5 ms·

Perhaps aptly, I just dumped my smartphone and am considerably happier.

by meaty 14y ago

jcfrei 14y ago
I don't believe that's the answer. we need to be able to cope with this influx of new information and distractions - thru better filtering. by just abandoning smartphones altogether you're missing out on one of the biggest technological advancements.
- meaty 14y ago
  Actually I think you are wrong. The problem is then replaced with filter maintenance. If you've ever witnessed a seasoned outlook email hoarder, you will see this is just as bad. I very much doubt a person functions any better with a smartphone versus without. Communications can usually wait, and if they can't, voice is still better.
  - eru 14y ago
    > Actually I think you are wrong. The problem is then replaced with filter maintenance. If you've ever witnessed a seasoned outlook email hoarder, you will see this is just as bad. Outlook is a bad example, because its filters are too dumb. GMail does a pretty good job of maintaining its built-in filters automatically. So filters might be a compromise worth going for. Going without a smartphone might be better in the long run. But that will be a harder sell to people than good filters.
    - meaty 14y ago
      I've not found Gmail or Outlook filters to be different to each other in any significant way. I actually find Gmail filters slightly worrying as they don't actually let you have SPAM and decide what to do with it. Occasionally in the past, I've had false positives on other providers but there is no way to know either way with GMail. I think people are starting to lose interest in smart phones. There is a rapid decline of them in my organisation (150 people). We've gone from all staff having them to about 90 users in the last year. The rest are back on cheap phones.
      - eru 14y ago
        GMails keeps your spam for two weeks. You can check the Spam folder regularly to check for false positives. > I've not found Gmail or Outlook filters to be different to each other in any significant way. Recently, GMail has introduced statistical filters for some predefined categories. Like Notifications, Social Updates, and a few more.
        plywoodtrees 14y ago
        Actually, gmail keeps your spam for 30 days. If it's so low-value that it was recognized as spam and I didn't go looking for it for 30 days, the odds are high that I'll never want to see it again.
gte910h 14y ago
eh turning off a vast number of notifications and keeping it in my pocket at meals defeats 99% of issues with it.
- meaty 14y ago
  At which point you might as well have a feature phone and some extra cash for that meal.
  - gte910h 14y ago
    The ability of a phone to interrupt me is not the core feature of a smart phone. I also have the phone auto mute every night till rather late every morning, and don't use push email nor a tone when email comes in (nor do I do that on my computers) I can read any number of books, check my schedule for years out, get directions to anywhere, text by voice alone, search the web from anywhere, or shop on amazon. None of those are interruptive, cause a constant ping of stress, or make anyone feel like I'm not paying them attention, however none of them work well on a feature phone, if at all. The issues people have with smart phones are almost entirely tied to people constantly checking them/audibly alerting them to incoming info, treating them as novelty delivering skinner boxes and more important than the people you are with.
    - rdl 14y ago
      Yeah, aside from a few senders and some automated notifications (like, stuff being down), I have the ringer turned off. It's an outbound communications device, and periodic checking of mail, and reading instapaper/web/etc. when I have downtime.
    - VLM 14y ago
      gte910h would I be summarizing you correctly into something like: you and I are the boss of our phones, rather than the other way around? Or some folks do what their phone tells them, in contrast we tell our phone what to do. This has a HUGE user interface impact. Active vs passive is probably the biggest UI issue in computing today. Even more important than the conversion from WIMP to touch. Whos the boss and whos the servant, exactly? "I shall bend this tool to serve my will, and my will only, or it shall be broken" said in DnD wizard voice, err, I mean old time unix wizard voice. Same thing many times.

Perhaps aptly, I just dumped my smartphone and am considerably happier.

by meaty 14y ago

Perhaps aptly, I just dumped my smartphone and am considerably happier.

I don't believe that's the answer. we need to be able to cope with this influx of new information and distractions - thru better filtering. by just abandoning smartphones altogether you're missing out on one of the biggest technological advancements.

meaty 14y ago
Actually I think you are wrong. The problem is then replaced with filter maintenance. If you've ever witnessed a seasoned outlook email hoarder, you will see this is just as bad. I very much doubt a person functions any better with a smartphone versus without. Communications can usually wait, and if they can't, voice is still better.
- eru 14y ago
  > Actually I think you are wrong. The problem is then replaced with filter maintenance. If you've ever witnessed a seasoned outlook email hoarder, you will see this is just as bad. Outlook is a bad example, because its filters are too dumb. GMail does a pretty good job of maintaining its built-in filters automatically. So filters might be a compromise worth going for. Going without a smartphone might be better in the long run. But that will be a harder sell to people than good filters.
  - meaty 14y ago
    I've not found Gmail or Outlook filters to be different to each other in any significant way. I actually find Gmail filters slightly worrying as they don't actually let you have SPAM and decide what to do with it. Occasionally in the past, I've had false positives on other providers but there is no way to know either way with GMail. I think people are starting to lose interest in smart phones. There is a rapid decline of them in my organisation (150 people). We've gone from all staff having them to about 90 users in the last year. The rest are back on cheap phones.
    - eru 14y ago
      GMails keeps your spam for two weeks. You can check the Spam folder regularly to check for false positives. > I've not found Gmail or Outlook filters to be different to each other in any significant way. Recently, GMail has introduced statistical filters for some predefined categories. Like Notifications, Social Updates, and a few more.
      - plywoodtrees 14y ago
        Actually, gmail keeps your spam for 30 days. If it's so low-value that it was recognized as spam and I didn't go looking for it for 30 days, the odds are high that I'll never want to see it again.

gte910h 14y ago

eh turning off a vast number of notifications and keeping it in my pocket at meals defeats 99% of issues with it.

meaty 14y ago
At which point you might as well have a feature phone and some extra cash for that meal.
- gte910h 14y ago
  The ability of a phone to interrupt me is not the core feature of a smart phone. I also have the phone auto mute every night till rather late every morning, and don't use push email nor a tone when email comes in (nor do I do that on my computers) I can read any number of books, check my schedule for years out, get directions to anywhere, text by voice alone, search the web from anywhere, or shop on amazon. None of those are interruptive, cause a constant ping of stress, or make anyone feel like I'm not paying them attention, however none of them work well on a feature phone, if at all. The issues people have with smart phones are almost entirely tied to people constantly checking them/audibly alerting them to incoming info, treating them as novelty delivering skinner boxes and more important than the people you are with.
  - rdl 14y ago
    Yeah, aside from a few senders and some automated notifications (like, stuff being down), I have the ringer turned off. It's an outbound communications device, and periodic checking of mail, and reading instapaper/web/etc. when I have downtime.
  - VLM 14y ago
    gte910h would I be summarizing you correctly into something like: you and I are the boss of our phones, rather than the other way around? Or some folks do what their phone tells them, in contrast we tell our phone what to do. This has a HUGE user interface impact. Active vs passive is probably the biggest UI issue in computing today. Even more important than the conversion from WIMP to touch. Whos the boss and whos the servant, exactly? "I shall bend this tool to serve my will, and my will only, or it shall be broken" said in DnD wizard voice, err, I mean old time unix wizard voice. Same thing many times.