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I have been following over the last fifteen years the statistics on the usage of digital media, and media in general, and it is easy to notice a shift from analogue media to the digital ones over this period.
As one would expect as the penetration of smart phones, tablets and digital media players increased, the attention shifted from the “classical” television (even if nowadays is digital and “smart”) to these personal devices (see graphic from Nielsen). This shift has been, not unexpectedly, particularly significant for the younger generations, whilst elderly -probably because they have reached the retirement age and have more time to spend at home- have increased, slightly, the consumption of classical television.
An interesting graph showing the shift towards the fruition of digital content, split over age range. Youngsters have almost completely abandoned the classical television preferring personal devices. Credit: The Economist based on data from Nielsen, REDEF and MillwardBrown
The latest statistics has just been published by Kleiner Perkins showing that the time we spend (data actually refers to the US market but we can assume that the trend applies worldwide) on digital media keeps growing.
Personally, I find hard to believe that a person can spend over 5 hours a day immersed in digital media (over half of that using a mobile device…), even more so if I look at other statistics for the last quarter of 2016 indicating that in addition to the digital media an average person spent between 2 and 5 hours per day watching television. Make the sum and you’ll see that we would spend between 8 and 11 hours per day in watching a screen (in various shape). Hard to believe indeed.
I am not disputing the accuracy of the data form the various sources, but probably there is some overlap. People watching television and playing with their smartphone, or simply doing the dishes with the television running in background. Also, a quick glance to pick up an information on the smart phone through an app engages the app for half a hour (till it is deactivated) but it only capture our attention for a few seconds…
Be as it might, it is indisputable that we are in an increased state of symbioses with the cyberspace and its bits (just ask my wife). Actually, as technology will progress making the borders between atoms and bits fuzzier and fuzzier we will be living our life in a “limbo” where the cyberspace will be a constant presence, augmented reality will be an example.
A richer life with continuous learning opportunity, as an example, will leverage on a mixture of bits and atoms, bringing relevant information bits over the atoms we will experience around us. Our senses, if we push the envelope just a bit further, will be augmented (all of them) through a symbioses with IoT again bringing the cyberspace to every moment of our life. In 30 years time many people will be living in a digital world for 12 hours a day, possibly more, with the real limit being 24 (I can imagine Brain Computer Interfaces that will be actively interacting through our sleep…).
Scaring? May be. On the other hand the future is what we will decide will fit us… so in the end it will be our own responsibility the type and level of symbioses we will have with the cyberspace.
