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Story Ideas from Shortcomings & Foibles
By Deb Gallardo
I have a confession to make. I’m a download junkie.
There’s no 12-step program for people like me, no support group where I can go to say,
“My name is Deb and I’m a download-aholic. I regularly acquire ebooks that I either don’t finish reading , or I never even open. Some were free, but many others I paid for with funds that were hard to come by and might have been put to better use on things like food and gasoline.”
We’ve all heard stories of people who are so addicted to in-home shopping TVshows that they have rooms filled with items that are still in their original wrappers. I always pitied them.
Then I started going through boxes I’d been storing since I moved two years ago and discovered that I have an entire crate of lessons on copy writing and taking professional photographs, for which I paid way too much. And would you believe that most of those lessons are still in their envelopes, the seals not even broken?
Furthermore, I have three crates crammed with binders of products I printed out and three-hole punched. They are all neat and tidy, and not one of them has been opened since I set them up. Well, maybe I’ve opened one or two.
I’m not sure when I started hoarding information products, because that’s really what I’ve been doing. Considering that much of what I download is related to online marketing, and given that the marketplace is constantly evolving, a lot of what I have on my hard drive and in those crates is not just “old news.” Much of it can be compared to a science article from the 1950s about mainframe computers — which is to say interesting from an historical perspective, but useless because of its lack of relevance to today’s pc-dominated world.
The problem with this download-and-stockpile mentality is that it gives the illusion of taking action, when in fact, there is no follow-through to the real action, which is opening and reading and implementing.
So, why am I writing about this? It turns out, I’m not the only one with this insidious “disease” of acquiring and hoarding, like some dragon accumulating “treasures.” I HOPE that you are not like me, downloading and then never consuming the very products you buy and download. If, however, you are a fellow download-aholic, then let’s help each other out.
You see, it’s not entirely our fault, although at some point we must take responsibility for our own actions. The truth is, the marketplace doesn’t care if we actually use the information that we download. They just keep trying to sell us more.
There are, however, individual marketers who do care if we consume their products. We’re not talking about toothpaste or peanut butter here. We’re talking about information products. These are also consumables, in the sense of using, not using up. And I’m hearing an increasing number of marketers who are concerned about this download-and-store mentality. They go to considerable trouble, and often expense, to create valuable, useful information products to meet the needs of their customers.
If your computer’s hard drive is filling up with videos, mp3 and pdf files you have downloaded, take some time today to watch at least one video, to listen to at least one audio file and read at least one ebook that you archived without consuming. You may discover you have a treasure trove. Then again, you may discover you’ve downloaded some junk. Good, then you’ll be able to clean off valuable hard drive space.
Writing prompt: think about a person who hoards everything, from paper clips to downloads. What is the root of this compulsion? How does this define the character? Where will this compulsion lead him/her and what consequences await?
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1 Comment »
September 13th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Oh you are not alone. I have so much stuff downloaded that I need to go through. But this year, I told myself I was not going to purchase anything else and I try not to download much even if it is free. It’s just going to take up too much space, on my computer and in my head LOL
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