Look Up: Social Media and the Addiction No One is Talking About

by Sonali Acharjee

Is a text the same as a hug? Can trolling be a full‐time career? Is FOMO turning to be a real psychological threat? Indian millennials have not only embraced the virtual space and all its extensions but are also living the fake reality. We now have the ability to reinvent ourselves online and keep our digital ego on fleek—flirting, preening, posting and filtering our way to a perfect profile. Social media has led to trading our offline family for virtual ones, relationships for app‐based affairs and birthday greetings for emojis. This constant interaction with the screen is taking a massive toll on our daily lives. Young adults are risking their lives for the perfect selfie; troll wars and cyber stalkers are driving people to depression; cyber porn, for small-town religious teens, is dangerously becoming an addiction. So where do we draw the line? How much is too much? Are parental controls and restrictions effective? In this book, the author, through a series of real conversations, breaks down the digital revolution of India and seeks to understand why we’ve turned into a society of hashtags, tweets, shares and likes.

256 pages, Paperback

First published June 13, 2016

About the author

Sonali Acharjee is a journalist who has worked with The Times of India, India Today and Open. She's a graduate of Delhi University and London School of Economics. Aside from social media, she's also been addicted to her dogs, snorkellling and trekking.