Why are we so dependant?

These days, thanks to so many social networking websites on the Internet, we seem to lose our privacy. Simply for a fact that we are giving away too much of ourselves which is not required. Sites like facebook, orkut, myspace, hi5 etc not only compel us to list down everything about us in detail but also make us follow them religiously. Something that even I give in ardently. A bane of modern technology. Like our dependence on a mobile phone. Can't sleep, talk, eat, move or dream without one! But the fact remains. We're dependant. One dreads the possibility of switching off completely even for a short while. The prospect of not keeping in touch or being disconnected frightens us all. Devices, mediums and technologies relatively unheard of in the recent past are as good as the oxygen cylinders on a heart patient under-going a surgery for us. Do we call this addiction or dependence?

I came across the following article on the internet regarding the same:

Two children are learning to live without their mobile phones after becoming so badly addicted to the technology they were admitted to a mental health clinic.
They were brought in after spending an average of six hours a day on their phones, talking, texting or playing games.
Their parents became concerned that the children, aged 12 and 13, were unable to carry out normal activities without their handsets. They were failing at school and deceiving relatives in an attempt to obtain more money for phone cards.
However, it may take a year to wean them off the “drug”, said Dr Maite Utgès, director of the Child and Youth Mental Health Centre in Lleida, north-east Spain, where they have been treated for the past three months.
“It is the first time we have used a specific treatment to cure a dependence on the mobile phone,” she said. “They both showed disturbed behaviour and this exhibited itself in failure at school. They both had serious difficulties leading normal lives.”
Both children had had their own phones for 18 months and were not controlled by their parents.
“One paid for their phone by getting money from the grandmother and other family members, without explaining what they were going to do with it,” said Dr Utgès.
At least two cases of phone addiction have been reported in Britain where young people who were obsessed with their phones and became depressed when the number of incoming calls or messages dropped.

Case of abuse? Hope none of us comes even close to this! Cheers and happy keeping in touch.