjen]

Being a geek means that I spend far to much time on the internet - and most of it is not productive. Had the poll included internet on work (or school) i would properly cross 10hr/day.

[Wanderer]

Probably about two hours per day, and the majority of that is spent constructively on this website or wasted on msn messenger. Its alot less than when I use to play ultima when i could clock up 4+ hours every day no problem

[kthdsn]

I probably clock up around 10 hours a day most days. This is a ridiculous amount of time to spend online considering how little I get done.

[Jill]

The Internet is simply part of my life like every other part. It's impossible to even measure the hours because it's pretty much all of my waking hours except when I have to do something offline. (Blech!)

[A.K.Light]

The majority of the members here use the internet 4 or more hours a day!??

[Dwane J.]

For me too much and I know it

If you use Firefox and want to get some detailed numbers of how you spend on line, try the pageaddict extension. I found a review of it here.

[Light]

I use the internet a lot. Easily 4+ hours a day. Some of it is very productive, other parts are total wastes of time. However, I'm always ready to jump at the chance to go out and do something with people.

[dECLAN]

I work online from home most days so it is not uncommon to have the computer on from 7.30am until 10pm at night. Of course very little of this time is spent surfing aimlessly! I go along with the Pareto Principle or in other words 20% of my time makes up 80% of my income.

[Cron]

I think a lot of people are missing the point that using the internet to further your goals and values is disntinct from wasting your time on the internet in directionless usage.

FWIW, IMHO, there is no problem in itself with the latter, unless it starts using up significant amounts of time.

I think many people do not recogonize the latter as being a problem in their lives.

Everyone is aware of TV as a problem, TV usage in the other poll is very low. However, internet usage in my poll is very high.

Television became a poor substitute for other things in many people's lives. The point in reducing television use is not to give up television for its own sake, but to get back to having what you were substituting television for.

It doesn't do any good to replace fluff time from television, with fluff time from the internet.

It is like curing alchoholism with a cigarette addiction.

Having said that, I am struggling with these issues myself.

[benza]

Originally Posted by Cron

I think a lot of people are missing the point that using the internet to further your goals and values is disntinct from wasting your time on the internet in directionless usage.

I do both. How much time I spend on internet? The better question would be how many hours i don't spend.

But no regrets. I enjoy every minute of it.

[birger]

Originally Posted by Cron

It doesn't do any good to replace fluff time from television, with fluff time from the internet.

It is like curing alchoholism with a cigarette addiction.

Having said that, I am struggling with these issues myself.

I disagree, wasting time on the Internet is marginally better than wasting time on the TV (provided the content is equally useless of course), since you at least have to perform some kind of interactive choices (moving the mouse and typing search words).

I'd rather be addicted to cigarettes than alcohol. I have no doubt about what's worst of the two.

[Ali]

I think I should have chosen the last option rather than 2-4 hours. Most of my work is based on internet work, study or business.

I guess it depends on what you do on the internet to consider it fluff or real work. I can't do my study and business without the internet, some people just sit ifront of the computer 24/7 and thats just too much.

Ali