Technological innovation has dramatically lowered the cost of computing, making it possible for large numbers of consumers to own powerful new technologies at reasonably low prices.

I do think that procrastination evolved in humans for good reasons. If you're trying to stay alive as a human being on the savanna 20,000 years ago, worrying about what's right behind that bush is a lot more important than worrying about what might happen three weeks from now.

Addictive behavior is kind of the inverse of procrastination: procrastination is about not being able to do what you want to do, addiction about not being able to not do what you don't want to do (drink, use drugs, etc.)

Self-dealing, essentially, occurs when managers run companies to line their own pockets instead of those of the companies' owners. It's been a perennial problem in American capitalism and became a real dilemma when America moved toward a model in which corporations would be run by professional managers who had only small ownership stakes.

Academics, who work for long periods in a self-directed fashion, may be especially prone to putting things off: surveys suggest that the vast majority of college students procrastinate, and articles in the literature of procrastination often allude to the author's own problems with finishing the piece.

There are lots of people who believe there may be at least some genetic component to procrastination, and even if there isn't, it seems to be the case that procrastination habits are often set relatively early in life (that's certainly the case with me). But I also think that there's lots of evidence that external tools can help quite a bit in getting people to stop procrastinating.

In conditions of uncertainty, humans, like other animals, herd together for protection.