What's Your Biggest Digital Distraction?

We live in a world where the possibilities of big data are endless and innovation has when all is said and done created a seamlessly productive universe in which we faultlessly live and function.

I in short caved in and bought an iPhone to get more work done better, faster, cheaper, anytime, anywhere. Nevertheless I've spent more time than I'd care to admit engaged in the serious business of slingshotting pigs with Angry Birds. Some days, I wish I could do the same with email. Slingshot it. All of it.

The very research that enables us at law firms

The very research that enables us at law firms, tech firms, businesses, and magazines can as well disable us -- from software glitches to the distractions of status updates, internet forum chatter, and entertainment.

"Email. It haunts me. I seem to be attached to my iPhone and have developed an annoying habit of always checking my email. Tim Ferriss [angel investor, author, and media darling] seems to have presented the best solution for this, really scheduling two times each day to check email. My addiction is unfortunately too strong for this."

Fortunately, one way to cut the clutter and temptation of email is to consign less serious thoughts to text messages, right? Wrong. Tom O'Connor, director of the Gulf Coast Legal Innovation Center, emailed this biggest distraction:

"Text messaging, hands down: Instant distractions, originally designed for emergency use to keep in touch with children now used constantly by business people to circumvent company email systems which they know are monitored and trapped in content management systems."

What about social media?

What about social media? They expand professional networks and access to work-enhancing content as they devour attention spans. Facebook has been called a productivity killer. However, with legal professionals, the trouble is with Twitter.

"My biggest distraction is colleagues who can't quite get their research to work right. No sooner have I helped someone use a cloud-based research to share information, at that time someone else forgets how to log in to access the information. Or worse, one of my partners gets a cool new smartphone and needs help setting up all his email accounts."

The potential to be a distraction

"Anything classified digital has the potential to be a distraction. Using the analogy of a firearm, it is the person holding the weapon that makes it dangerous. We are nevertheless learning how to properly multitask with new technology in other words being introduced into the market every day.

Additionally we are like test pilots with new research and failing miserably in regard to distractions. See human factor."

The tiny digital letters I have to type on my iPhone

"Another thing that gripes me is the tiny digital letters I have to type on my iPhone. However I don't want to turn into Andy Rooney, so I'll stop complaining."

For Rick Georges, attorney and FutureLawyer blogger, research holds no power to distract him. As a matter of fact, no problem at all:

"I use research every day. I never lose focus. I am working 24-7, and tech never distracts me. Every minute that I spend on Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, browsing eBay for tech stuff, fixing crashes of scanner software, removing paper from clogged up printers, spilling black toner powder all over myself, spending hours removing black toner powder from myself, looking at 5,000 digital images stored on my computer, watching hard drive backups for 6 hours at a time, and playing chess against the computer, is designed to increase my law practice, increase my client base, and make more work for myself."

And all things considered, what delights can as well distract, as innovation improves on old entertainments. This from Ralph Losey, national e-discovery counsel and partner at Jackson Lewis: