Offlining: Saving families and lives. Hats off to artist Jay Shells for his creative work.

IT’S the song that made thousands of fathers feel guilty.That would be Harry Chapin’s “Cat’s in the Cradle,” which, as any baby boomer who ever owned a radio can tell you, recounts the story of an overworked dad who’s too busy to spend time with his young son, and lives to regret it. Since Chapin wrote the song in 1974, digital distractions have created a whole new universe of ways to be an inattentive parent. And that’s why Chapin’s hit has been on the minds of Eric Yaverbaum and Mark DiMassimo, marketing executives who last year launched a campaign called “Offlining, Inc.,” urging people to put their digital devices down once in a while and reconnect with their kids and other living, breathing humans. For more click Here.

For Immediate Release
Media Contact:
Danielle Nacco
Ericho Communications
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OFFLINING FOUNDERS LAUNCH CAT’S IN THE CRADLE REBOOT COMPETITON
THIS FATHER’S DAY

Marketing Gurus Mark the One-Year Anniversary of Offlining, Inc.
by Asking Singers and Songwriters to Rewrite the Famed Father-Son Song for Today’s Digital Relationship

NEW YORK (June 7, 2011) – New York City-based dynamic marketing duo and serial entrepreneurs Mark DiMassimo and Eric Yaverbaum, who started the famous Tappening movement, an environmental campaign to “make tap water cool,” and the political and educational ‘Read to Vote’ initiative joined forces for a third time and created Offlining in 2010. This highly talked about and very viral campaign encourages people to go offline, by turning off their mobile devices and computers in order to devote time to the traditional face-to-face conversation that we have all grown to miss in the wake of Blackberries, iPhones and working twenty-four/seven.

The initiative highlights America’s ever-growing addiction to technology and to mark the one-year anniversary since its conception, DiMassimo and Yaverbaum are thinking BIG again. They are calling all singer/songwriters to rewrite the famous Cat’s in the Cradle song – originally sung by Harry Chapin, which shows how a father and son grew up without ever having time for each other, with a modern refresh for the Facebook generation. more after the jump (more…)

NY Metro

Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, a professor at Temple University in Philadelphia, had a difficult challenge for the students in her honors seminar on the psychology of technology: Go a full day without texting, tweeting, posting on Facebook or otherwise surfing the Web.
Of the 31 people in the class, only 14 made it. One student failed first thing in the morning when he started his day the usual way, checking his e-mail. Another lasted until the afternoon, when she was stuck in a long, slow-moving line (“Angry Birds” was also on the “don’t” list).  To read more click here.

THE MORNING CALL
November 24, 2010|By Kathy Lauer-Williams

According to a recent poll of over 900 teenagers, 64 percent say they’ve texted at the dinner table. Experts have said that families who eat dinner together have better communication and stronger connections – but not if no one’s talking to each other.
Now a pair of New York ad executives are asking families to “give thanks not thx” on Turkey Day and just turn off the cell phones.
Mark DiMassimo and Eric Yaverbaum even will send free turkeys to select people who sign the pledge to go offline on Thanksgiving at Offlining a website they created to encourage people to take a break from electronics and reconnect with the family. For more click here.