RESEARCHERS from Austria are trying to put a very big genie back in its bottle.

The Salzburg Academy on Media & Global Change has launched an experiment to gauge reactions among volunteers taking part in a total media black-out.

The tests are being conducted at many centres around the world, including Bournemouth University, where 530 students have signed up to deny themselves access to all forms of modern media for 24 hours.

No mobile phones, no computers, no email, no televisions, no radios, no newspapers or magazines. You name it, they are trying to do without it.

As they Šset about their endeavours, the students are recording their experiences, producing their own accounts of how severing these links – albeit for a relatively short period – changes the way they lead their lives.

It’s an interesting experiment on a number of levels.Š

For starters, these trappings of the modern world are not universally available.

Other initiatives, such as making mobile broadband available to poverty- stricken communities in places like India and Africa, have already demonstrated the ways in which modern ICT can transform lives at every level, creating and generating economic opportunities previously off limits for many.

Some of those taking part have never known life without a mobile, or the capacity to text, email and network.

One of the Dorset studentsŠ taking part has reported that “unplugging” herself has been far more of a challenge than she expected.

“At first, I thought it would just be not emailing or texting. I didn’t appreciate how much media there is all around me in my day-to-day life. I was really shocked that it is absolutely everywhere,” she said. Further recorded experiences are equally enlightening.ŠIn particular, those taking part record their unease and wariness at adapting to silence.Š Some describe it as scary and isolating.

That probably sums up the impact modern media communications has on every aspect of life and business.

That particular genie is well and truly out.Š And the development of new communications technologies to change our lives and the way we do business is continuing.