9 ms·

Sleepless in Silicon Valley

157 points by prostoalex 7y ago

Willson50 7y ago
https://outline.com/E7sbMG https://outline.com/E7sbMG
adharmad 7y ago
Apart from being a snarky article, the author does not propose any actual solutions. So what if a few folks try to hack sleep? Whatever floats their respective boats....
- lukecameron 7y ago
  > It is hardly surprising that techies are not getting enough sleep, given the industry’s culture of long hours, and the widespread notion that for a true entrepreneur, everything else in life is secondary to succeeding at work. This article was very snarky, even for the economist. It seems distinctly below their usual standard of quality with broad generalisations such as the above, seemingly contradicted by an anecdote about Bryan Johnson and others' bizarre sleep practices. For me this article would have been a lot better if it focused on the sleep tech industry, and applied a more measured and evidence-based approach to its silicon valley criticisms, some of which certainly are relevant and worthy of discussion.
- neves 7y ago
  Here: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/files/docs/public/sleep/healthy_sleep.pdf http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/files/docs/public/sleep/healthy_sle... I'd also recommend earplugs and a good blackout curtain.
B1FF_PSUVM 7y ago
Bet they'll have us walking on our hands before the century is over.
fizwhiz 7y ago
Tbh the oura ring has been a game changer for a data nerd like me. I can easily see how some exercise in the day actually impacts my HRV[1] and then the quality of my sleep. Had a heavy night of drinking? Watch what the oura ring reports not just on the same night but even the next night :) Basically if you're thinking of starting your own "protocol" for sleep and would like to A/B test what works and what seems like superfluous ceremony, the oura ring is a cost-effective way to measure the effectiveness of said protocol. I think the protocol described in the article isn't anything terribly new. Most folks on HN know that blue light actually messes with sleep so if you're planning on using a screen until right before you goto bed it's a great idea to use the blue-light canceling computer glasses. Mindfulness meditation is generally a great practice to calm oneself and be reflective. I don't personally sleep at 8:45pm (rather, 11:45pm) but I do have my meal a few hours before I goto bed. I also don't drink much water closer to bedtime so I'm not rudely awakened in the middle of the night to urinate. I live in a place where the black-out blinds aren't a necessity. I've never messed with deep sound waves. Of course, some folks will exclaim "Well I don't need a device to give me a report card on how well it thinks I slept!" ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ [1] https://ouraring.com/heart-rate-variability-basics/ https://ouraring.com/heart-rate-variability-basics/
- Hamuko 7y ago
  I have trouble justifying spending 314 euros on a sleep-tracking ring.
  - mirceal 7y ago
    it depends. do you have 314 in disposable income? is health really important for you?
    - Hamuko 7y ago
      Yeah, I probably have the cash. But it's just for tracking sleep. I know that I sleep like shit. I go to bed at 0030 and wake up at 0700. Don't really know what difference the ring would make here. No idea what the ring would tell me what I don't really know and how in the world I would turn the data into something usable.
jchrisa 7y ago
My hack is just fall asleep when putting the kids to sleep and wake up whenever I feel like. If I've been pushing hard, sometimes I'll take all 10 hours, other nights I'm up at 4am ready to work.
- seanmcdirmid 7y ago
  I wish my two year old would sleep 10 hours a night.
- rootusrootus 7y ago
  Hey, someone else who does the same thing as me! Yay! As soon as my wife and I put the kids down, we head to bed ourselves. Then I wakeup whenever, which frequently translates to 4-5am but like you, sometimes lasts until the kiddos wake up. We're lucky that both of our kids have always been great sleepers, aside from occasional attempts to get up in the middle of the night and come sleep with mom & dad.
checkyoursudo 7y ago
My sleep tracking now consists of putting my APAP on to counteract my sleep apnea, falling asleep within seconds because I'm like Pavlov's sleeping baby dog because of the machine, and then waking up and seeing what the machine says re: how long it has been pushing air in my nose. It works surprisingly well, actually. If I only got 6.5 hours of APAP last night, then I will pretty reliably go to bed a little earlier tonight. My takeaway from this is that someone should make a fake CPAP face mask for people who don't need a CPAP that tells you how long you've been wearing it. I'm 100% convinced that the mask itself is what makes me fall asleep so fast. Once the mask is on, my brain knows it's time for sleep and complies. I guess I don't know if that's the same for all APAP/CPAP/Bi-PAP users though.
- ip26 7y ago
  As Pavlov would tell you, it doesn't need to be a mask. It can be anything. So for the mass market, perhaps a bell would be a better choice.
  - wpietri 7y ago
    The one I recommend is automated light. A while back I built something to mimic a day-night cycle: https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise My original goal was to counteract the darkness of winter, which impacts my mood and productivity. But the thing I like best about it is that the lights dim in the evening, so I actually go to bed at a reasonable hour. Whereas with manual lighting, I can easily leave the lights on while doing something, not notice the hour, and throw off my sleep cycle.
  - favorited 7y ago
    Sleep researchers and doctors claim that your bed itself should be the bell. It will be easiest for you to fall asleep if you don't spend any time in your bed unless you are actively trying to fall asleep. No reading a book before you sleep, no checking your email in the morning, etc. They prioritize it to the point that, if you are lying in bed trying to sleep at night for more than 20 minutes, you should get up and spend some time relaxing somewhere else.
strikelaserclaw 7y ago
sleep, healthy eating, and exercise are fundamental to living a long and fulfilling life. I think it's great that people are trying to determine in a quantitative way when we've "slept good." I sure as hell can use a device that can tell me if I've slept well, so i can try to establish a pattern between how i feel the next day and what these devices tell me as to how i slept.
- DenisM 7y ago
  What would you do with that data, that you cannot do with a simple journal you'd fill out each morning?
hrzn 7y ago
"Why We Sleep" by Matthew Walker is an excellent book for those interested in what science has to say about sleep (disclaimer: it's excessively good for you)
- rootusrootus 7y ago
  Sometimes I wonder if Mr. Walker is paying people at HN to talk about his book :). Comes up more often than I'd expect.
  - davemp 7y ago
    Yeah the HN marketing worked on me and I almost never by non-fiction books.
  - chillacy 7y ago
    He should write me a check, I’ve recommended that book on HN and offline to at least 5 new readers.
- Symmetry 7y ago
  Sleep is very important in all sorts of ways but Professor Walker was throwing everything at the wall in an effort to convince the reader to get better sleep at times. One chapter talking about how people who get less sleep will naturally want to eat more. Another chapter telling how rats with given constant diets and restricted sleep eventually starve to death. I do trust all his citations to be accurate but I'm also sure that if there was some way in which less sleep was good for you he wouldn't mention it. But it was a very valuable book in terms of explaining just what sleep does for you.
- mirceal 7y ago
  it's good for you as in it will scare the shit out of you and make you pay attention to your sleep. the examples can be a little exaggerated and one has to wonder how anyone that does not get enough sleep is still alive - but yeah. if you haven't already, read the book
par 7y ago
though this article is basically an ad for the oura ring, i do think sleep hygiene is an interesting topic and worthy of conversation. Would love to hear what the HN crowd thinks.
remarkEon 7y ago
Hmm another sleep article. I'll share what I do. After being in the Army for a while, and waking up at 430 and going to bed at close to midnight for a long time during the week (there's no real "sleep schedule" overseas though) I've been working on tuning my sleep cycle for the seasons to great success. Over the last year I've been slightly altering my alarm each night based on when sunrise is (plus going to bed earlier/later as the days lengthen/shorten), and it's significantly improved how quickly I fall asleep, how easily I get out of bed in the morning, and how rested I feel. I'm not a huge "fitness tracker" guy (still analog in that regard, with a notebook for workouts instead of some app or a spreadsheet). No idea if there's any science behind any of what I'm doing and frankly I don't care. It works great for me.
- xixixao 7y ago
  Can you add more details on how you handle seasons? This is something I've been wondering about. Do you shorten/lengthen your sleep? Or just shift it to always wake up at sunrise? I think shifting seasons might be one "natural" thing which our biology is not "naturally" attuned to, and a fixed-length day would probably be better (maybe we'll have it in the future on a space colony, by I digress).
  - remarkEon 7y ago
    I think it's as simple as I sleep more in the winter and less in the summer and about the same between spring and fall. Not anything crazy. It's probably an average of ~7 hours in the summers and 8+ in the winter. I live in a high latitude city and last year I figured I'd just try it, given how much more light we get in the summer. Work is a little hard to accommodate in the winter sometimes, but otherwise I think I'll probably do this for the rest of my life.
- pythonpatrol 7y ago
  Can you detail it more? Sounds like I'd benefit from this way of sleeping.
  - remarkEon 7y ago
jasaloo 7y ago
Re/ oura rings... anyone else paranoid of a private company having access to intensely personal data? If I were an insurance company I'd be lobbying the shit out of these guys to see how much they'd charge me to get my hands on it. (and yeah, I read Oura's privacy agreement already... was less than impressed)
- rexpop 7y ago
  Of course, but this is just another in a long train of abuse-potential. The technology isn't the choke point for protecting our rights, and individual consumer choices will never be revolutionary enough to alter the terms of consumption.
- anotherevan 7y ago
  FYI, here is their privacy policy - https://ouraring.com/privacy-policy-device-and-application/ https://ouraring.com/privacy-policy-device-and-application/ And an article they wrote regarding the impact of GDPR - https://help.ouraring.com/oura-account-and-privacy/ouras-privacy-policy-and-gdpr https://help.ouraring.com/oura-account-and-privacy/ouras-pri... Would you trust Oura more or less than Fitbit or other, similar vendors?
DenisM 7y ago
Another view on the Oura thing: https://www.medpagetoday.com/practicemanagement/informationtechnology/78317 https://www.medpagetoday.com/practicemanagement/informationt... It's rather skeptical. Choice quote: [...] The SRI researchers studied 41 healthy adolescents and young adults (average age 17). Sleep data were recorded using the Oura ring and standard PSG on a single laboratory overnight. Metrics were compared using Bland-Altman plots and epoch-by-epoch analysis. The ring accurately detected "light" and "deep" sleep in 65% and 51% of the sleep epochs, respectively. It also accurately detected 61% of REM sleep epochs, with an overall overestimation of PSG REM sleep (by about 17 min). When the ring misclassified PSG REM sleep, the algorithm usually classified the epoch as "light sleep" (76%). These data suggest that the Oura Ring is virtually useless in telling you if you are in REM sleep versus deep or light sleep. [...]
- neves 7y ago
  I have a cheap Mi Band 2 and I'm impressed with how well it measures when I'm sleeping and when I'm awake. I don't know how good it is to measure deep sleep. I does not pretend to measure REM. Are there any weareable device that measures it well?
  - rootusrootus 7y ago
    I use an Apple Watch and an app called Pillow and it does a plausible job of guessing when I went to sleep and when I woke up. It also identifies light/deep sleep and REM, but I have no way of telling how accurate. It seems to detect awake periods at night as well as I can remember them. But ... I kinda assume it's a crapshoot and I use it more as a novelty and an estimate of total sleep than any kind of accurate representation of sleep cycles.
- RandallBrown 7y ago
  It doesn't matter so much how accurate it is, as long as it's consistently inaccurate. I don't care if my scale at home is perfectly accurate. I care about knowing that my weight is going up/down.
  - 7y ago
3xblah 7y ago
Polysomnography seems like an area in desperate need of innovation to improve efficiency and lower cost. It is far too expensive for the entire undiagnosed sleep-deprived population to have a single sleep study let alone for those already diagnosed to have more frequent observation.
peshooo 7y ago
> Techies obsess about OKRs (objectives and key results), KPIs (key performance indicators). What an over-generalization.
- calvinbhai 7y ago
  This article is published by an entity/author obsessing over SEO, CTR, CPM, CPI (basically ad $$$)
beat 7y ago
I recently went through a sleep study, and the doctor was openly aggravated by how current trends and devices focus on "deep sleep", when it's actually "light sleep" that we need to regain our mental focus.
- yocheckit 7y ago
  Really? Care to elaborate?
  - xkcd-sucks 7y ago
    REM is "light sleep", one 3 hour-ish sleep cycle is "NREM stage I -> NREM stage II -> NREM stage III -> REM" where REM is considered "pretty close to awake" and NREM stage numbers are "progressively deeper". Deeper basically means lower body temperature, less movement, and slower breathing. This is on the basis of clustering/pattern matching body movement, body temperature, and some brain wave/MRI crap. VERY broadly speaking, "deep" NREM stages are important for "body health" while REM is important for maintenence of memories and "mental health". As with anything in neurobiology, it's "emerging evidence suggests that..." and nobody really knows what's going on. Except all evidence suggests sleeping less is bad for pretty much everything. The dynamics of sleep state transitions are also pretty meaningful, e.g. time it takes to move from one stage to the next, whether there's "backwards" transitions, etc. For example, sleep deprivation lengthens deep NREM time, lowers latency from wake -> NREM I, and shortens the entire sleep cycle.
    - yocheckit 7y ago
      huh, that is fascinating to hear. Will definitely be keeping an eye on this space, thanks for the info.
chriselles 7y ago
I use a Samsung smartwatch that came with my Samsung S9 as a package deal. The sleep tracker has been useful to me in tracking my quantity/quality and average sleep. I still get to spend a few weeks a year a few times a year assessing human performance. Sleep is absolutely critical to human physical, mental, emotional, and social performance. And as the parent of adolescent children who are technology driven, monitoring their "digital nutrition", mixing in other activities, ensuring they are well fed/hydrated, and compelling good sleep hygiene is absolutely essential to their development as adolescents towards adulthood. It's quite shocking to observe how common it is for both adults and children to be seen suffering from poor sleep hygiene.
cocoa19 7y ago
Now I want to get an Oura! Are ads getting smarter?
chandeliermbing 7y ago
This is a great example of how quantitative facts decide over the qualitative evaluation of all things in Silicon Valley - including deeply personal matters like sleep and even relationships. I've been living in Silicon Valley for a while now and I can't believe my eyes and ears sometimes!
an4rchy 7y ago
Paywalled, but based on the free paragraphs, I was kinda surprised that it didn't talk about the other factors that may affect sleep. Currently reading 'Why we sleep' which is a fascinating book about the importance/history/evolution of sleep across species and time. (Highly recommend it -- definitely regretting all the sleepless/low sleep nights) At a high level, my understanding is that the duration/quality of sleep depends on physiological, mental and environmental conditions. It sounds like the focus of the article was on environmental (I would definitely love to sleep with zero light/sound). Similarly, the 5-10 mins meditation may help, but if you're stressed out or have something on your mind, that can still keep you awake or wake you up. You can make sure not to eat/drink anything by that time (6pm) but effects of caffeine/other foods you might have eaten earlier can impact your sleep quality. Finally, the right physiological/chemical changes need to occur (melatonin/REM cycles/tired from physically exhausting activities) for you to actually be sleepy. Most people can't just sleep on command, although, you might be able to build/force the habit.
- DenisM 7y ago
  >(I would definitely love to sleep with zero light/sound). You might not actually like it. Try a sensory deprivation tank and see how that works for you. To reduce the noise you can always reach for quality earplugs, a sleeping mask, and blackout curtains.
DiabloD3 7y ago
So why aren't we just using Sleep As Android like normal people, and not using some weird devices to track it? Absolutely don't understand the fetish of expensive devices just to track sleep, and I'm the one here with the non-24hr circadian rhythm.
- krtkush 7y ago
  Not everyone has an Android phone and some people don't like keeping their phones right next to their bed. I have a fitbit charge 2 and that thing does more than just track sleep - heart rate, VO2 max, steps, connected GPS for running. So the expensive device is not a bad investment IMO.
lacampbell 7y ago
In New Zealand, electric blankets are very common because (for the most part) we're too poor to live in insulated houses. It's hilarious that they've been re-discovered as a sleep hack for hyper-wealthy californians.
- dolguldur 7y ago
  Yours are probably just heating. Theirs are cooling
dqpb 7y ago
> radiation-blocking Faraday tents Is there any research that indicates this would be beneficial in any way?
person_of_color 7y ago
How to avoid waking too early?
cavisne 7y ago
I've found the app recommended by wirecutter https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-sleep-tracking-app/ https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-sleep-tracking-app/ Quite accurate, at least for time to sleep, and time asleep. I think the REM, NREM etc is mostly noise, if you are getting 8+ hours a night every night (super hard to do!) the quality of sleep should be fine. The best thing is to set a "go to bed" alarm, for night owls like me its so easy to say you go to bed "around 10" when in fact it can be much later.
wyclif 7y ago
I have a question for those far more into sleep hygiene than I am: is it possible to get blue light-blocking prescription lenses for normal glasses?
- neves 7y ago
  Yes. Every lenses has this option by now.
oddie 7y ago
The accuracy of estimating sleep stages using heart rate and movement metrics is an interesting, and tenuous, subject. WRT to Fitbit and Oura the TLDR is that Fitbit and Oura aren’t accurate for slow wave (Deep Sleep) or REM. However, Fitbit is better at REM detection [1][2] than Oura. While sleep staging can be useful for identifying case sleep disorders, we know that the brain self-optimizes the stages of sleep you go through. So, what’s far more important than worrying about your rem or deep is optimizing getting time in any stage of sleep. Each stage is critical in a different way. If you care about improving your performance the measures you should care about—backed by strong scientific consensus and a plurality of randomized evidence—are sleep debt and where you are in your circadian rhythm. Sleep scientists call this the two factor model This reality drove us to create a sleep improvement app, called Rise ([https://www.risescience.com](https://www.risescience.com/) https://www.risescience.com](https://www.risescience.com/)). We started both our research and company initially for elite athletes. We tell them what to do to improve their sleep tonight based on science. It's currently being used by both professional and collegiate teams across the NFL, MLB, NBA, MLS, and NCAAF. We've been taking what we've learned from athletes and adapting for us regular folk. If you're interested in joining our beta, sign up here: [http://bit.ly/hacker-friends](http://bit.ly/hacker-friends) http://bit.ly/hacker-friends](http://bit.ly/hacker-friends) [1] [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28323455](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28323455) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28323455](https://www.nc... [2] [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29235907](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29235907) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29235907](https://www.nc...

157 points by prostoalex 7y ago

https://outline.com/E7sbMG https://outline.com/E7sbMG

Apart from being a snarky article, the author does not propose any actual solutions. So what if a few folks try to hack sleep? Whatever floats their respective boats....

lukecameron 7y ago
> It is hardly surprising that techies are not getting enough sleep, given the industry’s culture of long hours, and the widespread notion that for a true entrepreneur, everything else in life is secondary to succeeding at work. This article was very snarky, even for the economist. It seems distinctly below their usual standard of quality with broad generalisations such as the above, seemingly contradicted by an anecdote about Bryan Johnson and others' bizarre sleep practices. For me this article would have been a lot better if it focused on the sleep tech industry, and applied a more measured and evidence-based approach to its silicon valley criticisms, some of which certainly are relevant and worthy of discussion.
neves 7y ago
Here: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/files/docs/public/sleep/healthy_sleep.pdf http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/files/docs/public/sleep/healthy_sle... I'd also recommend earplugs and a good blackout curtain.

B1FF_PSUVM 7y ago

Bet they'll have us walking on our hands before the century is over.

fizwhiz 7y ago

Tbh the oura ring has been a game changer for a data nerd like me. I can easily see how some exercise in the day actually impacts my HRV[1] and then the quality of my sleep. Had a heavy night of drinking? Watch what the oura ring reports not just on the same night but even the next night :) Basically if you're thinking of starting your own "protocol" for sleep and would like to A/B test what works and what seems like superfluous ceremony, the oura ring is a cost-effective way to measure the effectiveness of said protocol. I think the protocol described in the article isn't anything terribly new. Most folks on HN know that blue light actually messes with sleep so if you're planning on using a screen until right before you goto bed it's a great idea to use the blue-light canceling computer glasses. Mindfulness meditation is generally a great practice to calm oneself and be reflective. I don't personally sleep at 8:45pm (rather, 11:45pm) but I do have my meal a few hours before I goto bed. I also don't drink much water closer to bedtime so I'm not rudely awakened in the middle of the night to urinate. I live in a place where the black-out blinds aren't a necessity. I've never messed with deep sound waves. Of course, some folks will exclaim "Well I don't need a device to give me a report card on how well it thinks I slept!" ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ [1] https://ouraring.com/heart-rate-variability-basics/ https://ouraring.com/heart-rate-variability-basics/

Hamuko 7y ago
I have trouble justifying spending 314 euros on a sleep-tracking ring.
- mirceal 7y ago
  it depends. do you have 314 in disposable income? is health really important for you?
  - Hamuko 7y ago
    Yeah, I probably have the cash. But it's just for tracking sleep. I know that I sleep like shit. I go to bed at 0030 and wake up at 0700. Don't really know what difference the ring would make here. No idea what the ring would tell me what I don't really know and how in the world I would turn the data into something usable.

jchrisa 7y ago

My hack is just fall asleep when putting the kids to sleep and wake up whenever I feel like. If I've been pushing hard, sometimes I'll take all 10 hours, other nights I'm up at 4am ready to work.

seanmcdirmid 7y ago
I wish my two year old would sleep 10 hours a night.
rootusrootus 7y ago
Hey, someone else who does the same thing as me! Yay! As soon as my wife and I put the kids down, we head to bed ourselves. Then I wakeup whenever, which frequently translates to 4-5am but like you, sometimes lasts until the kiddos wake up. We're lucky that both of our kids have always been great sleepers, aside from occasional attempts to get up in the middle of the night and come sleep with mom & dad.

checkyoursudo 7y ago

My sleep tracking now consists of putting my APAP on to counteract my sleep apnea, falling asleep within seconds because I'm like Pavlov's sleeping baby dog because of the machine, and then waking up and seeing what the machine says re: how long it has been pushing air in my nose. It works surprisingly well, actually. If I only got 6.5 hours of APAP last night, then I will pretty reliably go to bed a little earlier tonight. My takeaway from this is that someone should make a fake CPAP face mask for people who don't need a CPAP that tells you how long you've been wearing it. I'm 100% convinced that the mask itself is what makes me fall asleep so fast. Once the mask is on, my brain knows it's time for sleep and complies. I guess I don't know if that's the same for all APAP/CPAP/Bi-PAP users though.

ip26 7y ago
As Pavlov would tell you, it doesn't need to be a mask. It can be anything. So for the mass market, perhaps a bell would be a better choice.
- wpietri 7y ago
  The one I recommend is automated light. A while back I built something to mimic a day-night cycle: https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise https://github.com/wpietri/sunrise My original goal was to counteract the darkness of winter, which impacts my mood and productivity. But the thing I like best about it is that the lights dim in the evening, so I actually go to bed at a reasonable hour. Whereas with manual lighting, I can easily leave the lights on while doing something, not notice the hour, and throw off my sleep cycle.
- favorited 7y ago
  Sleep researchers and doctors claim that your bed itself should be the bell. It will be easiest for you to fall asleep if you don't spend any time in your bed unless you are actively trying to fall asleep. No reading a book before you sleep, no checking your email in the morning, etc. They prioritize it to the point that, if you are lying in bed trying to sleep at night for more than 20 minutes, you should get up and spend some time relaxing somewhere else.

strikelaserclaw 7y ago

sleep, healthy eating, and exercise are fundamental to living a long and fulfilling life. I think it's great that people are trying to determine in a quantitative way when we've "slept good." I sure as hell can use a device that can tell me if I've slept well, so i can try to establish a pattern between how i feel the next day and what these devices tell me as to how i slept.

DenisM 7y ago
What would you do with that data, that you cannot do with a simple journal you'd fill out each morning?

hrzn 7y ago

"Why We Sleep" by Matthew Walker is an excellent book for those interested in what science has to say about sleep (disclaimer: it's excessively good for you)

rootusrootus 7y ago
Sometimes I wonder if Mr. Walker is paying people at HN to talk about his book :). Comes up more often than I'd expect.
- davemp 7y ago
  Yeah the HN marketing worked on me and I almost never by non-fiction books.
- chillacy 7y ago
  He should write me a check, I’ve recommended that book on HN and offline to at least 5 new readers.
Symmetry 7y ago
Sleep is very important in all sorts of ways but Professor Walker was throwing everything at the wall in an effort to convince the reader to get better sleep at times. One chapter talking about how people who get less sleep will naturally want to eat more. Another chapter telling how rats with given constant diets and restricted sleep eventually starve to death. I do trust all his citations to be accurate but I'm also sure that if there was some way in which less sleep was good for you he wouldn't mention it. But it was a very valuable book in terms of explaining just what sleep does for you.
mirceal 7y ago
it's good for you as in it will scare the shit out of you and make you pay attention to your sleep. the examples can be a little exaggerated and one has to wonder how anyone that does not get enough sleep is still alive - but yeah. if you haven't already, read the book

par 7y ago

though this article is basically an ad for the oura ring, i do think sleep hygiene is an interesting topic and worthy of conversation. Would love to hear what the HN crowd thinks.

remarkEon 7y ago

Hmm another sleep article. I'll share what I do. After being in the Army for a while, and waking up at 430 and going to bed at close to midnight for a long time during the week (there's no real "sleep schedule" overseas though) I've been working on tuning my sleep cycle for the seasons to great success. Over the last year I've been slightly altering my alarm each night based on when sunrise is (plus going to bed earlier/later as the days lengthen/shorten), and it's significantly improved how quickly I fall asleep, how easily I get out of bed in the morning, and how rested I feel. I'm not a huge "fitness tracker" guy (still analog in that regard, with a notebook for workouts instead of some app or a spreadsheet). No idea if there's any science behind any of what I'm doing and frankly I don't care. It works great for me.

xixixao 7y ago
Can you add more details on how you handle seasons? This is something I've been wondering about. Do you shorten/lengthen your sleep? Or just shift it to always wake up at sunrise? I think shifting seasons might be one "natural" thing which our biology is not "naturally" attuned to, and a fixed-length day would probably be better (maybe we'll have it in the future on a space colony, by I digress).
- remarkEon 7y ago
  I think it's as simple as I sleep more in the winter and less in the summer and about the same between spring and fall. Not anything crazy. It's probably an average of ~7 hours in the summers and 8+ in the winter. I live in a high latitude city and last year I figured I'd just try it, given how much more light we get in the summer. Work is a little hard to accommodate in the winter sometimes, but otherwise I think I'll probably do this for the rest of my life.
pythonpatrol 7y ago
Can you detail it more? Sounds like I'd benefit from this way of sleeping.
- remarkEon 7y ago

jasaloo 7y ago

Re/ oura rings... anyone else paranoid of a private company having access to intensely personal data? If I were an insurance company I'd be lobbying the shit out of these guys to see how much they'd charge me to get my hands on it. (and yeah, I read Oura's privacy agreement already... was less than impressed)

rexpop 7y ago
Of course, but this is just another in a long train of abuse-potential. The technology isn't the choke point for protecting our rights, and individual consumer choices will never be revolutionary enough to alter the terms of consumption.
anotherevan 7y ago
FYI, here is their privacy policy - https://ouraring.com/privacy-policy-device-and-application/ https://ouraring.com/privacy-policy-device-and-application/ And an article they wrote regarding the impact of GDPR - https://help.ouraring.com/oura-account-and-privacy/ouras-privacy-policy-and-gdpr https://help.ouraring.com/oura-account-and-privacy/ouras-pri... Would you trust Oura more or less than Fitbit or other, similar vendors?

DenisM 7y ago

Another view on the Oura thing: https://www.medpagetoday.com/practicemanagement/informationtechnology/78317 https://www.medpagetoday.com/practicemanagement/informationt... It's rather skeptical. Choice quote: [...] The SRI researchers studied 41 healthy adolescents and young adults (average age 17). Sleep data were recorded using the Oura ring and standard PSG on a single laboratory overnight. Metrics were compared using Bland-Altman plots and epoch-by-epoch analysis. The ring accurately detected "light" and "deep" sleep in 65% and 51% of the sleep epochs, respectively. It also accurately detected 61% of REM sleep epochs, with an overall overestimation of PSG REM sleep (by about 17 min). When the ring misclassified PSG REM sleep, the algorithm usually classified the epoch as "light sleep" (76%). These data suggest that the Oura Ring is virtually useless in telling you if you are in REM sleep versus deep or light sleep. [...]

neves 7y ago
I have a cheap Mi Band 2 and I'm impressed with how well it measures when I'm sleeping and when I'm awake. I don't know how good it is to measure deep sleep. I does not pretend to measure REM. Are there any weareable device that measures it well?
- rootusrootus 7y ago
  I use an Apple Watch and an app called Pillow and it does a plausible job of guessing when I went to sleep and when I woke up. It also identifies light/deep sleep and REM, but I have no way of telling how accurate. It seems to detect awake periods at night as well as I can remember them. But ... I kinda assume it's a crapshoot and I use it more as a novelty and an estimate of total sleep than any kind of accurate representation of sleep cycles.
RandallBrown 7y ago
It doesn't matter so much how accurate it is, as long as it's consistently inaccurate. I don't care if my scale at home is perfectly accurate. I care about knowing that my weight is going up/down.
- 7y ago

3xblah 7y ago

Polysomnography seems like an area in desperate need of innovation to improve efficiency and lower cost. It is far too expensive for the entire undiagnosed sleep-deprived population to have a single sleep study let alone for those already diagnosed to have more frequent observation.

peshooo 7y ago

> Techies obsess about OKRs (objectives and key results), KPIs (key performance indicators). What an over-generalization.

calvinbhai 7y ago
This article is published by an entity/author obsessing over SEO, CTR, CPM, CPI (basically ad $$$)

beat 7y ago

I recently went through a sleep study, and the doctor was openly aggravated by how current trends and devices focus on "deep sleep", when it's actually "light sleep" that we need to regain our mental focus.

yocheckit 7y ago
Really? Care to elaborate?
- xkcd-sucks 7y ago
  REM is "light sleep", one 3 hour-ish sleep cycle is "NREM stage I -> NREM stage II -> NREM stage III -> REM" where REM is considered "pretty close to awake" and NREM stage numbers are "progressively deeper". Deeper basically means lower body temperature, less movement, and slower breathing. This is on the basis of clustering/pattern matching body movement, body temperature, and some brain wave/MRI crap. VERY broadly speaking, "deep" NREM stages are important for "body health" while REM is important for maintenence of memories and "mental health". As with anything in neurobiology, it's "emerging evidence suggests that..." and nobody really knows what's going on. Except all evidence suggests sleeping less is bad for pretty much everything. The dynamics of sleep state transitions are also pretty meaningful, e.g. time it takes to move from one stage to the next, whether there's "backwards" transitions, etc. For example, sleep deprivation lengthens deep NREM time, lowers latency from wake -> NREM I, and shortens the entire sleep cycle.
  - yocheckit 7y ago
    huh, that is fascinating to hear. Will definitely be keeping an eye on this space, thanks for the info.

chriselles 7y ago

I use a Samsung smartwatch that came with my Samsung S9 as a package deal. The sleep tracker has been useful to me in tracking my quantity/quality and average sleep. I still get to spend a few weeks a year a few times a year assessing human performance. Sleep is absolutely critical to human physical, mental, emotional, and social performance. And as the parent of adolescent children who are technology driven, monitoring their "digital nutrition", mixing in other activities, ensuring they are well fed/hydrated, and compelling good sleep hygiene is absolutely essential to their development as adolescents towards adulthood. It's quite shocking to observe how common it is for both adults and children to be seen suffering from poor sleep hygiene.

cocoa19 7y ago

Now I want to get an Oura! Are ads getting smarter?

chandeliermbing 7y ago

This is a great example of how quantitative facts decide over the qualitative evaluation of all things in Silicon Valley - including deeply personal matters like sleep and even relationships. I've been living in Silicon Valley for a while now and I can't believe my eyes and ears sometimes!

an4rchy 7y ago

Paywalled, but based on the free paragraphs, I was kinda surprised that it didn't talk about the other factors that may affect sleep. Currently reading 'Why we sleep' which is a fascinating book about the importance/history/evolution of sleep across species and time. (Highly recommend it -- definitely regretting all the sleepless/low sleep nights) At a high level, my understanding is that the duration/quality of sleep depends on physiological, mental and environmental conditions. It sounds like the focus of the article was on environmental (I would definitely love to sleep with zero light/sound). Similarly, the 5-10 mins meditation may help, but if you're stressed out or have something on your mind, that can still keep you awake or wake you up. You can make sure not to eat/drink anything by that time (6pm) but effects of caffeine/other foods you might have eaten earlier can impact your sleep quality. Finally, the right physiological/chemical changes need to occur (melatonin/REM cycles/tired from physically exhausting activities) for you to actually be sleepy. Most people can't just sleep on command, although, you might be able to build/force the habit.

DenisM 7y ago
>(I would definitely love to sleep with zero light/sound). You might not actually like it. Try a sensory deprivation tank and see how that works for you. To reduce the noise you can always reach for quality earplugs, a sleeping mask, and blackout curtains.

DiabloD3 7y ago

So why aren't we just using Sleep As Android like normal people, and not using some weird devices to track it? Absolutely don't understand the fetish of expensive devices just to track sleep, and I'm the one here with the non-24hr circadian rhythm.

krtkush 7y ago
Not everyone has an Android phone and some people don't like keeping their phones right next to their bed. I have a fitbit charge 2 and that thing does more than just track sleep - heart rate, VO2 max, steps, connected GPS for running. So the expensive device is not a bad investment IMO.

lacampbell 7y ago

In New Zealand, electric blankets are very common because (for the most part) we're too poor to live in insulated houses. It's hilarious that they've been re-discovered as a sleep hack for hyper-wealthy californians.

dolguldur 7y ago
Yours are probably just heating. Theirs are cooling

dqpb 7y ago

> radiation-blocking Faraday tents Is there any research that indicates this would be beneficial in any way?

person_of_color 7y ago

How to avoid waking too early?

cavisne 7y ago

I've found the app recommended by wirecutter https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-sleep-tracking-app/ https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-sleep-tracking-app/ Quite accurate, at least for time to sleep, and time asleep. I think the REM, NREM etc is mostly noise, if you are getting 8+ hours a night every night (super hard to do!) the quality of sleep should be fine. The best thing is to set a "go to bed" alarm, for night owls like me its so easy to say you go to bed "around 10" when in fact it can be much later.

wyclif 7y ago

I have a question for those far more into sleep hygiene than I am: is it possible to get blue light-blocking prescription lenses for normal glasses?

neves 7y ago
Yes. Every lenses has this option by now.

oddie 7y ago

The accuracy of estimating sleep stages using heart rate and movement metrics is an interesting, and tenuous, subject. WRT to Fitbit and Oura the TLDR is that Fitbit and Oura aren’t accurate for slow wave (Deep Sleep) or REM. However, Fitbit is better at REM detection [1][2] than Oura. While sleep staging can be useful for identifying case sleep disorders, we know that the brain self-optimizes the stages of sleep you go through. So, what’s far more important than worrying about your rem or deep is optimizing getting time in any stage of sleep. Each stage is critical in a different way. If you care about improving your performance the measures you should care about—backed by strong scientific consensus and a plurality of randomized evidence—are sleep debt and where you are in your circadian rhythm. Sleep scientists call this the two factor model This reality drove us to create a sleep improvement app, called Rise ([https://www.risescience.com](https://www.risescience.com/) https://www.risescience.com](https://www.risescience.com/)). We started both our research and company initially for elite athletes. We tell them what to do to improve their sleep tonight based on science. It's currently being used by both professional and collegiate teams across the NFL, MLB, NBA, MLS, and NCAAF. We've been taking what we've learned from athletes and adapting for us regular folk. If you're interested in joining our beta, sign up here: [http://bit.ly/hacker-friends](http://bit.ly/hacker-friends) http://bit.ly/hacker-friends](http://bit.ly/hacker-friends) [1] [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28323455](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28323455) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28323455](https://www.nc... [2] [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29235907](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29235907) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29235907](https://www.nc...