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It's funny how these articles always go completely over the top rather than being about learning self control. Buying too much stuff? Cancel amazon prime, thro

It's funny how these articles always go completely over the top rather than being about learning self control. Buying too much stuff? Cancel amazon prime, throw away everything you own, go full digital nomad and spend the rest of your life moving from airbnb to airbnb so you can never own more than you can carry. On your smartphone too much? Man up! Don't just turn off notifications, delete the apps completely! Throw away your smartphone! Social media destroying your life? Delete it all, it's the only way! If you're really addicted to something I think it will take more than just these articles to help you, if not then you surely you can 'man up' enough to control yourself?

rm_-rf_slash 10y ago
My analogous example is when I quit (behaviorally) drinking. Time was I'd come home, crack open a beer, make/order dinner, open a beer, eat dinner, open a beer, watch tv, open a beer. I knew it wasn't good for me but I enjoyed it at the time and didn't really care about the ramifications. At least, I didn't care enough to stop. After a particularly uncomfortable combination of beer and Mexican food, however, my system was so shocked that I swore off drinking entirely, at least until I got better. After a few weeks I had my first sip of alcohol again and realized I didn't actually enjoy it: I was mostly drinking out of inertia. I rarely drink now. If my mother is in town I can guzzle a bottle of wine over dinner and then stay dry for weeks without wanting even a sip of sake. The problem was never the alcohol to me. The problem was the habit. I imagine the same for smartphone addiction (or, perhaps, "compulsive use"): the problem is not the smartphone - it's the habit.
- YCode 10y ago
  It was a long time ago and I wish I was less foggy on the details but I read this comment on Reddit by a purported neuroscientist or some such who was talking about how we don't actually enjoy social media. They described basically what you've said. We take the actions and get the tiny reward and our brain gets a little jolt of there you did it but when it comes right down to it we don't actually enjoy the activity. More importantly, we're no more satisfied when we finish the activity than we were when we started, we just do it because we've become conditioned to. I suppose a more concrete source would be the Extra Credits video on Skinner Boxes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWtvrPTbQ_c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWtvrPTbQ_c
  - rm_-rf_slash 10y ago
    A Skinner box is a great example. I see it more like a slot machine: you put in your time, pull the crank, and say to yourself: "This is SHIT! Why am I wasting my time on this?" Then you put in another quarter... That being said, I do enjoy HN yet I rarely if ever comment on reddit or Facebook. It's really the community that keeps me here.
noonespecial 10y ago
You know it's gone too far when it starts to sound like yesteryear's pretentious "I don't even own a television".
- anexprogrammer 10y ago
  Hah. We got rid of the tv a decade or more ago. Though being pretentious wasn't part of the decision. :)
- CPLX 10y ago
  Back in the yesteryear of the early 2000's, I didn't own a television. It was better. Now I'm one of those people that does spend too much time refreshing my smartphone. It's worse. So maybe we were on to something back then.
- Arizhel 10y ago
  What's important IMO isn't not owning a TV, it's not having or using traditional TV services, namely cable TV or even over-the-air TV. Having a TV by itself can be good, so you can watch a movie at home with friends (preferably served by a mediaPC). It's cable/network TV, stuffed with ads and mostly worthless shows, that's the real time-waster. (And even if there's worthwhile shows in there somewhere, they're aired at inconvenient times, you actually have to watch them as they air (without spending extra money to rent a DVR), and you can't pause or rewind them (again without a DVR rental). The whole scheme is archaic and ridiculous and inefficient. Finally, a big factor is cost (except with OTA). The TV itself is pretty cheap these days unless you get some big 60" quantum-dot display or something. A simple 32" TV can be had for just over $100 now, and a 40" for around $200. These are one-time costs. But cable TV can easily cost you over $100 every month, or over $1200/year. And for what? So you can watch ugly, over-compressed video, loaded with loud commercials, that you have no ability to control when you watch, or pause or rewind?
Retric 10y ago
Alcoholics can't just have one beer with friends. Addiction simply does not work that way. Digital additions can be just as strong even without the external chemical influence.
- kraftman 10y ago
  I'm not saying that you can't get addicted, I'm saying that if you are or you think you are, I doubt articles like this will help, because they aren't aimed at you. They're aimed at guilting people who think maybe they spend a bit too much time on their phones and should be doing something else, or validating people who have gone cold turkey. Just look at the other comments here, how does only using your kindle on flights and buying more hardbacks have anything to do with smartphone addiction? Unless we're talking about addiction to screens, or all things electronic, which seems a bit broad. 'If you must, carry a dumbphone' - Is ideal solution to addiction really to aim at not being contactable at all?
  - Retric 10y ago
    Dumbphone is a long way from not being contactable at all. The idea is you can still get in touch with anyone at any time, and anyone can get in touch with you. You simply have a tiny effort filter so you don't see what everyone had for lunch etc. It's like storing cookies in the kitchen instead of having a bowl of them next to you as your reading this. Most people can have cookies in the house without eating them right now. Few people I know can sit next to such a bowl for hours without eating them.
    - kraftman 10y ago
      It was more the 'if you must' part. Like it's permissible for now, to wean you off, but of course the end goal is complete disconnection.
  - noobermin 10y ago
    This is probably a strange comment, but this morning, I uninstalled a game called Ingress. It's a mobile game similar to Pokemon Go (made by the same company, Niantic) except you capture the "pokestops" called "portals" in this game and defend them and destroy the other teams' portals. There are two global teams, blue and green. I installed it as a way to play with my gf, and I didn't realize I joined the (globally and locally) losing team, green, to be on her team. In about 11 days since installing it, I've advanced to just before level 7, the level before the last (level 8) with significant powerups. By contrast, my gf reached that level after about a month and a half of play. In these last 11 days, I've tracked around 70 to 80 km (~47 mi.) of walking and I've lost about 3 lbs. While some of that is great for my health (been trying to slim down), I had become quite anxious. Being on the losing team (by a factor of two in terms of control of portals and area in the city, it was a factor of ten the day I started), I had literally become paranoid throughout the day that any moment, a notification would come in that the portals I controlled would come under attack, and I would have to defend them. Given we were on the losing team and the winning team had more resources, it was a challenging but exciting fight. A few of the advanced green players had taken out time to give me rare items when they observed my advance. I'd been thinking of just stopping thus despite how much fun it was and how much I love walking and seeing my city in general. When I saw this article this morning, I kid you not; sure it was kind of cheesy, but it triggered a few minutes of introspection and I eventually decided to uninstall the app for now. So, no, I'm probably not going to turn off all notifications and be crazy like the author (I have ig notifications off for likes and don't get frequent notifications in general), but at least for me, articles that at least raise the awareness of such issues do at least push some people ever so slightly in the right direction. It actually did it for me.
croon 10y ago
And the last sentence of the article: > Follow Alex on Twitter @alexwoodcreates. I'm starting to think it's not a coincidence that "everything in moderation" still applies.
- alexwoodcreates 10y ago
  That's in my bio ;-)
  - croon 10y ago
    Well, to be fair, you tweeted this 7 minutes ago: https://twitter.com/alexwoodcreates/status/839860998198657024 https://twitter.com/alexwoodcreates/status/83986099819865702... And that's not a knock. It's totally okay to be on twitter. The problem isn't too much social media, it's [anything] taking priority over more important stuff in your life. At least my $0.02.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
digler999 10y ago
2nd to last sentence: > It’s about finding balance. I became conscious of what matters to me, in my life. My smartphone is still a part of it, but it’s no longer the boss.
drzaiusapelord 10y ago
This is also bothersome to me. I find that we've completely dismissed the wisdom of the Greeks in regards to moderation. There's always a middle path to follow. When I find my smartphone usage is interfering with life I just make simple and small changes to make it slightly inconvenient to pull out and read. I'll plug it into a charger at home and leave it my bedroom so I'm not tempted to pull it out when my son wants to play, for example. Or I have an annoying unlock pattern to keep me from casual reddit reading when I shouldn't be. The problem is that 'boring' solutions like these that actually work aren't exciting enough to make it to the top of a voting system like HN or reddit have. So we only get the big dramatic articles because those tickle the lizard part of our brains that say "omg upvote this!" The more calm and rational side of us is far too slow moving and less easily excited to make that effort for more 'boring' articles. Its like we're all living in Kahneman's thinking 'fast' world now. I sometimes wonder what it'll be like for the kids growing up today who will know nothing but targeted ads, customized news, clickbait articles, and everyone gaming the 'attention economy.' Will they be better or worse off than those who grew up before those things. Endless 'fast' thinking and constant instant gratification may come with a price in the long run.

rm_-rf_slash 10y ago

My analogous example is when I quit (behaviorally) drinking. Time was I'd come home, crack open a beer, make/order dinner, open a beer, eat dinner, open a beer, watch tv, open a beer. I knew it wasn't good for me but I enjoyed it at the time and didn't really care about the ramifications. At least, I didn't care enough to stop. After a particularly uncomfortable combination of beer and Mexican food, however, my system was so shocked that I swore off drinking entirely, at least until I got better. After a few weeks I had my first sip of alcohol again and realized I didn't actually enjoy it: I was mostly drinking out of inertia. I rarely drink now. If my mother is in town I can guzzle a bottle of wine over dinner and then stay dry for weeks without wanting even a sip of sake. The problem was never the alcohol to me. The problem was the habit. I imagine the same for smartphone addiction (or, perhaps, "compulsive use"): the problem is not the smartphone - it's the habit.

YCode 10y ago
It was a long time ago and I wish I was less foggy on the details but I read this comment on Reddit by a purported neuroscientist or some such who was talking about how we don't actually enjoy social media. They described basically what you've said. We take the actions and get the tiny reward and our brain gets a little jolt of there you did it but when it comes right down to it we don't actually enjoy the activity. More importantly, we're no more satisfied when we finish the activity than we were when we started, we just do it because we've become conditioned to. I suppose a more concrete source would be the Extra Credits video on Skinner Boxes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWtvrPTbQ_c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWtvrPTbQ_c
- rm_-rf_slash 10y ago
  A Skinner box is a great example. I see it more like a slot machine: you put in your time, pull the crank, and say to yourself: "This is SHIT! Why am I wasting my time on this?" Then you put in another quarter... That being said, I do enjoy HN yet I rarely if ever comment on reddit or Facebook. It's really the community that keeps me here.

noonespecial 10y ago

You know it's gone too far when it starts to sound like yesteryear's pretentious "I don't even own a television".

anexprogrammer 10y ago
Hah. We got rid of the tv a decade or more ago. Though being pretentious wasn't part of the decision. :)
CPLX 10y ago
Back in the yesteryear of the early 2000's, I didn't own a television. It was better. Now I'm one of those people that does spend too much time refreshing my smartphone. It's worse. So maybe we were on to something back then.
Arizhel 10y ago
What's important IMO isn't not owning a TV, it's not having or using traditional TV services, namely cable TV or even over-the-air TV. Having a TV by itself can be good, so you can watch a movie at home with friends (preferably served by a mediaPC). It's cable/network TV, stuffed with ads and mostly worthless shows, that's the real time-waster. (And even if there's worthwhile shows in there somewhere, they're aired at inconvenient times, you actually have to watch them as they air (without spending extra money to rent a DVR), and you can't pause or rewind them (again without a DVR rental). The whole scheme is archaic and ridiculous and inefficient. Finally, a big factor is cost (except with OTA). The TV itself is pretty cheap these days unless you get some big 60" quantum-dot display or something. A simple 32" TV can be had for just over $100 now, and a 40" for around $200. These are one-time costs. But cable TV can easily cost you over $100 every month, or over $1200/year. And for what? So you can watch ugly, over-compressed video, loaded with loud commercials, that you have no ability to control when you watch, or pause or rewind?

Retric 10y ago

Alcoholics can't just have one beer with friends. Addiction simply does not work that way. Digital additions can be just as strong even without the external chemical influence.

kraftman 10y ago
I'm not saying that you can't get addicted, I'm saying that if you are or you think you are, I doubt articles like this will help, because they aren't aimed at you. They're aimed at guilting people who think maybe they spend a bit too much time on their phones and should be doing something else, or validating people who have gone cold turkey. Just look at the other comments here, how does only using your kindle on flights and buying more hardbacks have anything to do with smartphone addiction? Unless we're talking about addiction to screens, or all things electronic, which seems a bit broad. 'If you must, carry a dumbphone' - Is ideal solution to addiction really to aim at not being contactable at all?
- Retric 10y ago
  Dumbphone is a long way from not being contactable at all. The idea is you can still get in touch with anyone at any time, and anyone can get in touch with you. You simply have a tiny effort filter so you don't see what everyone had for lunch etc. It's like storing cookies in the kitchen instead of having a bowl of them next to you as your reading this. Most people can have cookies in the house without eating them right now. Few people I know can sit next to such a bowl for hours without eating them.
  - kraftman 10y ago
    It was more the 'if you must' part. Like it's permissible for now, to wean you off, but of course the end goal is complete disconnection.
- noobermin 10y ago
  This is probably a strange comment, but this morning, I uninstalled a game called Ingress. It's a mobile game similar to Pokemon Go (made by the same company, Niantic) except you capture the "pokestops" called "portals" in this game and defend them and destroy the other teams' portals. There are two global teams, blue and green. I installed it as a way to play with my gf, and I didn't realize I joined the (globally and locally) losing team, green, to be on her team. In about 11 days since installing it, I've advanced to just before level 7, the level before the last (level 8) with significant powerups. By contrast, my gf reached that level after about a month and a half of play. In these last 11 days, I've tracked around 70 to 80 km (~47 mi.) of walking and I've lost about 3 lbs. While some of that is great for my health (been trying to slim down), I had become quite anxious. Being on the losing team (by a factor of two in terms of control of portals and area in the city, it was a factor of ten the day I started), I had literally become paranoid throughout the day that any moment, a notification would come in that the portals I controlled would come under attack, and I would have to defend them. Given we were on the losing team and the winning team had more resources, it was a challenging but exciting fight. A few of the advanced green players had taken out time to give me rare items when they observed my advance. I'd been thinking of just stopping thus despite how much fun it was and how much I love walking and seeing my city in general. When I saw this article this morning, I kid you not; sure it was kind of cheesy, but it triggered a few minutes of introspection and I eventually decided to uninstall the app for now. So, no, I'm probably not going to turn off all notifications and be crazy like the author (I have ig notifications off for likes and don't get frequent notifications in general), but at least for me, articles that at least raise the awareness of such issues do at least push some people ever so slightly in the right direction. It actually did it for me.

croon 10y ago

And the last sentence of the article: > Follow Alex on Twitter @alexwoodcreates. I'm starting to think it's not a coincidence that "everything in moderation" still applies.

alexwoodcreates 10y ago
That's in my bio ;-)
- croon 10y ago
  Well, to be fair, you tweeted this 7 minutes ago: https://twitter.com/alexwoodcreates/status/839860998198657024 https://twitter.com/alexwoodcreates/status/83986099819865702... And that's not a knock. It's totally okay to be on twitter. The problem isn't too much social media, it's [anything] taking priority over more important stuff in your life. At least my $0.02.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

digler999 10y ago

2nd to last sentence: > It’s about finding balance. I became conscious of what matters to me, in my life. My smartphone is still a part of it, but it’s no longer the boss.

drzaiusapelord 10y ago

This is also bothersome to me. I find that we've completely dismissed the wisdom of the Greeks in regards to moderation. There's always a middle path to follow. When I find my smartphone usage is interfering with life I just make simple and small changes to make it slightly inconvenient to pull out and read. I'll plug it into a charger at home and leave it my bedroom so I'm not tempted to pull it out when my son wants to play, for example. Or I have an annoying unlock pattern to keep me from casual reddit reading when I shouldn't be. The problem is that 'boring' solutions like these that actually work aren't exciting enough to make it to the top of a voting system like HN or reddit have. So we only get the big dramatic articles because those tickle the lizard part of our brains that say "omg upvote this!" The more calm and rational side of us is far too slow moving and less easily excited to make that effort for more 'boring' articles. Its like we're all living in Kahneman's thinking 'fast' world now. I sometimes wonder what it'll be like for the kids growing up today who will know nothing but targeted ads, customized news, clickbait articles, and everyone gaming the 'attention economy.' Will they be better or worse off than those who grew up before those things. Endless 'fast' thinking and constant instant gratification may come with a price in the long run.