I thought I was living digitally (wireless network at home, teleconferences and cellphones, blogging and wikiing and teaching electronically), but Joi Ito has a degree of connectivity that is couple of standard deviations further out.
In the end, he asks whether he is a freak, or whether this is the way people will work. I think he a bit on the edge, but less for his use of technology than for the disjointed way he works, jumping from one conversation to the other, because he can. In the end, more people will use the technology, but most people will not jump between conversations the way Joi does.
New technology will always be used first by those with the highest need for it. Joi Ito is a venture capitalist and a technologist – and as such, may need to talk to three groups of people as soon as he wakes up in the morning. The first users of a technology also shape its design – and the introduction of the ability to talk to many people fast means that more of us are going to talk to more people, fast.
The interesting thing, as far as I am concerned, is how we can use the technology in the slower lane. Realizing that increases in quantity and convenience is a quality in itself, how can the technology help us increase the quality of our conversations?