What is the difference between just playing with technology and being addicted to it?

I thought about this question and tried to find the line that divides the two.  I found an article that defined what an internet addiction is.  These are the characteristics that they explained “being preoccupied by the Internet, feeling the need to use it, repeated efforts to stop using it, being restless without it, staying longer than intended when using it, readiness to suspend social relationships, lying to other close friends or family, and using the Internet as a way of escaping from problems.” (Israelashvili, Kim & Bukobza, 2012) I think that each of these characteristics could apply to any addiction. 

I grew up playing a lot of video games and watching a lot of TV.  I remember some summers in middle school that I would wake up and get my laptop out and play almost all day, just taking breaks to eat something and go to the bathroom.  After a while of doing this I would feel horrible because I felt that I had just wasted my whole day.  Even though I played that much I do not think I was addicted to it because I did not feel a super need to have to play or that I could not do anything else.  I just spent way too much time playing games. 

On another hand during high school I watched a lot of TV.  I would stay up really late and surf the channels over and over trying to find something to watch.  I usually went to bed at 10:30pm so I could get enough sleep, but I started really getting addicted to staying up until 1:00 am or later.  I would find something stupid on just to entertain myself even if it was something I hated.  I would rationalize starting to watch a new show saying to myself ‘I will only watch for a few minutes’ then I was sucked in to watching for another hour.  I started to question myself of why I was staying up to just watch TV.  It felt like I was out of control. 

Each of these situations helped me to learn and maybe my later TV watching came because I played video games for too long when I was younger.  You can get addicted to things like TV and the Internet easily if you do not control yourself.  I have tried to stay away from playing games and watching too much TV but I sometimes catch myself wasting too much time.  I usually just set boundaries and time limits and that seems to help.  Now that I am married my wife also helps me to spend time doing other things and not spend too much time wasting away by myself watching TV or playing video games. 

Israelashvili, M., Kim, T., & Bukobza, G. (2012). Adolescents' over-use of the cyber world –

internet addiction or identity exploration?. Journal of Adolescence, 35(2), 417-424. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy.lib.utah.edu/science/article/pii/S0140197111000868