Drinking from the fire hose

It's no surprise to read that U.S. workers are "exposed to this fire hose of information," says Roger Bohn, a professor of management at the University of California, San Diego, and co-author of the "How Much Information?" report.

"Your capacity to drink is the same as it always was, but there's a bigger puddle around you when you're done of stuff you weren't able to assimilate," he adds.

IBMers send 12 million instant messages to each other per day, John Rooney in the CIO's office told The Wall Street Journal.

The average worker spends about 25% of the day searching for needed information, getting back to work after an interruption and dealing with other effects of information overload. IBM offers a variety of helpful tips, but the sheer volume of information suggests many of us aren't following them.