3. Discuss your opinion of Linda Stone’s view that individuals should learn to police themselves online, rather than relying on software to help them manage their computer use. For a supervisor, is getting control over time by any means more important, or is learning self-control more important?

Information scientist Fred Stutzman noticed that whenever he went online, he was just a click or two away from a treasure trove of information, entertainment, and social connections. Just one little click, and he could find some tidbit that would be more engaging than whatever project he had sat at the computer to tackle. As he told a reporter recently, being on the Internet provides a “sense that at any point in time, you can dip into this stream.” Consequently, Stutzman, like other computer users, finds that he doesn’t give 100 percent of his attention to what he is supposedly doing at his computer.
So Stutzman used his computer expertise to create a new piece of software he named Freedom.
Freedom basically provides a means of escape from online distractions by making it hard for computer users to go online when they have set aside time for other work. When a user launches Freedom, it asks how long it should disable the computer’s Internet access—any period of time within a range from one minute to eight hours. Next, it asks the user whether it should allow access to the local network, which might include printers or other computers to which the user is connected locally. After the user answers the questions and provides a password, Freedom delivers freedom from distractions by shutting off connections as specified.