[Here in Silicon Valley it sometimes feels as if we are canaries in a coal mine...]

By Tom Foremski

With the first phase of the Internet a common issue was one of "information overload."

In this second phase of the Internet, which is marked by the use of two-way media technologies such as blogging, the issue will be one of "conversation overload."

I can deal with information overload—I've resigned myself to the fact that I can/will never be able to read/know all the things I think I should read/know. I can live with that.

But, conversation overload is different, because I *want* to have all these conversations. They are important to me.

These conversations are in email; they are in the comments written by readers of SVW and left on this and other sites; there are phone conversations to respond to; there are conversations with my kids, with my family, with my friends. With my business partners, with my colleagues, with my peers. And the conversations I have with myself.

All are important. Yet most seem started and rarely finished.

Or is it just me? I think this could become a much more common issue in this Internet 2.0 phase.

Published on SVW: 2005-08-01 06:36:1

I wanted to republish this because I see so many people suffering from conversation overload these days because we have fragmented our communications channels. Now we have to keep up with SMS, Facebook messages, LinkedIn messages, and many more.

How do you deal with it?

I think there are two ways:

-You can realize you cannot deal with it all and just do your best.

-Try to deal with it and suffer the consequences of social media burnout, maybe even nervous breakdown.