Blasting the age of digital individuality

Michael Gartenberg | June 14, 2004, 01:17 PM

The Boston Globe has an interesting editorial about the increasing practice of customizing technology and accessories... "That's how it is with accessories, which might seem ridiculous at first but then manage to seduce the rational mind. Someday economists should measure how much productivity is lost to these presumed time-saving gadgets, and psychologists should plumb the fixation with mechanized individuality."  Yikes, lighten up a little bit. This is not a new phenomena. I wrote about the notion of technology as fashion nearly four years ago. This is a natural extension of something that has been going on long before ring tones. Remember when Bell telephone introduced the Princess phone that came in colors other than *gasp* black? The fact that we're willing to personalize, accessorize and otherwise integrate the technology and tools we use into our lives is not a bad thing, in fact, it's a pretty good one.