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Why social media only? After being a news addict for years, I've decided to not only limit my social media posts (and reading) down to zero, but also the amoun

Why social media only? After being a news addict for years, I've decided to not only limit my social media posts (and reading) down to zero, but also the amount of time I spend on the daily news sites (NYT, Guardian, Politico etc). Instead I read media that operates on a longer cycles like weekly (Economist, NewYorker) and longer (Foreign Affairs, Private Eye) Its been an interesting experiment: most "news" is just content that is ultimately inconsequential, discussing ephemeral events that will be forgotten by the next news cycle. However, the weeklies and the monthlies, because they have to edit what they write about, do a great job of filtering out the fluff and giving me a better perspective of what mattered that week/month. I've found I still know what I need to know, suffer much less distractions, and more time to read books (amazing invention btw!)

Dragonai 10y ago
This is a super interesting approach and I really like the sound of it. I might just try switching to it sometime! Thanks for sharing :) Side note: it sounds like adding the occasional dose of /r/tldr + /r/outoftheloop would add quite nicely to the "filtering".
- noir-york 10y ago
  It was hard at first breaking the habit, developed over years, of opening up a few tabs with news sites each morning over breakfast. I still occasionally scan the headlines, which is enough to know what is roughly going on. News is essentially free (and commoditized). What I value is thoughtful analysis and good interviews; Andrew Marr's interview with Marine Le Pen being a recent case in point.
harryf 10y ago
Very interesting. Makes me wonder if the same techniques which get people hooked to current forms of distracting social media could be used to encourage better habits, focus etc? Have see some humorous attempts such as http://www.chorewars.com/ http://www.chorewars.com/ and http://code.rpgify.com/ http://code.rpgify.com/ but usually with a focus on motivating groups of people.

Dragonai 10y ago

This is a super interesting approach and I really like the sound of it. I might just try switching to it sometime! Thanks for sharing :) Side note: it sounds like adding the occasional dose of /r/tldr + /r/outoftheloop would add quite nicely to the "filtering".

noir-york 10y ago
It was hard at first breaking the habit, developed over years, of opening up a few tabs with news sites each morning over breakfast. I still occasionally scan the headlines, which is enough to know what is roughly going on. News is essentially free (and commoditized). What I value is thoughtful analysis and good interviews; Andrew Marr's interview with Marine Le Pen being a recent case in point.

harryf 10y ago

Very interesting. Makes me wonder if the same techniques which get people hooked to current forms of distracting social media could be used to encourage better habits, focus etc? Have see some humorous attempts such as http://www.chorewars.com/ http://www.chorewars.com/ and http://code.rpgify.com/ http://code.rpgify.com/ but usually with a focus on motivating groups of people.