Floridian Larry Fischer has six computers, a laptop, a desktop and a server. A couple are just lying around, unplugged, fallow. He doesn’t like to delete email. His desktop is messy. He doesn’t throw away the old computers, because he doesn’t want to get rid of the files on them. “He’s what you might call,” the horribly concerned voiceover guys laments, “an e-hoarder”. Yes, you might. You might call him Captain Banana Cakes, or Sith Lord Pumpkin Pie. You might call just call him Larry. You might call him whatever you want, news show!
Except really, is Larry that different from us? Sure, he’s got some dusty old computers lying around. And he accumulates crap on them. He has 3552 emails in his Gmail account! MY GOD. Except, I have 13,835. Am I also mentally ill? Nope! We both just use an email service with huge amounts of free storage – and computers built in the last half decade – which don’t give you any incentive to delete things. I have homework study sheets from 10th grade, history reports from fifth grade, countless stupid GIFs, a giant folder on my desktop of bookmarked articles I haven’t gotten a chance to read yet – do I deserve to have a psychologist question my ability to make decisions, like Larry? No. I rarely empty my trash either – because who cares?
Some people are computer neat freaks. Anal desktop groomers. Meticulous folder hierarchy barons. And that’s fine!
But some of us just don’t give a shit, and pile our stuff into a hodgepodge of folders and subfolders, ad infinitum, because our hard drives are made so damn big that there’s no reason not to. The difference between having 605 “e” things in my trash because I still have over 60 gigs of hard drive space left, and having an overflowing trash can in my apartment, are immense. This isn’t hoarding. It’s just tech letting us be careless with ourselves.
Larry might be a slob. He might be lazy. But putting him on the same plane as those who have TIME magazine issues dating back to the Johnson administration and a garage full of hissing, urine-drenched cats is silly. There are probably people out there with seriously obsessive compulsive problems that manifest themselves digitally. But at worst, Larry’s a desktop slob. As am I, and probably some of you. So let’s cut Larry some slack. [via The Awl]
Paddy
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 11:02 AMQuite right.
I have 20778 in my Yahoo inbox. I have had the account about 14 yrs and I don’t like deleting emails.
(unfortunately I also get about 60 emails a day that go straight into my spam folder because ‘back in the day’ I signed up to way too much!)
Fortunately the spam filter is good enough that they don’t bother me.
Owen
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 11:08 AMNot sure why he can’t just move all the data on those old machines to a massive drive… Some of those other ones not plugged in HAVE to be <200Gb drives. Buy a few 2Tb WD Greens, copy all data, bam. Even run it in mirrored RAID if you have to, but srsly.
NFI what to do with my C2D E8400 rig when I upgrade :/
Martin
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 11:12 AMThe only time that psychologists and psychiatrists use diagnostic labels is when the symptoms interfere with quality of life (e.g., work, relationships) or create very high levels of distress. A diagnosis helps your therapist choose treatments that have a good evidence base – it is not a judgement of your character, or the only way that your therapist will understand and work with your particular problems. Just as everyone is differerent in their own way, people also have unique maintaining factors and personal strengths and resources.
So no, having a bunch of emails or hanging on to sentimental items doesn’t mean you have a mental disorder.
What we are finding is that people who would meet the diagnostic critera for hoarding disorder (to be included in DSM-5) tend to hoard on their PCs too, so it seems be a related phenomenon.
Ask yourself: what thoughts and feelings come to mind if you imagine wiping your email archive without screening the unread emails? How about throwing away your old school reports? The thoughts and feelings that are likely to come to mind are the exact same thoughts and feelings that persons with OCD and Hoarding problems have (e.g., what if something important is in there? What if I need it later? I need that report because it helps me remember my childhood, etc..) These are dimensional disorders – we all have hoarding and obsessive traits, its just that some will develop more serious problems.
The Gremlin
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 11:47 AMCall me a neat freak, I meticulously delete emails on the spot. When an email comes through I glance at it and delete it if irrelevant. If it stayed on my account, I’ll be reviewed later.
My current Work email account has 2064 emails on it. Each and every one is related to what I’m doing.
I was always confounded at why people would keep, say, Happy Birthday emails for other people in the office, for years, for people you don’t even know.
James
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 11:52 AMThose nunces at NBC… Waitaminute… That’s us! oh crap!
My inbox contains 11212 items originating from MSN, ninemsn and MSNBC. Is NBC suggesting that they themselves, are E-Hoarders?
In this journalists opinion, Yes.
Vote in this poll. It Increases our revenue.
Barry
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 11:58 AMI subscribe to the “Open Air Filing System”. It has never let me down.
david
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 12:01 PMNo point deleting email ever. This isn’t 1998 we have a search function now that works really good. So who cares
Matt
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 5:45 PMIt makes me want to rename my C drive “Computer” and move as much as possible to the root directory, wipe everything off my desktop except for a shortcut to “Computer” right in the middle of the screen.
jasonk
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 8:13 PMI totally agree with David. No need to delete – and more and more the decisios communicated by email are now used as the basis of contract discussions.
@Martin – I would worry about deleting a bunch of unread email. Would you throw out a bunch of items in your letterbox, or scan through for bills first?
Steve
Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 11:36 PMI suppose I’m more of a porn-hoarder.
That and miscellaneous crap like Steam games which I could never ever possibly get around to playing (But it’s only $2 USD!)