The leading article in the February 2008 issue of Wired contends that technology and personal interaction are complementary like peanut butter and chocolate, usurping the conventional wisdom that technology destroys distance. While the hope still remains that cells phones and broadband will allow introverts and traffic planners to telecommute, author Tim Harford makes a compelling case that technology makes "face-time" easier and creates more of it.

Just like how indoor plumbing and urban sanitation allowed greater density in cities, so do Google Maps, cell phones, and Facebook allow people to find other people and things in a vastly larger population. That population can be a large city, organization, or community of clients, vendors, and colleagues. Email allows someone to maintain greater communication with more people in less time, freeing up time for more meetings in person.

And face-time seems more critical than ever. If indeed the workplace is shifting to value ideas because problems and processes are becoming more complex as the author contends, then meeting face-to-face is the best way to communicate those ideas. The upshot for your business or firm, studies have found that the most productive companies have the most intra-company e-mail, which actually encourages more personal contact, not less.