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A little more than a dozen years ago a seemingly harmless device burst into our lives, and changed... everything.

It changed the way in which we interact with each other, the way we shop, and the way we work; it obliterated the line separating our private and our professional lives. It even changed the way in which we perceive something as fundamental as the concept of 'the facts', and in many ways it did so without us even realizing it.

All of a sudden it was just there, and the more it did for us, the more we came to rely upon it.

That device is here to stay, there is no getting around that fact. Its place in our lives is unquestionable, as are some of its advantages, but the fact that its place is unquestionable doesn't mean its presence shouldn't be questioned at all. It doesn't mean we should accept its presence without thinking of what those changes mean, of what they entail, and what the price we will have to pay for everything we have gained happens to be, because at the end of the day there is a price we will have to pay, a price that to a large extent is unavoidable, but also one that goes up the more unquestioning our acceptance becomes.

Think of it this way: it is easier to overspend when you are paying with a credit card than when you are paying cash... and it is even easier to overspend when what you are spending is something that is utterly intangible, when the price can't possibly be narrowed down to dollars and cents.

This is my attempt to figure out what that price happens to be, to put that change in its proper historical context. What has been gained, and what has been lost, from the perspective of something I describe as 'the bilingual generation'. And what do I mean when I speak of 'the bilingual generation'? I mean those of us who encountered computers for the very first time when we were in our late teens; who went to school before computers became ubiquitous, but who have had them as a constant part of our professional lives... I mean those of us who are stuck between our parents, who can't handle the technology, and our children, the so-called 'digital natives' who can't live without it.

In that regard our position is unique. We are the only bilingual generation that ever was, and ever will be, so why not take advantage of that fact?