The Solitaire Empidemic

In You’ve Got Mail, Meg Ryan’s boyfriend mentions a newspaper article he read. The article said that Solitaire had been removed from the Federal computers of Virginia because no work had been for six months as everyone was tucked away in their cubicles playing Solitaire. For this assignment I decided to do some investigating and see if this actually happened. And it did! Sorta.
The article I found “Is that a spreadsheet on your screen – or solitaire?” written by Patrik Jonsson for the Christian Science Monitor, tells of Senator Allen of North Carolina and his quest to rid all federal workers’ computers of Solitaire and Mindsweeper. By doing this, he claims that millions of dollars of taxpayer’s money would be saved. (I always love how the term “taxpayer’s money” is used. As though I am supposed to now be roused, hunting for my pitchfork.) The article also discusses ways in which the solitaire crisis has been “solved” without eliminating the game. One way, the amount of people working is cut so that each person has more responsibility and, consequently, less time for games.
Should Solitaire be removed from computers, should it monitored somehow? I work for an accountant. I work with two other women in one room. The accountant works across the hall in another room. The three of us have our own desks, but they each have a computer and I don’t. One of the women, let’s call her Susan, uses the computer quite a bit for personal reasons, though she accomplishes a lot. The other woman does not (she accomplishes a lot too.) I think Susan uses the computer a bit much. She is, after all, at work, being paid to write up bills and fill out forms, not to email. But am I just jealous that I don’t have that option?
I have mixed feelings about people misusing computer games during work hours. Of course I don’t want to be paying anyone to play Solitaire; however, I also wouldn’t want to be trapped in a job, stuck at a computer, in a tiny cubicle all day. I would want a mini breaks, I would want to play solitaire.
This article is not quite the “metacommunication” Wood and Smith talk about. Solitaire is not a form of communication. However, the article does bring about the question of personal privacy and the computer. When does work end and Solitaire begin? The computer has become essential to businesses and bureaucracies, and yet, the easy access to Solitaire on that same computer has become a hindrance. Would workers really work harder, better, more efficiently without Solitaire? I doubt it. I believe they would twiddle their thumbs or doodle or play hang man with one another. The computer and the internet have not created new problems in the workplace, they have, simply, put a little modern twist on old issues.

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