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There's no doubt that incredible amounts of time are "wasted" by all of our quick dopamine hit apps and sites. These are the new opiate of the masses. It seems

There's no doubt that incredible amounts of time are "wasted" by all of our quick dopamine hit apps and sites. These are the new opiate of the masses. It seems to be something we are all aware of, and we talk of unplugging. Some do, here and there. It's a constant struggle. The new cigarette / snack food. Just as hard to quit - but we should all at least try.

eksemplar 9y ago
It'll be interesting to see if these new dopamine fads play out differently. My government puts a lot of effort (money) into making people quit smoking because smokers are extremely expensive on public healthcare. Our goals are 4% by 2025, but even in countries with less of a business case for health, there are still huge campaigns against smoking. Facebook, Reddit, candy crush, instagram and so on aren't really seen as health risks. They mostly occupy the masses, and no one wants to put money into stopping that. At least not yet.
- emerged 9y ago
  Yeah, at least not nearly with the same momentum as smoking etc. But i do think the risks and costs of these new addictions are in the collective conciousness. So it's just a matter of time until a rebellion of mass scale IMO.
- Simon_says 9y ago
  Which government is yours? Everything I've read is that smokers have lower total healthcare costs since they die earlier and tend to have sudden deaths instead of lingering around using healthcare services. https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/03/22/alcohol-obesity-and-smoking-do-not-cost-health-care-systems-money/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/03/22/alcohol-...
  - eksemplar 9y ago
    Danish, smokers are 8,3 billion DKR more costly a year than non smokers. http://www.fyens.dk/modules/mobile/article?articleid=3106811 http://www.fyens.dk/modules/mobile/article?articleid=3106811 The municipality where I work operates in a 3 billion yearly budget by comparison. So you could run more two and a half cities with 50.000 people for a year for the money smokers cost us.
    - Simon_says 9y ago
      Per year, yea. But smokers live shorter lives. That's why I referenced the lifetime total expenditures.
      - eksemplar 9y ago
        You misunderstand, it's what they cost extra compared to non-smokers, agelengths included.
        Simon_says 9y ago
        Well, maybe. I can't read whatever language that article is in, but I Google Translated it, and it appears to only talk about per year costs. If you disagree, would it be possible to give a quote from the article?
jopsen 9y ago
Haven't most people always been wasting most of their time? Before it was TV, Radio, gossip magazines, books, you name it. Do we know?
- dredmorbius 9y ago
  The distractions weren't driven by vast, A/B-tested, AI-assisted, institutional machines with the resources of major nation-states. In 1817, your primary distractions would mostly have involved hauling: bringing water, food, wood, and materials into a home, and hauling the waste products out. The metaphor was buckets and baskets, not pipes. There might have been some home-craft production, or farming. But those were not idle pursuits. Entertainment was something done rather than consumed: people told stories or read to one another (if they could), or played music (or dice or cards -- considered vices). And the primary information conduit was a weekly sermon or service.
- emerged 9y ago
  Good question - some tools/tech have increased productivity, and others have optimized their ability to drain productivity (in exchange for monetized attention). Sad bit is, I'd be hesitant to trust any scientific studies which tried to weigh their relative proportions (for a variety of reasons).
- ahartman00 9y ago
  dredmorbius makes a good point, but if you change always to recently, and time to free time, i think you are right. Brave New World was published in 1932 after all. "As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions."" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World#Comparisons_with_George_Orwell.27s_Nineteen_Eighty-Four https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World#Comparisons_wi... "In most online communities, 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute, 9% of users contribute a little, and 1% of users account for almost all the action." https://www.nngroup.com/articles/participation-inequality/ https://www.nngroup.com/articles/participation-inequality/ relevant: "The pace of modern life" https://xkcd.com/1227/ https://xkcd.com/1227/
petra 9y ago
Sure, a lot of time is wasted by quick dopamine hits. But let's be realistic, for most people who hold a job, and family or relationships, do they have the energy to start something that makes meaningful money in their spare time ? And in a similar fashion she underestimates the difficulty and determination needed for creating a real business. EDIT: Reading it again, this article just seems like bragging:" i'm and entrepreneur an you're not, because you're all so lazy".

eksemplar 9y ago

It'll be interesting to see if these new dopamine fads play out differently. My government puts a lot of effort (money) into making people quit smoking because smokers are extremely expensive on public healthcare. Our goals are 4% by 2025, but even in countries with less of a business case for health, there are still huge campaigns against smoking. Facebook, Reddit, candy crush, instagram and so on aren't really seen as health risks. They mostly occupy the masses, and no one wants to put money into stopping that. At least not yet.

emerged 9y ago
Yeah, at least not nearly with the same momentum as smoking etc. But i do think the risks and costs of these new addictions are in the collective conciousness. So it's just a matter of time until a rebellion of mass scale IMO.
Simon_says 9y ago
Which government is yours? Everything I've read is that smokers have lower total healthcare costs since they die earlier and tend to have sudden deaths instead of lingering around using healthcare services. https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/03/22/alcohol-obesity-and-smoking-do-not-cost-health-care-systems-money/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/03/22/alcohol-...
- eksemplar 9y ago
  Danish, smokers are 8,3 billion DKR more costly a year than non smokers. http://www.fyens.dk/modules/mobile/article?articleid=3106811 http://www.fyens.dk/modules/mobile/article?articleid=3106811 The municipality where I work operates in a 3 billion yearly budget by comparison. So you could run more two and a half cities with 50.000 people for a year for the money smokers cost us.
  - Simon_says 9y ago
    Per year, yea. But smokers live shorter lives. That's why I referenced the lifetime total expenditures.
    - eksemplar 9y ago
      You misunderstand, it's what they cost extra compared to non-smokers, agelengths included.
      - Simon_says 9y ago
        Well, maybe. I can't read whatever language that article is in, but I Google Translated it, and it appears to only talk about per year costs. If you disagree, would it be possible to give a quote from the article?

jopsen 9y ago

Haven't most people always been wasting most of their time? Before it was TV, Radio, gossip magazines, books, you name it. Do we know?

dredmorbius 9y ago
The distractions weren't driven by vast, A/B-tested, AI-assisted, institutional machines with the resources of major nation-states. In 1817, your primary distractions would mostly have involved hauling: bringing water, food, wood, and materials into a home, and hauling the waste products out. The metaphor was buckets and baskets, not pipes. There might have been some home-craft production, or farming. But those were not idle pursuits. Entertainment was something done rather than consumed: people told stories or read to one another (if they could), or played music (or dice or cards -- considered vices). And the primary information conduit was a weekly sermon or service.
emerged 9y ago
Good question - some tools/tech have increased productivity, and others have optimized their ability to drain productivity (in exchange for monetized attention). Sad bit is, I'd be hesitant to trust any scientific studies which tried to weigh their relative proportions (for a variety of reasons).
ahartman00 9y ago
dredmorbius makes a good point, but if you change always to recently, and time to free time, i think you are right. Brave New World was published in 1932 after all. "As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions."" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World#Comparisons_with_George_Orwell.27s_Nineteen_Eighty-Four https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World#Comparisons_wi... "In most online communities, 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute, 9% of users contribute a little, and 1% of users account for almost all the action." https://www.nngroup.com/articles/participation-inequality/ https://www.nngroup.com/articles/participation-inequality/ relevant: "The pace of modern life" https://xkcd.com/1227/ https://xkcd.com/1227/

petra 9y ago

Sure, a lot of time is wasted by quick dopamine hits. But let's be realistic, for most people who hold a job, and family or relationships, do they have the energy to start something that makes meaningful money in their spare time ? And in a similar fashion she underestimates the difficulty and determination needed for creating a real business. EDIT: Reading it again, this article just seems like bragging:" i'm and entrepreneur an you're not, because you're all so lazy".