Instead of thinking about what was said at the conference, who were the best speakers, which people you should talk to more, or one of the million other, possibly much more beneficial, things that would pop into your head if you didn't occupy yourself with this thread.
I'm as guilty as everyone else here, admittedly. What's making me think seriously about something like this is that while I was on holiday recently and kept leaving my phone in my room, I had more random thoughts than I've had in a very, very long time.
A number of years ago I did a year without the Internet (except at work, but only for work purposes). You would be amazed how much I got done without the distraction. To be more specific, I designed over 12 table top games, wrote numerous stories, and learned a ton by reading good old fashioned books.
And why, would i ask? For instance, I was supposed to be reading an ebook on my iPad, but instead I've been reading this thread for the past half hour...
I apologize, not to be overly skeptical, but we don't know how many tabletop games the OP would have created if the internet was kept on. If it was something like 7-9, then the effect of not having internet as a distraction would be minimal.
But that may be just me; I'm always skeptical of statements of the sort of "I turned off internet/facebook/friends/etc. for a year, and look how much different life is". They may be true, but they are not generally true. I use the internet a lot and I also read a lot of paperbacks.
I'm as guilty as everyone else here, admittedly. What's making me think seriously about something like this is that while I was on holiday recently and kept leaving my phone in my room, I had more random thoughts than I've had in a very, very long time.