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Nice piece. At this point I am pretty exasperated at the ~ decade of efforts I've made to reduce my social media usage as a gen-z person. The greyscale, the tu

Nice piece. At this point I am pretty exasperated at the ~ decade of efforts I've made to reduce my social media usage as a gen-z person. The greyscale, the turning off notifications, the uninstalling of apps, the screen time blocks. The only things that have had long-term (and yet still incomplete) benefit is physically separating myself from my phone, like leaving it in the car or at home during dinner, as well as maximally delaying phone usage in the morning. Whats frustrating is that the discourse, like in this essay, usually revolves around summoning discipline or willpower on the part of the user, and usually doesn't discuss the behavior of the tech companies. These apps and technologies are engineered very carefully to exploit the fast, instinctual type 1 side of your brain that, for good reasons, has evolutionary has dominion over the deliberate, thoughtful type 2 thinking that I think most of us would prefer to be doing more of. Because of this, I just don't see this scourge changing through efforts on the parts of the users. Maybe that's pessimistic.

andrewrn 1y ago
I do wonder what AI will do to this dynamic. The generative capabilities will surely turbocharge the existing dynamic (which frankly I don't see how it can get too much worse), but I do wonder about AI applications that can act as a sort of tether to the conscious type 2 thinking. When conscious, you define how you'd like to spend your time, and that agent/AI can help reel you in when you lapse into unconscious scrolling. Or an AI that curates only topics you'd be happy spending time viewing. A bunch of very powerful people have a huge vested interest in not letting these things happen, though, so I'm not hopeful.
thefaux 1y ago
In the long run, the only way things can get better is through individual action as daunting and hopeless as that might feel in the face of the current system.
- andrewrn 1y ago
  You're right about this. Thanks for catching my cynicism lol
graemep 1y ago
Uninstall the apps. Only use social media from a desktop. That gives you the physical separation in a sustainable way.
- xorvoid 1y ago
  Agreed. I don’t use social media of any kind. Not even on the desktop. I always run with Downtime on. All new apps are disallowed from running or notifying unless I whitelist them explicitly. You really don’t need this “attention porn” in your life. Just turn it all off. Make friends IRL instead. So worth it.
  - andrewrn 1y ago
    I am in complete agreement that the attention porn is not needed. But that doesn't address the fact that its habit-forming. Nicotine is also not needed in the lives of smokers. This isn't terribly different.
    - graemep 1y ago
      That is all the more reason to make an effort to break the addiction. That is what people do with nicotine. I do not know of any countries that have banned nicotine. Almost all countries banned sales to kids from a very long time ago, so that was not what changed. One thing I remember from looking at the industry (I was an investment analyst back then) about 25 years ago, and from my own observations, is that there was a cultural change. Smoking became uncool, a mark of a lack of education. First in the west, and then later globally. Sales of more expensive brands declined, market share moved to cheap brands. That motivated people to break their addiction and a lot of people gave up as a result. However, everyone with an addiction had to struggle to break it. Maybe we need more support for people trying to break their social media addiction. Social media addiction anonymous? I guess it still feels like someone trying to give up smoking when everyone did it. On the other hand, I would encourage you to try. I am very fond of quoting the serenity prayer, and this is something you can control (although its not easy).
      - 1y ago

andrewrn 1y ago

I do wonder what AI will do to this dynamic. The generative capabilities will surely turbocharge the existing dynamic (which frankly I don't see how it can get too much worse), but I do wonder about AI applications that can act as a sort of tether to the conscious type 2 thinking. When conscious, you define how you'd like to spend your time, and that agent/AI can help reel you in when you lapse into unconscious scrolling. Or an AI that curates only topics you'd be happy spending time viewing. A bunch of very powerful people have a huge vested interest in not letting these things happen, though, so I'm not hopeful.

thefaux 1y ago

In the long run, the only way things can get better is through individual action as daunting and hopeless as that might feel in the face of the current system.

andrewrn 1y ago
You're right about this. Thanks for catching my cynicism lol

graemep 1y ago

Uninstall the apps. Only use social media from a desktop. That gives you the physical separation in a sustainable way.

xorvoid 1y ago
Agreed. I don’t use social media of any kind. Not even on the desktop. I always run with Downtime on. All new apps are disallowed from running or notifying unless I whitelist them explicitly. You really don’t need this “attention porn” in your life. Just turn it all off. Make friends IRL instead. So worth it.
- andrewrn 1y ago
  I am in complete agreement that the attention porn is not needed. But that doesn't address the fact that its habit-forming. Nicotine is also not needed in the lives of smokers. This isn't terribly different.
  - graemep 1y ago
    That is all the more reason to make an effort to break the addiction. That is what people do with nicotine. I do not know of any countries that have banned nicotine. Almost all countries banned sales to kids from a very long time ago, so that was not what changed. One thing I remember from looking at the industry (I was an investment analyst back then) about 25 years ago, and from my own observations, is that there was a cultural change. Smoking became uncool, a mark of a lack of education. First in the west, and then later globally. Sales of more expensive brands declined, market share moved to cheap brands. That motivated people to break their addiction and a lot of people gave up as a result. However, everyone with an addiction had to struggle to break it. Maybe we need more support for people trying to break their social media addiction. Social media addiction anonymous? I guess it still feels like someone trying to give up smoking when everyone did it. On the other hand, I would encourage you to try. I am very fond of quoting the serenity prayer, and this is something you can control (although its not easy).
    - 1y ago