Have you ever felt compelled to respond immediately to an email requiring a long, extensive response just because someone asked it? You might check out this post and then this site if that’s true.

I’m not sure if this is a case of old habits dying hard or just a misuse of technology, but here at my office, we have some bulletin boards for internal classifieds. For years, the process has involved sending duplicate 3×5 cards with data to a central approval office that would approve, post and remove the cards after a certain amount of time.

Now, the boards have been replaced with an internal online classified system. I’m not sure it was the right thing to do. Here’s why: in the past, I would peruse the listings almost daily. I walked through the hall with the boards while I was waiting to meet someone for lunch. I would wander over there on a break hoping to find a good deal on something.

Now, the boards are out of sight and out of mind. I don’t think about them and so they don’t have any effect on me unless I make a conscious effort to visit them online.

Perhaps if they were on the internet and other people could access them (like Craigslist.com) it would be one thing, but they are still on our intranet. And they aren’t RSS trackable, so you actually have to visit the site to see if anything is for sale.

I have a hunch the system has saved someone some time. But it hasn’t improved anything for the community of users who used to find lots of good deals and quickly sell items. It’s had a quite negative effect on them.

What are you doing with technology? Is it making your life easier or more complex? And is your use of it effecting your audience in a positive way?