4 ms·
Ask HN: Why Is the Internet Boring?
Im on a slow downhill trajectory concerning things on the 'net to read, learn, and/or entertain me.
I mainly browse HN and one or two news sites. Sometimes I feel hungry for something new, but feel unimpressed when i venture outside my usual places.
Anyone else having similar issues? What do you do?
For me, I've been trying to do something "worth while", like learning a new skill or language, often i find myself mindlessly clicking down a wikipedia rabbit hole... And then these activities bore me after a while.
Am i the only one?
- jacknobody 4y agoThe Internet is boring because it is enormously distant from, and really quite distinct from, love, and happiness. These are the things that make life worth living
- cbluth 4y agoWow, drilling down to the core, thanks for that, fuel for introspection
- xupybd 4y agoIt sounds like you want to learn and get a deep understanding of topics. I find books are much better than online articles. The incentives are different. Click based revenues tend to drive towards interesting things to click on that are easy to digest. Book sales are different, people often buy books based on other people's opinions. So the books need to be of better quality.
- burna_aws_acct 4y agoHmm... What if there was a better way of indexing across multiple media types? Then we could have a "down the audio-visual rabbit hole" experience via info clusters in a format such as an RSS feed. We could have AI glasses that use eye-tracking and haptic gloves to select AV content. And this would allow us to be anywhere while taking in info, instead of glued to a physical computer monitor. For me, there's the part of learning that is interpersonal. Shared excitement about learning a topic with and from others within reasonably close physical proximity does have benefits. I guess holograms and VR are supposed to supplement this, though I'm unsure a cartoonized avatar is a sufficient replacement.
- surprisetalk 4y agoI've been feeling a similar phenomenon. First thing I've been doing is connecting more to people via comments (like right here). Easiest way to do so is through a secret HN link. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/asknew https://news.ycombinator.com/asknew Second thing is subscribing to small newsletters. [2] https://ooh.directory https://ooh.directory Outside of "The Internet", I've been reading a ton of books! I've been particularly trying to plow through books considered "the greatest". [3] https://taylor.town/books https://taylor.town/books [4] https://taylor.town/eschew-the-new https://taylor.town/eschew-the-new But most of all, I've been making things! Your brain might be trying to signal to that you don't need consumption or information right now -- you need to synthesize what you know into something new :)
- GianFabien 4y agoI am a HN addict, so my suggestion might be unreliable. I learn best and sustain my motivation by working on specific projects. So far I've created several LED light installations using both Arduino and ESP8266 controllers. Implemented smart home functions using Rasperry Pi and various hacked WiFi IoT devices. Built several bits of furniture and trying to grow vegetables. All of these required focused research, experimentation and then more research as my knowledge grew incrementally. Before Google/StackOverflow etc, I used to buy lots of computer books. Now I have a thousand times more information at my finger tips.