I Used to Be a Human Being

http://nymag.com/selectall/2016/09/andrew-sullivan-technology-almost-killed-me.html?mid=twitter-share-selectall

by oscarwao • 10 years ago

344 217 10 years ago

FuNe• 10 years ago

The interruptions often feel pleasant, of course, because they are usually the work of your friends. Distractions arrive in your brain connected to people you know (or think you know), which is the genius of social, peer-to-peer media.

Silly as it will sound I'd never thought of it that way. Cunning , brilliant and cunning again.

danblick• 10 years ago

A related thought: for any app, there's a question ~ "How do I get the user to open the app regularly? How do I turn checking the app into a habit?"

Messaging apps have a nice solution to this: they allow your friends to summon you to the app by sending you a message.

sdegutis• 10 years ago

From a business point of view, that's an important goal. The more a user depends on your product, the more you stay in business. And the goal of a business is to survive indefinitely.

But from a human perspective, I'd argue it's completely unethical. As a business, your goal isn't merely to encourage potential customers to choose your brand over another. It's also to get them to buy it even if they don't want it. And it's to get them hooked so they come back and buy more.

Now, what if your product is vodka? Your job suddenly became to make as many high-functioning alcoholics out of customers as possible (high-functioning so that they can continue to buy).

This may be a stretch from a mobile game or social media platform, but not much. They both have negative effects with real impacts on the health and happiness and sometimes even safety of the consumers.

jkot• 10 years ago

I couldn’t check my email or refresh my Instagram
... trying to describe what I was feeling. The two words “extreme suffering” won the naming contest in my head...

mcphage4• 10 years ago

The "extreme suffering" was in relation to his emotional crisis, not because he was unable to use his phone.

oldmanjay• 10 years ago

Hyperbole makes a point weaker, not stronger.

retbull• 10 years ago

Wow you took that out of context.

resetting• 10 years ago

I'd be interested to hear everyone's strategies to combat this, as I assume many of us that work in the industry encounter similar problems of distraction and inundation.

First, I don't use any devices directly after waking up. I meditate for about 20 minutes upon waking and then try to read fiction for 40 minutes. So, all in, somewhere around an hour of no device distractions before starting my day.

Slack is one of the biggest interrupting factors while coding these days, more so than IRC ever was for me, so I try to have chunks of time during the day with it closed. This is something I've struggled with recently as co-workers always expect to be able to get in touch, but often I really need 30-60 minutes of uninterrupted focus for real tasks.

For personal things, I deleted Facebook and feel quite a bit better. I still scroll Instagram too much. I deleted the Twitter app from my phone and will only check it from time to time on the web. I try to turn on Do Not Disturb mode in the evenings, but it's hard when you have systems that potentially could go down and things could get escalated to you.

On top of that I try to take psychedelics a few times per year, not in any type of party settings, but with people that are close to me. Screens tend to turn up this feeling of disgust when I look at them in that state, so I automatically disengage with them. I find that for at least a short while after the trip my usage of distracting Internet things goes down a lot as well.

Interested to hear other strategies!

overcast4• 10 years ago

I've done the same. Facebook was closed last year, Reddit this year, Twitter never really used, but deleted the app. I've added comment blockers in all of my browsers to get rid of all of the negativity on websites, especially YouTube. I don't use any other social apps besides the occasional Instagram for business purposes.

My phone goes into Do Not Disturb about an hour before bed, and I place it face down on the nightstand.

I read daily before bed to wind down.

I've considered revisiting psychedelics, but it's been a long time since college!

I exercise daily, mostly high intensity aerobic, pushups, pullups, situps, indoor rowing, or hiking.

The phone stuff is really getting out of control, and I'm not sure what the solution is for less disciplined people. Dating sucks, going out socially sucks, going to concerts sucks, all because of the pervasiveness of the modern phone.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

How do people survive without Facebook? How do I keep up with what everyone's up to? Sure, there's a lot of mindless posting on there but for me the good outweighs the bad.

CMYK52• 10 years ago

One thing that has helped me is a "digital purge." I do mine on New Years Day, and I go through every app and ruthlessly un-follow/unfriend anyone who doesn't isn't contributing positively to me in some way (sometimes deleting entire apps).

At the end of the day I'm offering these people direct access to me multiple times daily. If I don't get a positive outcome from these interactions, why keep them around?

pawadu2• 10 years ago

Sounds like a great idea. I am going to try this!

marmot77745• 10 years ago

That's something I do consistently but I've not really consciously thought it through. I just delete any apps or "unfriend" people that I determine to be a negative force in my life even in a small way. This one everyone should do even if they don't want to get into the digital 12 step program. I'm waiting to hit digital rock bottom before I quit.

fudged712• 10 years ago

I agree, a purge is a good step, although it's not a total solution. It feels like spring cleaning.

The privacy/notification tools on each site update over time and so do our interests in people and topics, so it makes sense to go in and jig things around every once in a while.

gerbilly2• 10 years ago

I'd be interested to hear everyone's strategies to combat this, as I assume many of us that work in the industry encounter similar problems of distraction and inundation.

- Close any social media account not used for your job.

- Stop using GPS unless in dire emergencies, even in foreign cities. Buy a map, ask directions.

- Read physical newspapers and books.

- Text people only for coordinating where to physically meet up, no conversations.

- Take up a sport and interact with your friends face to face more.

- Use your phone literally as little as possible. Start with a cold turkey period, and then re-introduce slowly.

nxzero2• 10 years ago

Always fun watch someone go cold turkey, since it becomes obvious to them their an infozombie really quick; reaching for a phone in their pocket that's not there every few minutes, going through withdrawals from not being able to read feeds/email, etc.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

Then I'd have to face the holes in my life. That kind of sucks.

zeveb3• 10 years ago

Slack is one of the biggest interrupting factors while coding these days, more so than IRC ever was for me, so I try to have chunks of time during the day with it closed.

I used a client which enables me to mute most of the notifications, which is pretty nice.

For personal things, I deleted Facebook and feel quite a bit better.

I like it, but I only check it once in the morning and once in the evening, from my desktop.

I don't have any social apps on my phone, except G+ — and it's hardly brimming with notifications!

pawadu2• 10 years ago

Surprisingly, I think you can fully disable G+ on Android.

But somehow, G+ has never been in the way for me. It almost feels like a grown up version of Facebook.

ThrustVectoring• 10 years ago

I don't have the self-control and willingness to impose organization to safely have a smartphone without it turning into a skinner box. So, I just don't own a smartphone. I sometimes carry a flip-phone, though usually I leave it at home.

It's really easy to get caught up in optimizing the process you have, rather than choosing which processes best fill your needs.

munchbunny• 10 years ago

I practice two small repeatable activities throughout the day:

1. Spend five minutes looking out a window, not doing anything, not talking, not looking at your phone, not thinking about work or errands, but just trying to be present. I focus on breathing evenly and relaxing my muscles wherever I feel tense, and I find that my brain appreciates the break from its usual stressors.

2. If I'm experiencing negative emotions, I take 5-10 minutes to think about why I am feeling those emotions, and what I'm going to do about it. No communication, no phone, no computer. Like the author of the article said, the goal is to let myself feel bad and move on rather than to avoid it. This is sometimes harder than other times. For example, after a breakup "5-10 minutes" might actually be a 30 minute walk through the park to sort out my feelings before going back to work.

I find that both of those exercises help me reduce my emotional dependence on technology so that while I do still feel the impulse to reach for my phone, I don't find it hard to resist because I have no emotional investment in the phone, apps, etc.

Also helps that all of my friends know that I am often slow to respond to texts. When there are no expectations of immediate responses, it's much easier not to feel pressured into eternal communicative vigilance.

Capt-RogerOver2• 10 years ago

Since you already experiment with things like meditation and psychedelics, you should look more into finding out more about your psyche and feelings, and other self-development themes. Find out more about your inner being, about the structure of your (and in general, human) soul, what motivates you, what deep fears you have, in what ways are you still unconscious about yourself. There are tons of books, trainings, coaches that can help with this. Basically you should do more "self-development".

There is no innate problem with facebook, slack, or computers or screens or any other similar thing. The problem is that you are getting distracted. You are not fully present with what you are doing. Thinking that facebook is a problem is just grossly misleading.

When you have fixed your internal issues, you will not care how many websites or LCD screens are around you. You will do what you want, when you want it.

Telling this to an average person is next to pointless, because they are so unconsciouss that they will not understand it. They have lost touch with the notion that they actually have a choice of whether to be distracted or not, they have a choice in how to feel in every single moment. Since you already experiment with the stuff you wrote about, you just might though.

For someone who is in deep unconscioussness, who lacks knowledge about themselves, who is constantly distracted and who eats junk food that does not provide their brains with enough nutrition, etc. - trying to do simple dumb things like "I'll only look at facebook 10 minutes a day" - sure it might give some results. But once you've gained some basic groundedness - it just becomes ineffective to look at specific distractors, and much more effective to look at deeper issues within you that cause distraction in the first place.

SolaceQuantum2• 10 years ago

What do you do if the situation you are in do not allow time to sit down and perform deep introspective behavior? I find myself very easily falling into introspection to the point where my mind often cries out for it if I go without for a while. However, my current work and the balancing of multiple careers (as a programmer, as a writer) and social obligations mean I often don't have time and feel intense stress/distress at the inability to commune with myself for long periods of time. I also know I suffered greatly in college due to similar distress. How does one find the time to oneself when the world demands ones time?

marmot77745• 10 years ago

Thank you for this. This is something I could possibly pull off immediately. Going cold turkey's too high a mountain for me to summit at the moment. I'd imagine a lot of people could start here.

petercooper• 10 years ago

I'd be interested to hear everyone's strategies to combat this

I started a business that requires me to binge on everything I'm interested in online.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

You seem super human to me. I can't imagine doing any of the above, well, except the last one as Ayahuasca is useful. Maybe I'll go back there with the intention of more balance. She never goes there. She didn't seem to care either way on screen time.

jsprogrammer2• 10 years ago

Fiction books are another era's addiction, if you believe the theses being presented here.

andrewmd• 10 years ago

You're barking up our tree! Having experimented with many of those strategies too, we believe the best solution is to change the menu altogether.

We're working on a minimalist phone to help you disconnect and be more focused, through an intentionally limited feature set and smarter notification management. All the utilitarian tools you need to navigate 2016, none of the slot machines.

PM if you are interested in our beta test. We're also looking for a tech lead ;)

jstimpfle• 10 years ago

I shut down my facebook account seven years ago. I'd noticed fairly early on that what I did there was basically marketing myself and some stalking. I also noticed I was poor in marketing and felt ashamed of myself. In consequence my interest in stalking / following others' marketing faded, and shutting down my account was the only logical action to take. I've never regretted it.

I have a smartphone, but don't use it except for texting and making calls. Since I have maybe 10-20 calls or texts a week, I usually don't take my phone to work. For me, email at work and a phone at home is enough for setting up appointments and leading a satisfactory social life. It's a great relief not carrying this nagging tracking device around with me all day.

I don't understand what's the great thing about smartphones. They are much less convenient to use than a desktop or laptop for most of the things I do (emailing, web surfing, software development). (what things are so important that need the mobility or the special devices not typically found in desktops such as touch, GPS, camera? Maybe if I played Pokemon Go or had selfie-taking or QR scanning addiction...).

I also totally hate when I have to share others' attention with their smartphones. Personally I've learned to embrace or even enjoy boredom, or watching out the window, or sitting in a bar drinking beer, thinking of nothing at all. I feel my head is working underneath, and I need the balance I get from doing nothing conscious. A quote from Pulp Fiction that I like: “‎That's when you know you've found somebody really special. When you can just shut the fuck up for a minute and comfortably share silence.”

However my big problem is dealing with computers at work, and sitting in front of them 8-10 hours a day, at work and at home. When I don't feel productive (most of the time -- I try to make good decisions in my software designs, and thoughts need time to settle), my time is spent randomly clicking links on news sites, HN and twitter (barely sending, mostly consuming).

I would really like to be more productive and consume less unimportant news. However knowing I'm not a genious I doubt that more isolation will improve my productivity.

beachstartup• 10 years ago

this is exactly the reason i got rid of fb also. i found myself stalking people online, trying to initiate probably-unwanted communications, something bizarre and creepy that i certainly do not do in real life. it just becomes easy and abstract on social media.

jomamaxx• 10 years ago

Try living without your iPhone.

I put it away most of the day, and don't have any email reminders.

Get away with the least you can.

After a while, notifications etc. become bothersome and you'll actively find ways to get away from the noise.

Osmium• 10 years ago

I'd be interested to hear everyone's strategies to combat this

For me, it's all about latency: I try to introduce a barrier for being able to access typical time-wasting sites. If there was a way on OS X to reduce browsing certain websites to pre-broadband speeds, I'd be all on that.

For personal things, I deleted Facebook and feel quite a bit better.

I did this too. So glad, don't miss it at all, and actually feel like I talk to my friends more now as a result.

I'm still on the fence about contributing to a community like HN (anyone looking at my profile will see a big gap of about a year). It's a nice community with useful discussions, but I'm not sure it positives outweigh the negatives for me (distraction).

I also try to get my news via newsletter now, e.g. I get the top HN articles emailed to me rather than checking the website manually. That way I get to stay up-to-date without that 'slot machine' effect of just refreshing the front page when I'm taking a break.

Overall, I strongly believe the Internet is addictive. I'm glad it exists. It's enriched my life in many ways. But the addictiveness is certainly real, and it's something I'm trying to actively address in myself.

thunder_cougar• 10 years ago

The newsletter thing is huge for me. I used to be really addicted to constantly checking the forums for new updates, but a weekly newsletter will sum all the important things I need to know. I try to dedicate a block of time to read it all in one go, rather than randomly clicking on links and reading them sporadically.

It's kind of like having a dedicated block of time to reply to all your emails vs. replying to them as they arrive in your inbox. I find that it reduces multitasking and increases focus.

pikachu_is_cool• 10 years ago

I'm in the process of swapping out my phone for my old iPod Touch. It creates a lot of moments where getting access to the internet requires effort (e.g. asking people for their WiFi password, finding/knowing about public places with WiFi, looking up routes in Google Maps and screenshotting it before leaving WiFi, etc).

Doesn't work for everyone, but works for me.

And also I save $50 a month.

gasull• 10 years ago

1) Don't check email when waking up. Wait until noon. And check email only twice a day. Say in your email signature that you usually check your email twice daily, so people know what to expect.

2) Meditate.

3) Configure your phone to be in airplane mode or do not disturb as much as you can get away with it. Definitely when you sleep, but also for other times in the day.

4) Don't read news on weekdays. Save articles people send to you on Pocket, and subscribe to no more than 5 newsletters that you read only on the weekends. At the end of the weekend delete what you haven't read at https://getpocket.com/privacy_clear

When to multitask:

When commuting, read or listen to an audiobook.

simonbarker873• 10 years ago

I read somewhere recently that smart phones have essentially become random gratification engines in the same way as slot machines. Sometimes on a slot machine you win the jackpot, because of this every pull gives you an endorphin kick, each time we pick up our phones or get a notification it might be an important/interesting thing, therefore we get a little endorphin kick that keeps us checking.

Because of this I turn off all notifications apart from phone calls and text messages. I don't have app badge counters or notifications for email either, if it is that important the person would ring me.

hammock2• 10 years ago

Look up "Skinner box." Basically codified the psychology behind a slot machine. A mouse hits a single lever that either releases or doesn't release food. When the lever is set to Always release food, the mouse soon gets bored and only eats when he's hungry. When the lever is set to Randomly release food, the mouse gets addicted, compulsively hitting the lever all day without concern for how fat he is getting.

achileas• 10 years ago

To expand on this a bit, BF Skinner founded the behaviorist area of psychology (which is important in later fields like neuroscience for training animals on various experiments), he specifically investigated operant behavior (behavior where the organism does something to its environment) and various schedules of reinforcement. The schedule you're thinking of is one of the strongest schedules for inducing behavior, and that's the variable ratio schedule, where reinforcement occurs after a variable number of responses from the organism. Skinner was actually one of the first to try and bring more rigor to psychology.

qb45• 10 years ago

Sources for that? "Skinner box" is a generic term for a much broader class of experiments.

mikeash2• 10 years ago

I've been saying this for years. You open Twitter and you may or may not get something cool. Same thing for Facebook or mail or whatever. It's inherently addictive.

mitchty• 10 years ago

I must be defective, I get really annoyed with the inconsistency and just give up on things in that case in general.

ErikAugust• 10 years ago

https://medium.com/@tristanharris/how-technology-hijacks-peo...

Related - you may have read it here.

pixelmonkey• 10 years ago

Regarding "smartphones as slot machines", the piece you are remembering is this one by Tristan Harris, probably:

https://medium.com/swlh/how-technology-hijacks-peoples-minds...

"How Technology Hijacks Minds"

simonbarker873• 10 years ago

Yep, that's the one, thanks

Torgo2• 10 years ago

This is the daily reminder that technology is not politically or socially "neutral".

cushychicken• 10 years ago

What was the origin of that quote? I mentioned it offhand in conversation the other day but couldn't remember where I'd heard it.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

Technology is neutral, though. It's the people using the technology that are not neutral or am I missing something?

pmoriarty2• 10 years ago

For some reason, I misread what you said as:

"smart people have essentially become random gratification engines in the same way as slot machines."

Somehow, that seems strangely appropriate.

If you're making interesting posts on social networks like Facebook (or HN, for that matter), you're providing that instant gratification you're talking about.

Similar things could be said about those building social networks and the technology that enables them, that are then used for instant gratification.

simonbarker873• 10 years ago

Amusing misread and yes I suppose it still works.

TeMPOraL4• 10 years ago

Interesting misreading. I guess in a way, HN is a random gratification engine for me like that - I visit it nowadays mostly for the often insightful comment threads.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

That's true in the same sense that soap has become a tool of OCD people. I don't even install games and never have so I don't know what I'm missing.

I also turn off notifications, too. That's a must for all but a critical communication channel.

sliverstorm2• 10 years ago

I have been going around and around on notifications. If sound is enabled, my phone interrupts me for trivial things & spam. If only notification is enabled, I constantly pick up my phone to see if I have email. If nothing is enabled, I unlock my phone & open my email app to see if I have email- less frequent, but more likely to get sucked in.

None of these things are good.

dredmorbius6• 10 years ago

Having worked at multiple organisations who specifically targeted "stickiness" and user-time-on-site as performance (and employee reward) metrics, there's substantial reason to believe that a large part of the tech industry are deliberately exploiting this phenomenon.

OnLookAStar• 10 years ago

Huh. Weird. I have the opposite issue. Notifications/phone calls actually make me anxious because for the past few years its far more often related to something going wrong at work.

cle• 10 years ago

I get this same unnerving feeling from most video games, and once I notice it, it's hard to want to continue since I get the feeling of being "duped". Most modern games follow these same principles and it's really infuriating. The games I really enjoy are the ones where the "rewards" are subtle enough that I don't notice that they're consciously trying to addict me. Or games where the "rewards" are self-generated (open-ended games like Minecraft come to mind).

hitekker• 10 years ago

"I used to be a human being": I like this phrase. It captures, poetically, the existential despair of losing the conditions of humanity. Regardless of if the author's particular conditions necessitates the implicit drama, each of one us, I'm sure, have felt like we lost what made us "real" or "authentic" at some point or another.

pmoriarty2• 10 years ago

People have complained about the loss of authenticity for much longer than the internet (much less social media) has been around.

It happens around any time of great change. We happen to be living through a period of some of the fastest changes in human history, so it's not surprising a lot of people are confused and feel like they've lost something.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

What have we lost? I don't doubt we have lost something, I just don't know what it is.

kp1234321• 10 years ago

We happen to be living through a period of some of the fastest changes in human history

Couldn't this have been said accurately at just about every point in human history? I'm not asking to try and refute what you said - I think that supports the first point you made. The world is always changing at an exponential rate and we are always on the curve, so people will continue to lament loss of the past until the end of time.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

Is the problem of authenticity, another word for being yourself (right?) a problem specific to online? I wonder if it's a problem that came with modern civilization. People can feel this way IRL. I guess the Internet does add an extra measure of distance in a sense but in another sense it reduces those distances. We all routinely interact with people all over the globe.

I'm not arguing against what you're saying, just trying to think about it. When did we lose the authentic? And are we trying to restore it online? If so, is it working at all?

stnmtn4• 10 years ago

I was reading a book a couple weeks ago and there was a throwaway line that really stuck out to me. I think it was a David Foster Wallace book

It was something like all the great themes are taken. We've taken all the great themes and adventures and created theme parks where you can go to experience a fantasy yet know this isn't real. You know it's not authentic.

I'm butchering the meaning of it, wish I could figure out where I read it

Edit: I found it! apparently, it's from a 1990 movie I've never seen nor heard of, which doesn't sound right. I'm like 80% sure I read it in Brief Interviews with Hideous Men

"You see, there's nothing to do anymore. Everything decent's been done. All the great themes have been used up. Turned into theme parks. So I don't really find it exactly cheerful to be living in the middle of a totally, like, exhausted decade where there's nothing to look forward to and no one to look up to."

rdiddly• 10 years ago

The loss of authenticity most definitely has something to do with modern life itself (i.e. since the Industrial Revolution) though arguably goes back to the dawn of the practice of agriculture some 10,000 years ago. You ought to read, I hesitate to suggest, the Unabomber Manifesto a.k.a. "Industrial Society and its Future" by Ted Kaczynski. No shortage there of ideas on how modern man has lost his authenticity. (He also calls for violent revolution, which is just ADORABLE.)

We evolved to be hunter-gatherers in small social groups. As such, being on high alert for a faint sound, a movement in your peripheral vision, or some sign from your friends, comes naturally to us because these are traits that were naturally selected and could mean the difference between having a meal and going hungry, or between life and death. "Distraction" wasn't an issue either, because the distraction was usually the more important/urgent thing to be paying attention to, and because there weren't as many of them. We didn't have the situation we have today, where these entire natural cycles of stimulus/response/reward have been studied, and where people have figured out through years of trial-and-error, how to replicate the stimuli, and replace the rewards, in order to substitute a different response that just so happens to make them money. To the degree that you are susceptible to these stimuli you are actually being an authentic human being. It's the environment you're in that is completely inauthentic. We're all swimming in an ocean of bullshit. Being born into a world already mostly built and made for us, it's easy to forget that somebody (humans) had to come along and construct it all. Once you realize humans built it all, you then realize they had to have a reason, an incentive, maybe even an agenda. Being authentic requires reclaiming your own agenda and rejecting others' agendas where they differ from yours.

nxzero2• 10 years ago

Just wait until machine learning gets really good at providing information that's of value that you "must have" to get through the day.

Retr0spectrum2• 10 years ago

This service does a rather good job of summarising individual articles:

http://smmry.com/

mcguire• 10 years ago

I'm not sure nxzero (and I) think that is a good thing.

CMYK52• 10 years ago

The problem is that these technologies are increasingly necessary to function within normal society. Do we somehow regulate the allowable behaviors of apps? Is it on us to improve our self control so we can act as engaged, but distant participants?

There's also the ethical question around people not being aware of their obsessions/addictions (especially in the mobile gaming space)

SandersAK• 10 years ago

This article could have been called "here's all the thoughts I have after watching anime for the first time"

Raphmedia• 10 years ago

I fixed my brain by cancelling my internet services. All I had was 1gb of cellphone data.

Never been happier.

Right now I am back with an internet subscription and I'm miserable. I am an internet addict and having internet at home is very bad for me. I strongly consider cancelling my internet suscription again.

ashark2• 10 years ago

I've had good success putting my laptop away and only using an inconveniently-located desktop when I want to do Computer Stuff. I can still go spend a lot of time on it (sometimes you need to, sometimes you actually want to), but it's a conscious choice to go do that. I can't just carry the cancer that is the Internet around the house with me, flip the lid open "just to check something" and surface two hours later having accomplished nothing.

wott2• 10 years ago

I have no smartphone, I don't use mobile Internet. Fixed Internet is enough of a problem for me.

What I would love is to go back to dial-up times. I mean, paying by the minute/hour, or a limited plan + by the minute/hour after the limit, or a fixed limit in hours or Go per month. Something like this. That would help me a lot.

People might tell me to implement it on my side, but I know it is not going to work for me: there's no way I pay full price to have a 24/24 connection and then limit myself. And as operators are not going to propose such schemes that would lower their income, I am screwed. Only satellite operators still have such systems.

----

I had an ADSL failure that lasted 8 days a few months ago. The first 2 or 3 days were tough (launching compulsorily the web or mail browser, wondering how the hell I am doing to do X or Y, having to remember that there is no point in doing X and to remember the 'old' way of doing Y), but then it was a relief. A breath of fresh air. We (the family) began to talk to each other. We even did things together!

Then the ADSL was fixed and the Internet addicted behaviours started again, same as before..

tim3333• 10 years ago

I rather like the internet connected version of living.

bernardino2• 10 years ago

How so?

tim3333• 10 years ago

Well at the everyday level you can keep in touch with your friends, catch Pokemon, access the world's information and the like.

More speculatively you have the points made by Louis C.K in the article, that "Underneath in your life there’s that thing … that forever empty … that knowledge that it’s all for nothing and you’re alone …" "you just feel … kinda satisfied with your products. And then you die." As an engineering type I think a lot of that can be fixed by technology, that as computers equal and pass human brain capacities a lot of cool stuff will be possible maybe including fixing the alone and dying stuff and it's interesting to see things progress.

ryandrake3• 10 years ago

Did this really need a 7000+ word essay? If you don't like Facebook, don't use it. If you're concerned about "distraction overload" then remove things from your life you find distracting. Nobody is putting a gun to your head and forcing you to use smartphone apps and 10 different text messaging systems. If you want to live as a technology-free hermit, go right ahead. But don't try to argue that I should live like you.

The author instead seems to be taking his personal opinions about technology and trying to apply them to everyone. It's not enough that he doesn't like these things. We should not like them either and here's why. Time with my kid is invalid because I also have the TV on? GPS leads me to stop remembering things? Emojis are unsuitable replacements for voicemail? The author imagines restaurants where smartphones must be surrendered upon entering. Cool, you've described a place I'll actively avoid. Where's that "stop liking things I don't like" GIF when you need it?

"Our enslavement to dopamine?" -- how about YOUR enslavement to dopamine? Leave me out of it.

maus422• 10 years ago

If you want to live as a technology-free hermit, go right ahead.

That's very nice, but if you want to live as a technology-free non-hermit you naturally would try encourage other people to join you.

You don't have to read their 7000+ word essays, either, if you have so aggressive reactions to their claims.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

Yeah no kidding. I would regret my decision after about 45 minutes sitting up on cold mountain. Shit, I probably wouldn't get service even if I hadn't given my phone away. What now?

People would spot me outside the library in town, resisting the urge to go inside... To return the edible plant id guide and maybe I don't know surf the web just a little.

te_chris• 10 years ago

Or, how about the writer has experienced something very personal which their editor thought would appeal to an audience as wide as that of NYMag? Perhaps, instead of just saying the writer is wrong, you could try and empathise with the position, see if you feel better after some time apart from the internet. Try and understand another perspective.

Writing is 1 to many, the author was most certainly not writing just for you. No need to be so incensed.

ryandrake3• 10 years ago

It's fine to say, "Hey, I don't like this--here's the personal story about how I had a huge problem with it." It goes off the rails when he starts calling it "our" [collective] problem. Sorry, I just think that's assuming an awful lot about one's audience.

dwaltrip• 10 years ago

You haven't really addressed the article. Are the descriptions of how smartphones have changed society and the people living in it wrong in some way? I'd be curious to hear thoughts on that. You spent 3 paragraphs essentially saying "I disagree", with little elaboration.

"Living technology-free" is a strawman. The author is saying we should be more conscious of how we use technology, not abandon it all together.

P.S. You also seem to be taking it rather personally...

ryandrake3• 10 years ago

It was about to be a great story about how smartphones and technology distraction affected _him_, and how he dealt with it. Then it took a turn down the "this is a problem for all of us" path. Think of a hobby you really enjoy, and then imagine someone telling you "I didn't like that hobby--I thought it was a bad use of my time, AND I think it's a bad use of your time too!" He has a right to say it of course, but I think it's fair to have a personal reaction to that.

bernardino2• 10 years ago

I don't know. I think the writer is just spreading awareness.

mfringel• 10 years ago

Your data point has been noted by the Ministry of Statistics. Thank you for your participation.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

I used to read his blog. He's kind of a quasi libertarian not your ministry of stats kind of wonk.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

He's expressing something that benefits some people. If you what he has to say does not resonate with you why did you keep reading and then take time to post? It's a lot of work to say essentially, "this does not apply to me." :-)

rublev• 10 years ago

Yes. This article put my heart in my throat. I've grown up on the web and have for a long time only used it for work and try my hardest to steer clear of current events / the information high way. But it's depressing. All of your friends interactions are abstracted through social media which I now don't have access to. You become invisible.

RUG3Y• 10 years ago

I spent the weekend working on my Honda, replacing the timing belt, water pump, clutch cylinders. It's been a long time since I've come up for air, so to speak, and spending the entire weekend off the computer was immensely gratifying. I found more satisfaction in fixing my car than I have in anything for a long time. I found myself thinking that perhaps being on the internet constantly has caused me to lose some taste for life.

I'm taking a vacation soon, 9 days with no computer will be a much needed reset.

marmot77745• 10 years ago

I see his point and used to read his blog. But could he have been just as effective online while scheduling in a real life? That is, he could have achieved as much or more with some measure of balance. Easier said than done.

I'm not saying I have a life but I'm hoping to get one real soon now.

mcphage4• 10 years ago

But could he have been just as effective online while scheduling in a real life? That is, he could have achieved as much or more with some measure of balance.

I'd like to believe it's possible, but I think he had to accept the fact that, he didn't know how. Maybe he'll figure it out, now that he has some more free time?

jonstokes• 10 years ago

The number one thing I've found to be effective in combatting this is sleep. I have to get 8 hours of uninterrupted, unmedicated sleep. 9 hours is even better. And I have to do it for a few nights in a row.

If I do anything at all that interferes with the quality of my sleep, I'm screwed, and The Stream will suck me in. Conversely, things that increase the quality of my sleep -- exercise, diet, not using gadgets after a certain hour -- all increase my ability to fight off Stream-induced distraction.

So that's my recommendation. YMMV.

toddsiegel• 10 years ago

Yes. Lack of sleep weakens my discipline and makes it easier to get sucked in and it's a vicious cycle after that.

n723• 10 years ago

Absolutely my finding as well. On those days I'm tired I just get sucked in for hours. I guess I should pick up an easy to read novel on those days.

cortesoft• 10 years ago

If only my infant daughter would agree to this plan....

dohertyjf• 10 years ago

Indeed. I also leave my phone in another room and have a separate alarm clock. Really helps with quality sleep!

remarkEon• 10 years ago

I'll second this, but note that I wasn't getting the ~8 hours of truly restful sleep until I rejuvenated my exercise routine. Not to hijack this comment and turn it into a thread from /r/Fitness, but I simply couldn't turn off "the Stream" (a helpful metaphor, thank you) without actually going to bed tired.

My knees are shot now, so running isn't an option. But if you're able I highly recommend swimming.

hprotagonist2• 10 years ago

reminds me of the poem "The World is Too Much With Us", by William Wadsworth:

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;

The winds that will be howling at all hours,

And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;

For this, for everything, we are out of tune;

It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be

A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;

Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;

Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.

fmela• 10 years ago

I believe this is William Wordsworth.

hprotagonist2• 10 years ago

Whoops. Edited to correct.

Disruptive_Dave• 10 years ago

Meditation, meditation, meditation. These devices/games/stimuli are training your brain, so it's up to you to actively combat that with your own training. That's how I view it - you are being programmed one way or another, either by outside forces or by your own doing.

kubernetizen• 10 years ago

Gossip + Random Rewards = Addiction

morgante4• 10 years ago

To me, this reads like an alcoholic ranting about how everyone should stop drinking. Yes, technology can be addicting. That doesn't mean we're "helpless" or even that it's bad. I'm really sick of these hyperbolic luddites.

Personally, it's not at all a problem. I'm not a technophobe—I have an iPhone, use Facebook, etc.—but it's done nothing but positively improve my life. I can keep in touch with friends around the world and work remotely from anywhere, all thanks to the beauty of these "distracting" technologies.

However, even though my life is heavily entangled with technology I certainly don't feel "addicted" to it. I have no problem going out into the wilderness for a week and having 0 contact with the world. I certainly don't interrupt conversations to check my phone.

If technology is hurting your life, the problem could just as easily be with you as it is with technology.

kelvin0• 10 years ago

I see what you mean, and you are quite possibly right. Please don't take it as an insult, but how do you know this technology is not causing similar issues in your life? We've all seen some people in our lives deny some facet of themselves only to realize they had a problem (after much introspection). I would really like to have your opinion on this.

morgante4• 10 years ago

Please don't take it as an insult, but how do you know this technology is not causing similar issues in your life?

That's something I think a lot about. For me, the evidence that technology is not having that effect on my life:

1. At least once a year, I go on a hike of at least 1 week (without a phone). I'm consistently able to do this without feeling any sort of withdrawal.

2. I try to read a book on my Kindle for an hour every day. [0]

3. Whenever I fly, I never purchase wifi. If I'm able to consistently go 9-12 hours without any internet access, just reading or napping, it hardly seems like I'm addicted.

4. When I'm around other people, focus on them. If I go out to dinner with someone, I sit and talk to them instead of playing on my phone. It honestly boggles my mind that people think it's acceptable to stare at your phone while talking to someone.

[0] The fixation on "printed" books really is ludicrous. Reading on the Kindle is no more or less distracting than reading a printed book. It's essentially an offline experience.

tspike• 10 years ago

If we're going with the alcoholic analogy, alcoholism very clearly has a genetic component, so some people are predisposed to it. I don't think it's far fetched to hypothesize that technology addiction might be genetic as well, with the key difference being that using technology is basically compulsory while using alcohol is not.

Sounds like you're just saying "deal with it" because you don't personally struggle with it.

morgante4• 10 years ago

Sounds like you're just saying "deal with it" because you don't personally struggle with it.

Sorry if it came off that way. Like I said, I don't doubt that some people might be addicted to it.

I absolutely think they should pursue the remedies they need for themselves, whether that's quitting social media or pursuing a meditation practice. I have friends who quit Facebook and I don't hold it against them (though I do recognize it makes keeping in touch a lot harder).

My problem is that he can't seem to recognize that this addiction might not be universal, just like alcoholics shouldn't force prohibition on the rest of us. (In fact, he literally calls for "restaurants where smartphones must be surrendered upon entering.")

arcticfox• 10 years ago

If technology is hurting your life, the problem could just as easily be with you as it is with technology.

In large part, that's what the author is saying: "And I realize that this is, in some ways, just another tale in the vast book of human frailty."

Humans are weak in the face of what we've built, some (the author) more than others (you). That doesn't mean it's a problem for everyone, but it's definitely a problem for some.

And to use your comparison to alcohol: humanity has millenia of experience with the consumption and overconsumption of alcohol. We basically know the risks. "The Stream" has only existed for something like a decade and it's only getting stronger every day. IMO there's nothing wrong with being very cautious about it and quickly reacting to ill effects.

I wouldn't say I'm addicted and I have nothing close to this author's problem, but I do find "The Stream" lowering my quality of life, so I'm working on moving away from it.

Also, another quote from the author since you seem to be very upset with him over a bit of a strawman that you set up:

"...it reveals, perhaps, that we are not completely helpless in this newly distracted era."

callmeed4• 10 years ago

Respectfully disagree with your view.

Technology in and of itself is not bad. But when technology is run by technology companies whose motive is profit, it can be bad.

I think what we're seeing is new externalities caused by technology. I think junk food + soda + obesity is a more apt analogy than alcoholism. It's easy to say "don't get addicted to junk food or soda" but you have to remember that these companies specifically formulate their products to hack your body and make you crave more. Then they bombard you with ads. All so they can sell you more.

In the same way, technology companies make more money the more you use their products. So they specifically architect their products to hack your brain so you will use it more. It's easy to say "don't get addicted to Facebook" or "the problem is you" but, frankly, I don't think its that simple.

blisse• 10 years ago

But with your junk food analogy, there are still alternatives and it's up to you to decide how you live your life.

tim3333• 10 years ago

I don't feel the author is a luddite but her problems may well be down more to her mother's "screams of frustration and misery" and going to mental hospital regularly throughout her childhood rather than too much Facebook.

n723• 10 years ago

I'm considering writing a plugin which, much like an ad-blocker, removes click bait links. There would be various black lists one could use. Any feedback on implementation appreciated.

dredmorbius6• 10 years ago

My thinking is leaning toward a few concepts:

* Quantified content utilisation. I've been looking at measures of just how much content people can engage with in a day, and it's much smaller than you might think. Stephen Wolfram and Walt Mossberg both hit about 150 - 300 emails. The NY Times comment moderation crew tackle about 800 comments each per day. That latter means 36 seconds per comment, assuming an 8-hour day. At some point, your brain simply becomes full. I suspect a much smaller number of detailed items, and a small number (10-30) medium, and perhaps 100 or so trivial items, is about the sane limit.

* A quality metric for content, based on some finite, depletable, periodically renewed resource. "Time" might be one such metric (you've only got 86,400 seconds today, but you'll have more tomorrow!). I have a 5-6 point ranking of content, from '0' (actually makes you stupid for having read it) to 5/6 (defines a field, 6 == extends it). Most news articles fall in the 1-2 range, a good news article perhaps 3, a solid technical paper a 3-4. Key is to not assign everything a top-of-the-scale range.

* Assignment of reputations to sources based on those ratings. Both authors and publishers.

Increasingly, I'm simply adding clickbait sites to my firewall's blocklist.

https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/wgtaltzorrurzat3wf-lwa

Iwould very much prrefer to have that capacity on my tablet itself (Google and Samsung say I cannot, fuck 'em, fuck 'em hard), or in some brwoser-like tool (really a next-gen browser).

https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/ubkidr7yuc7azg9hdnl7lq

cartlonchew• 10 years ago

Would be interesting to see whether this would cause a retreat to "honest" titles, or an evolution to something completely different.

agentcooper• 10 years ago

Shameless plug: I created a Chrome extension which makes me wait 1 minute before proceeding to the one of distracting websites, helps me a lot. Maybe it will help you too: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/better-things-to-d....

fudged712• 10 years ago

Thank you so much! This is great

n723• 10 years ago

The best thing I found to combat this is make distraction difficult. To that end, the best two things I did was write an FF plugin to hide FB's news feed and removed the News feed from my iPhone. Now I actually have to type a URL if I want distraction, which becomes something of a deterrent.

mesmerizingsnow• 10 years ago

What's clicked for me is:

https://selfcontrolapp.com/

It's an open source project either:

https://github.com/SelfControlApp/selfcontrol/

What I do is, essentially, the following: every day at around 0-1 am (before I go to sleep) I set a timer so that it would fire at 7-8 pm (that's when I would get home). This allows me to force myself from browsing unnecessary sites (facebook, twitter, HN, reddit etc.) that would otherwise distract me from doing meaningful work.

As for the other devices, not long ago I would have twitter, facebook, VK, and a few others social media apps on my iPhone. I deleted everything except twitter which I check rarely (<= 10m a day). Deleting the facebook app contributed greatly to my smartphone's battery life either.

m2qlaeldek• 10 years ago

Is it really bad if you aren't doing meaningful work at 8 pm after you get home from work?

int_19h• 10 years ago

What I would say to this guy is this.

Your "virtual" life is also real. The news that you read, happen in real world. The people whom you talk to are real people. There's no "real life" and "non-real life". Everything that happens to you is "real life" by definition. That includes social networks etc.

The only thing that matters is whether it is a life that you're comfortable with, or not. And there is certainly a point that many people are not actually comfortable, but forced into comforming.

Being uncomfortable about it because it's "not real" is a fallacy, though.

thr0waway1239• 10 years ago

One suggestion for people who ask if there is a better way than cutting yourself off from social networks:

Try to practice "memory walk meditation" - I made up the word to combine two things I have learnt about, essentially to combat distraction. (And I have been generally successful - but I also don't need it a whole lot)

Next time you read a book, or just anything you feel would be good to remember - take the key points and associate them with objects in the room that you spend the most time in, or where you usually sit/stand when you interact on the social network. If you are completely unfamiliar with the field of memory training, I recommend picking up some old copy of any book written by Harry Lorayne to learn how people usually commit things to memory when doing memory training. (For example, creating outrageous and vivid images is key to retrieval. Learning the major system will help memorize arbitrary numbers)

The actual memory walk meditation consists of traversing those objects first physically, then eventually mentally in a certain order - as you approach the object, use the image to retrieve the concept/idea associated with it. Hopefully you can identify at least 10 or so objects in your room.

After a while, it becomes a bit (too) easy. Read another book, do it for something else you wish to learn.

The point is, it is easier to move away from a bad habit like too much FB by building something else that you look forward to than using denial.

A very nice advantage of this technique is that you can decide, for example, that you will at least go around the room (mentally) once before logging in to the social network, and increase it to two, three etc. So you can slowly build up your resistance, so to speak. A second advantage is that since the objects are usually right in front of your eyes, it gives you triggers all over the environment to help you build the habit.

philippeback• 10 years ago

I swim. Often. No phone. No internet for 2 solid hours.

After that my mind is clear. And I do not want to reach for a smartphone.

One great feature on this phone is the ultra energy saving feature. Basically turning it into a black and white display reminiscent of a Nokia 3310.

Notifications are turned down for everything.

My life is better. Walking the dog and looking at the scenery is feeling good.

I like to have my life back from the social internet blackhole.

I Used to Be a Human Being

Related Stories