Self check out

A couple of weeks ago, my local branch of the public library started aggressively promoting their self check out machines.  I've used self check out before, but when there are library staff around, I prefer going to the counter to check out my books.  It's not like I have big conversations with the staff or anything.  I just give them my book, then they ask for my library card, they scan everything, ask me if I need anything else, I say no, they give me my receipt and my books and I say thank you and go.  That's it. 

During their self check out promotion blitz, staff directed all patrons to check the books out themselves using self check out.  Out of habit, I still went to the counter.  They had a self check out machine set up there too.  When I got to the front of the line, the librarian directed me step by step on how to use the machine to check my books out myself.  I got the message.

So at my most recent trip to the library, I used self check out.  It's very simple.  It's quick.  But I didn't like it.  I missed the little dialog with the staff. the little thank you and good bye, the acknowledgement of my presence and patronage of their library.  With self check out, I just go in and out.  No one acknowledges that I came, nor do I acknowledge anyone else.  It's almost like I wasn't there.

It just doesn't sit right with me.  There we are, all these people, sharing a common space and a common interest in books but everyone is in their own world.  And one of the few points of contact between individual worlds, i.e. the check out counter, has been removed.

I can see the benefit of self-serve options in situations when it's not practical to employ someone to serve customers.  For example, vending machines allow us to buy things at odd hours and in locations where it wouldn't pay to have an employee at the cashier.  Zipcar makes renting cars from many different locations at any time of day possible through their self-serve model.  But in a library, the staff have to be there anyways.  And the patrons are there too.  If everyone is in the same place at the same time, what does it hurt to have them interact a bit?

I just miss getting my books checked out at the counter.

Technological burdens

A few days ago, I went out for a walk with my friend.  Because of the outage in the Blackberry network, she left her phone at home.

As we walked and talked and then sought shelter from the rain, she remarked how free she felt without her Blackberry.  She had no idea what sort of messages she missed.  Due to the outage, she couldn't know and didn't have to know and was quite content not knowing.

I wonder how many technological innovations become burdensome to their owners like this.

Initially conceived as a way to make lives easier, to enable us to do what we couldn't do before, they somehow make our lives more difficult and stressful.  For the ability to do something is often quickly followed with the expectation to do it.  If you don't have a smart phone, you can't read and answer email anytime from anywhere.  But if you do have one, not only can you read and answer email from wherever you are, but you are now expected to.  Even if that expectation comes only from yourself, it's something else that draws your attention, something else on your mental to do list, another distraction.

Is it worth it?  I don't know.

But for the time being, I'm not going to try to find out.

Listening to the stillness

Just now, as I sat down to write a new blog post, I instinctively started clicking around my web browser, checking different sites, looking for inspiration based on what's going on today.  After a few seconds, I stopped.  I wasn't going to write about the headlines on the Huffington Post.

It's so easy to lose myself in the deluge of information that comes onto this little screen.  Sometimes, I just need to stop.  And listen to the stillness.