Two additional NY Times articles on technology and the negative implications on productivity:

An Ugly Toll of Technology: Impatience and Forgetfulness

Has high-speed Internet made you impatient with slow-speed children?

Do you sometimes think about reaching for the fast-forward button, only to realize that life does not come with a remote control?

If you answered yes to any of those questions, exposure to technology may be slowly reshaping your personality. Some experts believe excessive use of the Internet, cellphones and other technologies can cause us to become more impatient, impulsive, forgetful and even more narcissistic.

“More and more, life is resembling the chat room,” says Dr. Elias Aboujaoude, director of the Impulse Control Disorders Clinic at Stanford. “We’re paying a price in terms of our cognitive life because of this virtual lifestyle.”

More Americans Sense a Downside to an Always Plugged-in Existence

While most Americans say devices like smartphones, cellphones and personal computers have made their lives better and their jobs easier, some say they have been intrusive, increased their levels of stress and made it difficult to concentrate, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll.

Younger people are particularly affected: almost 30 percent of those under 45 said the use of these devices made it harder to focus, while less than 10 percent of older users agreed.

Blackberries, iPhones and laptops in meetings are very distracting. A challenge at Microsoft (where everyone sits in meetings with their laptops open), famously written up in the article Minding the Meeting, or Your Computer?. What the article suggests is that laptops are not a problem in MS meetings, which is simply not the case. No matter what the published ‘etiquette’, the reality is that a laptop or Blackberry or iPhone will constantly distract.

I never thought I would say ‘too much technology’.