10 ms·
The high speed of society has jammed our internal clock
- anotheryou 8y agoI think this explanation can be simplified greatly. It's an obstacle, literally in my way to fulfill my goal. Why wouldn't I be upset at least slightly about that? To elaborate a bit more: I was minding my own business, in thoughts and happily walking at my own pace. Now I'm ripped out of this rather meditative state. My thoughts are interrupted, there as something challenging my goal of getting somewhere and I need to handle a sudden social or at least spacial situation. Only now what one might want to call "zen" comes in to play. Now the question is if I can resort to ratio and figure a few seconds won't change a thing and I can quickly get back to my thoughts while they are still fresh.
- gridlockd 8y ago"We now insist that Web pages load in a quarter of a second, when we had no problem with two seconds in 2009 and four seconds in 2006." Not true at all. The "scientific" benchmark of "instant" page loads is 250ms. This is the goal. Pages should load instantly because they can load instantly, poor connection or large content notwithstanding. Four second page loads were absolutely not "okay" in 2006. They weren't even the norm. Always aim for those 250ms, everywhere. For example, if your programming workflow takes more than a second to do a build iteration cycle, it's bad. Slow tools are bad. The status quo may be bad, but that's no excuse not to aim higher.
- nostrademons 8y agoThe parent comment is downvoted (pretty heavily, since an upvote still didn't un-grey it) as I reply, but it's absolutely correct. I was doing latency optimization for Google in 2009. There was a strong negative correlation between latency and click-through rate - enough that the additional latency of adding JQuery (~140ms IIRC) would've cost us about $150M, and just moving the ads above the results in document order was estimated at $50M (the latter figure turned out to be wrong when I ran the experiments in 2010 - broadband penetration had made the latency difference in document order negligible - but that was the figure Marissa Mayer got in 2002 when most users were on dialup, extrapolated out to Google's 2010 revenues). 2 seconds was absolutely too long; our target was 250ms for the whole search to come back, including all backend calls. If anything webpages have gotten slower today, with the rise of SPAs with lots of Javascript. Some of that is compensated for by faster Internet (though not a lot; in most of the U.S, speeds haven't budged much since 2009), but a lot is just that people have given up on the sort of marginal use-cases like amusing themselves that they used the web for in the 00s, and now tend to use it only for important things where they're willing to put up with slowness.
- andrewflnr 8y agoIt's technically correct but irrelevant to the point the article is trying to make, which is more about tolerance of users for sub-par performance than about where the goal should be set. Granted, you don't have to be relevant. There's plenty of room for making side points as long as you don't try to present them as a takedown of the OP.
- GordonS 8y agoYep, early web user here - I always had an issue with slow load times. After the WWW became a thing, I was on a 14k modem, and load times drove me up the wall. In 2006, load times still drove me up the wall - pages don't have to load in nanoseconds, but I want them to at least have the perception of loading instantaneously.
- mindslight 8y ago> Always aim for those 250ms, everywhere Erm no. that number varies depending on the context. For instance, the rule of thumb for UI lag on embedded devices is around 10ms to feel "instant". Which is why the current crop of surveillance devices feel like cheap junk, because their developers shrugged off that rule in favor of using latency-inducing technology stacks meant for servers. But not everything can be immediate either. For example, I'll take issue with build time. Sure if you're working with something that can get it down to near instantaneous that's great. But there's also a virtue in needing to plan the change you're making and what you expect it to do.
- maccard 8y ago> For example, I'll take issue with build time. Sure if you're working with something that can get it down to near instantaneous that's great. But there's also a virtue in needing to plan the change you're making and what you expect it to do. And I'll take issue with this too - my current work project takes about 4 minutes to _link_. That's the absolute quickest I can get. There is definitely a ride ground, and in my experience that middle ground is somewhere around the point of "do I check email/slack/hn when I hit build"
- hodgesrm 8y agoThis line caught my attention too. It's hard to understand how anyone could argue that slower web pages are better. I typically have 50 to 100 open browser tabs at any given time and am constantly referencing material in them. Anything slower than a small fraction of a second is a material productivity hit.
- Izkata 8y agoIt's not an argument that slower is better, but that the same duration was more acceptable to more people in the past. I do think they got the years wrong though; by memory 4 seconds load time was acceptable around 2000, not 2006.
- SubiculumCode 8y agoI walk fast because I am trying to squeeze a liitle exercise in. Someone who saunters (in the middle of the sidewalk) can be frustrating.
- mindslight 8y agoAnd yet the people most glued to their device-dopamine loops are the ones most likely to be ambling along... The problem isn't really slow walkers (etc), but rather the ones who are in the way due to not paying attention and seem to justify it by thinking everybody should just walk as slow as themselves. One can be slow and considerate, just like one can be fast and inconsiderate. The latter mainly just comes to a head with people walking opposite directions though, for obvious reasons.
- capsulecorp 8y agoI have to agree with you. Same issue with slow drivers, its really a matter of consideration not speed.
- fulfillment 8y ago{}
- MrEldritch 8y ago...you seem like a pleasant person.
- selimthegrim 8y agoBukowski called, he wants his side hustle back
- bryanrasmussen 8y agoI don't mind someone walking slow that much, most people walk slower than me even when I'm not energized about something, what I hate is if they take up so much space that I can't get past them and generally they don't take up that much space because they're big but because they are normal size but need to take the middle of a narrow path.
- rootusrootus 8y agoCool story time. I actually was the target of a bit of 'sidewalk rage' not all that long ago. Not really a sidewalk, but effectively one. Walking down the main hallway in our office (not terribly long, maybe a hundred feet), one of the guys who works not too far from me was behind me, and I wasn't walking too fast (funny, I'd say I wasn't exactly slow either, probably ambling a bit at perhaps 2.0 mph, I've never really felt like speedwalking to my desk to sit for a couple hours). There's a point near the area we both work in where it jogs to the right and you can go around either side of a table, and the guy behind me actually sped up a bunch and cut me off on the other side of the table. Close enough in front of me to be rude about it, but he really needed to be in front of me. At that point we were maybe 25 feet from the area where we work. I almost laughed aloud. It did make me wonder what it's like to be him. He always seems outwardly angry, never says 'hi' to anyone he doesn't know well, hardly ever smiles, etc. Now I wonder if he lives out his days getting pissed at everyone that walks too slow for his liking, kinda like how I sometimes feel when I'm driving and can't find a clear lane that wants to go the same speed as me. The anger I feel in that situation has had a profound impact on my approach to driving as I've grown older; I try much harder now to remember that I'm not actually in a big hurry and it rarely matters one bit how long it takes to drive somewhere. I changed my definition of 'winning' the driving game as getting to my destination without my blood pressure rising.
- rectang 8y agoPrimate dominance rituals everywhere.
- Moru 8y agoAdded bonus: Driving slower means less fuel usage. Important in countries like Sweden where fuel is expensive. Try driving 70 km/h instead of 90 km/h, the difference is significant with a modern car.
- pmalynin 8y agoUhh, idk but when I can get my car into overdrive it is about twice as fuel efficient. At 70km I would have to be in fourth or fifth, which isn't nearly as close. Actually I think this is true about most ICE cars.
- skookumchuck 8y agoThe article posits that this is something new. Hardly. My whole life I've agitated behind slow drivers. Just yesterday I got stuck behind someone going 25 in a 35 for several miles. Behind me was a looooong tail of cars, probably all wondering wtf was going on. This sort of thing has always been maddening to me, since long before the internet. Though in my younger days I'd take risks getting around them.
- freedomben 8y agoI hear ya man. To make things even worse, around where I live many of these drivers will turn onto the road I'm on (now in front of me) when they didn't have time. So I have to hit my brakes to avoid running in to them, and then have to drive 10 to 15 mph slower than I was going before. I'm getting a little irritated just writing about it lol
- AznHisoka 8y agoMy pet peeve isn’t slow walkers but people looking at their phones, bumping into you and telling you to “watch where you are going”. Similarly in driving, I don’t mind slow drivers (after all they could just be beginners), but drivers who feel they own the road and double park right across another double parked car in the opposite road.
- pmiller2 8y agoPeople who drive a little slow don’t bother me, but the ones that drive 45mph on the freeway when there’s no good reason for it (traffic, etc.)? Those people piss me off. If you can’t go approximately the speed limit on the freeway when traffic conditions are good, you don’t belong on the freeway.
- mirimir 8y agoIn Mexico, it's accepted for them to drive in the shoulder.
- rounce 8y agoWhy? If you're pulled over on the shoulder, it's for refuge from the traffic speeding past. How does it make sense to encourage slightly slower traffic to use a lane where at one time or another will be vulnerable people and stationary vehicles? Surely a safer solution is employing correct lane discipline.
- mirimir 8y agoTrue enough. But the fact remains that it is pretty common there.
- hedora 8y ago“Left lane fast, right lane slow” is actually not the law in California. It really should be though — traffic in CA flows ridiculously poorly compared to everywhere else I’ve driven. (Left lane fast, right lane slow is the law in many parts of the US, even though passing on the right is generally legal too.)
- djKianoosh 8y agoI laugh at all these responses. Im the one who purposely goes slow. AMA
- djKianoosh 8y agolol at the downvotes
- freedomben 8y agoWhy are you laughing at all the responses?
- djKianoosh 8y agopeople getting aggravated by what others do and say. always seemed funny/interesting to me.
- freedomben 8y agoI agree with regards to people getting aggravated with things that don't affect them. But what about people that are being blocked? Does that not seem rude?
- tuesdayrain 8y agoWhy purposely go slow? Sometimes I take my time because I don't want to start sweating, but I don't think I've ever actually walked slowly anywhere.
- djKianoosh 8y agowhy go fast? I enjoy walking slowly.
- koyote 8y agoI am not sure where you live but when I was living in London walking slow vs walking fast meant less time spent on a stressful commute and less time wasted just getting to places. A slow stroll can be very pleasant if you're in the countryside but in a large city you rather get from A to B as quickly as possible when in crowded areas; especially if it is your daily routine. A large group walking in front of you and blocking your path are literally wasting your time. That wasted time adds up a lot on a daily basis. (5 minutes 'wasted' each way a day on your commute would equate to over 40 hours a year of time spent walking slowly behind a large group of people).
- cbanek 8y agoI have sidewalk rage. But it's not really about having people walk slower. What gets me is when people have no situational awareness (on their phones, mostly), and are walking very slowly because of that. Then they tend to clump in groups and take the whole sidewalk and won't move over to let you pass, even if you're walking in the opposite direction. I think it's inconsiderate. Same for deciding to gather your whole family right in front of the airport bathroom, just to make it harder for everyone else entering and exiting. I'm always amazed how people tend to aggregate and stop in the worst places (intersections, tight spaces, in the middle rather than out of the way). Traffic patterns are really quite amazing and I think a great source of understanding human nature.
- devit 8y agoIt's probably because you only consciously notice people aggregate when they do so in a place that causes you an inconvenience.
- enra 8y agoLike the op, I also tend to have this “situational awareness guilt”. I get anxious to stop in places where I can see myself blocking someone else. I think it comes from the fact that generally I like to keep space around me and generally observe my surroundings, which I guess not everyone shares.
- amiga-workbench 8y agoI get the same thing very often, what annoys me the most is when I'm walking with someone and there are oncoming people, and the person I'm with isn't walking in a straight line, they're slowly veering me into the path of other people. I've just got to stop and walk around the other side of the person I'm with when they start doing that. Its incredibly tiring being hyper-aware of your surroundings like this, always trying to avoid any awkwardness.
- luckman212 8y ago
- pmiller2 8y agoHere are some scenarios that get me: multiple slow walkers taking up more than half the sidewalk, and people running into me when I’m walking so far to the right, I’m practically rubbing up against a building on my right side. Both of these happen to me on a regular basis in SF.
- paultopia 8y agoI really wish people would at least try to see if economic pressure is an explanatory variable here. Intuitively, it seems to me that when I get angry at slow people it's usually because, eg, I'm trying to get to work. Or I worked late and am late for the next thing. As the pressures from the main thing that structures our time go up, wouldn't you think that our anger at lack of control over the other constraints on our time go up?
- rayraegah 8y agoIn Tokyo, people drive their bicycles on the sidewalk (ment only for pedestrians) while completely ignoring the bicycle lane with painted instructions for them. They can't drive fast and usually end up causing a mess by almost running into someone every 30-60 seconds. What's even worse is they don't even ring their bells but try to sneak past you. Most of these cyclists are not alone, they have their kids in a basket. This causes me to rage. These days I just walk on the bicycles path since all the bicycles are in the pedestrian walkway.
- andai 8y agoWhy don't they use the bike path? One country I've lived in is similar to how you describe, but there's hardly any bike paths there. Where I am now there's plenty, and everyone bikes on the bike paths.
- zulln 8y agoDo you have any guess on why people are doing that?
- rayraegah 8y agoThey fear driving on the road and prefer personal safety or value personal safety (self preservation reasons) I had a friend who did that and I proceeded to interview/profile her. I didn't ask her why she did that, I simple talked to her about the subject and noticed the primary reason was fear of driving on the road, secondary was laziness i.e. they'd have to cross the road and drive on the other side to reach their target or cross the road to drive on the correct side and cross the road again for the target which could be a little far off from the crossing. I've been looking for opportunities to talk to more people who do this to get more insight into the problem.
- temdbej 8y agoI’m usually the one who rages at slow walkers, but going to Amsterdam was a humbling experience because I seemed to inadvertently walk into angry bikers on a bike path everywhere I went
- carapace 8y ago> Research has shown meditation and mindfulness—a practice of focusing on the present—helps with impatience, although it’s not entirely clear why. Er... Ever try to be impatient without tensing your muscles? Ever try to mediate without relaxing your muscles?
- trophycase 8y agoI somewhat agree but slowpoke on the sidewalk are also somewhat of a modern problem. Because of the priority cars are given over humans, walking in cities is essentially a 1 dimentional affair, so it's somewhat understandably infuriating when someone is holding up everything and has no awareness
- philpem 8y agoFor me it's not so much slow walkers that's the problem - everyone walks at a different speed, and I tend to walk quite quickly anyway (pretty close to a slow jog, I'm told). The more annoying thing are the "street zombies" who - upon their phone beeping - stop dead in the middle of the street. Usually at a crowded bus stop on a narrow street where it's impossible to pass. By that point they're so oblivious to what's happening around them (or wearing noise-cancelling headphones and listening to music so loudly I can hear it too!) that it takes two "excuse me please"-s or a tap on the shoulder to snap them back into reality. I don't know why I find it so annoying, but I do. It does, however, make me appreciate the people who are considerate. The phone goes beep, they move to the side and make a decent effort to leave room for people to get by. I turned the beeper and vib motor off on my phone (well actually, the vib motor is broken and spares are NLA). I'll deal with it when it's convenient and safe to do so, thanks. And people are generally okay with this - so long as they know that if they need me, they're in for a bit of a wait.