14 ms·

We're creating a culture of distraction

166 points by mmariani 13y ago

DougN7 13y ago
This resonates so much with me and my kids. On Saturday when school is out, they'll spend 80+% of their day engaging with one screen or another. And during my non-work time, blogs and forums (ahem), online news and magazines are where I end up spending a lot of time...
- aestra 13y ago
  Maybe your family should try what the person in the video has, a weekly "non-screen" day where everyone turns off their cellphones, computers, and TVs. Your kids might object at first, but it will be good for them in the long run.
  - tekalon 13y ago
    Wouldn't that just open up the family to be 'distracted' by something else? If the family wants social time, yes, there should be a social time set up for games or mutual activity, but otherwise it will just open up for kids to be distracted with books. I've heard very social parents complain that their kids rather read than go play with other kids (and been complaint since books/learning has been around). I knit to keep my hands busy when watching anything or in church listening.
contextual 13y ago
This is why I walk. I don't drive, or even have a car. I do my best thinking when I walk and my mind is free to roam. VOW of NOW[1], Summon the Warrior[2] and my upcoming Self Experiments[3] are all products of walking and gap time. Not only does walking spark creativity, but I've met a lot of new people this way. [1] http://vowofnow.com http://vowofnow.com [2] http://summonthewarrior.com http://summonthewarrior.com [3] http://selfexperiments.com http://selfexperiments.com
- return0 13y ago
  I think driving is a less distracting experience than walking
  - contextual 13y ago
    Walking provides a potent combination of fresh air, exercise and the freedom to explore that driving never could.
    - agumonkey 13y ago
      I mostly agree but vehicles shields you from the environment which is nice too. I don't know how many people function this way but being in my own physical bubble makes my brain expand.
      - Karunamon 13y ago
        Unbelievable, and you get downvoted for this. Folks, you've all had ideas come to you in the shower, yes? The heat, the warmth, the isolation from all else tends to make it a great place to just relax and think. Now imagine a mobile climate-controlled bubble with no noise but whatever you put on the radio or barring that, the constant background of rubber rolling across asphalt, and you get that same effect.
        agumonkey 13y ago
        Who was downvoted ? All in all there are different environment which helps thinking. Long walks put your body in long term effort, releases endorphins which helps inspiration, or at least relaxation. Isolation helps too, be it showers, cars, toilets ... whatever works.
  - agumonkey 13y ago
    It's contextual. If you walk or drive in a disrupting location you won't be able to wander or think. Taking the bus works sometimes when they're almost empty. One disappointing thing I learned is that the less efficient is biking, I thought I'd be able to day dream while riding but it's the fastest path to injuries.
casca 13y ago
While I agree that this is a phenomenon, it's too soon to tell how it will play out. It's not possible to be meaningfully productive if you're unable to focus, so this could just be a function of the ages which are represented. Perhaps they'll learn through the requirements of higher education? I've regularly espoused that the biggest advantage to hiring someone with a degree is that they've shown that they can complete a pointless task that they don't enjoy. Direct link to video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzpX0TLKS9Q http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzpX0TLKS9Q
- speeder 13y ago
  Not necessarily, some people might finish a degree and get access to broadband and smartphones after it for example.
julianpye 13y ago
I think part of this trend has to do with the fact that many people tend to have fear/anxiety issues, when they have nothing to do. We have lost the capability to truly relax, even to bore ourselves. When we are not active, we worry, so we constantly distract ourselves from these feelings of anxiety. Another example - a few years ago there was a huge trend of housewives playing Hidden-image games. It turns out that these games were so simple that people could do them in parallel with other tasks such as being on the phone, but they created a level of 'noise' that kept them from worrying about their lives. It's quasi electronic self-medication.
- metl_lord 13y ago
  I think that a good deal of that fear/anxiety comes from the fact that people are expected to be more productive. If someone doesn't respond to an email immediately, we think the are not working or are being lazy. I've recently noticed that I will often think about and come up with a solution to an issue at work while driving or eating dinner. I suspect this happens because I'm not being distracted by the problem. It also bothers me a little. If I worked in a factory assembling widgets, I would not be able to take my work home. You can't leave your brain at work if your job is mostly mental work.
  - TausAmmer 13y ago
    Usually encountering problem and not solving it almost instantly, I switch to something else, switch off from original problem, come back few minutes later, either fix it instantly or go away again. Stop thinking about thinking, that is one of greatest issues.
  - dbecker 13y ago
    I think that a good deal of that fear/anxiety comes from the fact that people are expected to be more productive. If someone doesn't respond to an email immediately, we think the are not working or are being lazy. A quick but possibly meaningless e-mail response doesn't constitute productivity. The expectation you describe is just one of availability (or working), while ignoring productivity or presenting real solutions.
queeerkopf 13y ago
earlier discussion on HN: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4710217 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4710217
speeder 13y ago
I desperately need to fix this. Since I was a kid I was known to quickly get bored, and then read something, annoying teachers. But back then I could sit still at home and make levels for my favourite games hours at end Now since I got this goddmn.smartphone for professional reasons ( got phone in 2011, but work making smartphone games since 2008) I am getting more and more easily distracted and anxious, there was even a day recently that I spent the whole day looking at Facebook, Wikipedia, Wikis, tvtropes, hn, newspapers, and other random shit, and when it was time to go home, I noticed that I never even opened my IDE :(
- a8da6b0c91d 13y ago
  > smartphone for professional reasons The digitally tethered to work thing is a killer. I was very happy not having a smartphone and not having internet access in my home for a couple years recently. To use the internet I would get dressed and go to the apartment building lobby. This arrangement was very productive for me and calmed my mind. When I was in my apartment I had undisturbed focus. But professional demands required I get wired up. I quite dislike it.
- mhurron 13y ago
  So basically your issue is you lack self control. Sounds like a personal problem.
noptic 13y ago
TL;Look a cat!!!
darkxanthos 13y ago
I'm not convinced this is new. How would one go about showing that it is?
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
yesbabyyes 13y ago
"All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone." - Blaise Pascal Also, Louis CK on smartphones: http://gawker.com/louis-c-k-s-explanation-of-why-he-hates-smartphones-is-1354954625 http://gawker.com/louis-c-k-s-explanation-of-why-he-hates-sm...
- martinwnet 13y ago
  Immediately thought of the same Louis CK bit from Conan. Pascal's quote is revealing and shows that this problem is by no means a recent invention. Though I would wager that new technology has made it much, much easier to quickly distract ourselves from idleness.
  - darkxanthos 13y ago
    I would argue technology has made it more obvious.
- bjhoops1 13y ago
  I knew someone would beat me to this. :) Even as an introvert, I rarely have moments of sadness and loneliness like this any more. I kind of miss that, and enjoy it when one does sneak its way into my life. It's really hard to regularly decide to leave the phone and "do nothing" over "doing something", even though we probably all know that the thing we're doing with our phone was really not that important.
mdup 13y ago
The funniest part is that this "culture of distraction" is so neglictible today compared to what it will be in 50 or 100 years. "Remember 2013 when we didn't have those lenses showing continuous news feed? When we didn't have 360° vision camera wired directly to our brain? Back then our attention span was sooo high"
gz5 13y ago
I think our human desire for constant attention, feedback, approval, communication, collaboration, instant satisfaction, etc. has always been there. But now technology has caught up. Perhaps though the pendulum will swing back the other way if technology enables us to get too much instant, constant attention?
- Loughla 13y ago
  I don't think it's 'perhaps', as much as 'eventually'. One defining characteristic of human (USA at least) generations is their absolute burning desire to find fault in the social norms of the previous generation. It stands to reason that the next generation or the one after will take it a step back from smart phones and everything instantly accessible simply because that's what their parents or grandparents thought was cool. You're already seeing this - hipsters are entranced by the pastoral - city chickens/livestock, city farms, etc.
- Florin_Andrei 13y ago
  There is also a human desire to consume lots of sweet and/or salty, or fatty food. It has always been there, and for good evolutionary reasons. But then the fast-food technology caught up. And now watch the results.
- nly 13y ago
  Personally I think it's more likely that we'll adapt over the next few generations to cope with it, than it is that a conscious effort on our part will reverse the trend. People underestimate the rate at which social behaviours change. I'm 27 and have younger cousins who have completely different social conventions and understandings in and out of school than what I experienced. Much of that is due to pervasiveness of the net and mobile. It's really bizarre.
FrojoS 13y ago
My personally theory is, that this development has been going on for thousands of years. As we find better ways to deliver messages, e.g. horses, pigeons, telegraph, telephone, eMail, twitter, our time horizon has apparently been shrinking accordingly. Think about the cathedrals which took hundreds of years to build. The mindset that was required for such undertakings seems almost alien now.
- marcofloriano 13y ago
  For sure, it´s a eternal need of humankind to make things faster. In some ways, it can be good. But in other ones, it´s very bad. So our challenge right now is too start making better choices about what we should make faster and what we should make slower. Building a bridge or finding the cure for the cancer needs to be faster. But talking with your son, chilling out and hanging out with friends?
- 6d0debc071 13y ago
  The person making the decision didn't actually have to work on the thing for a hundred years. If you think of them buying their way into heaven - or making a show of how religious they were - then it's really just a long-term insurance scheme that someone else is going to go on to manage the complexities of for them. I'm not sure that's really any different to paying a pension company that manages part of it's liabilities via long-term bonds.
- AznHisoka 13y ago
  I think the development has gone on as people have moved to bigger cities, and increased their exposure to other human beings. In the old days, we only interacted with 10-20 people on a daily basis(your butcher, your barber, your few co-workers, etc). Now, living in large cities, we have interact/encounter with hundreds of random strangers everyday.
david_otoole 13y ago
Careful or you will destroy all the social app crap that makes this website profitable.
alan_cx 13y ago
Just one of those observations: A while ago, could be 3 or so years, I was in my local fish and chip shop. For those who don't know, there are small take away food shops in the UK (and I guess else where) and generally you wander up, order your food, then usually wait a few minutes while your order is put together or cooked. 10 mins or so. (I like the wait because usually it means my food is being cooked fresh.) Usually I stand to the side waiting, and just gaze around, usually at the world going by out side the window. Normally the customers are not just one off people, but a couples or a pair of friends, or a parent and kids, and so on. You know, a decent variety of however people come. Usually there is a bit of a buzz of conversation and what not. This time, I looked up, and all 10 or so of the people waiting in the show were literally buried, absorbed in their smart phones, and the shop stood stark silence. The people on their own, the kids, the parents, the couples, the whole damn lot. The only sounds were of the people working in the shop preparing the food. Usually when the food is cooked, the person behind the counter only needs to mention the beginning of the order and the right person usually snaps in to action to retrieved their food, and leave the shop. This time I noticed it took up to 3 or 4 attempts before the smart phone spell was broken and the person realized their food was ready. And the weirdest thing was, as they came to, coming out of their smart phone spell, each and every one of them had that look of some one who had just woken up in the morning. Eyes blinking, rubbing eyes, the slow realization of where you are, what you are doing, what comes next, etc. I found the whole thing incredible creepy. And since then, I've seen it more and more. In fact, I have even been round people houses or in a pub, where there are a few people meeting up, and I've observed the exact same thing. Oh, add to that, railway stations, bus stops, and so on. OK, smart phones are very, very useful. Great little devices. But Im not so sure about they way people use them. Seems to me there must be something socially damaging about over use. Its like having the kid who is (exaggerate to show the point time) 24/7 in his/her bedroom on their computer. Now its like that but we can take the computer everywhere. Yeah, we can isolate ourselves anywhere.
- hfsktr 13y ago
  "And the weirdest thing was, as they came to, coming out of their smart phone spell, each and every one of them had that look of some one who had just woken up in the morning. Eyes blinking, rubbing eyes, the slow realization of where you are, what you are doing, what comes next, etc." I bet the same would happen if they had a book or magazine and were reading or even just staring off into space and daydreaming or watching TV. Change of context.
WickyNilliams 13y ago
Scott Adams, author of Dilbert, wrote an interesting piece on this before. He argues that we've effectively eliminated boredom and that it really isn't a good thing. Why? Because bored people are compelled to do stuff, whether it be creative thinking or seeking out a new experience. When boredom relief is cheap and readily-available then we lose the need for these things. It's a great read: http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/creativity/ http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/creativity/
- trhaynes 13y ago
  John Cleese's short (13min) lecture on creativity mentions this as well. Very entertaining, too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijtQP9nwrQA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijtQP9nwrQA
cafard 13y ago
"Smoking has gone out. To be sure, it is a shocking thing, blowing smoke out of our mouths into other people's mouths, eyes, and noses, and having the same thing done to us. Yet I cannot account, why a thing which requires so little exertion, and yet preserves the mind from total vacuity, should have gone out. Every man has something by which he calms himself: beating with his feet, or so." Samuel Johnson, quoted in Boswell's *Tour of the Hebrides", entry for August 19.
lucaswoj 13y ago
This has been on my mind through internships at several major silicon valley social networking companies. There's a line of thinking in the industry that, when revenue is driven by ad impressions, driving more interactions with your product is the highest goal. This means two things: getting more users (fine) and driving more interactions per user (dangerous).
avodonosov 13y ago
Fully agree with the title. But haven't read fully - too many characters, don't want to distract that much from the current tasks :)
reneherse 13y ago
Powerful stuff. I've noticed that my "long form" mental focus has gradually declined, I believe beginning from about the time I began using a smartphone a couple of years ago. It's now so bad that if I can't improve it through developing good habits, I'll be ditching the smart phone for a dumb one, and finding other ways to curtail short-form reading and internet browsing :) A relevant plug: My brother and I are developing a web app to help with this problem of distractedness. It's a to-do list manager that encourages mindfulness by helping you monitor procrastination and training your ability to steadily focus. Launching sometime this fall: http://fleur.io http://fleur.io
- Florin_Andrei 13y ago
  I've found two things can keep this at bay: reading old-school dead-tree books, and meditation. I am an avid reader who is quite fussy about what he's reading. Everyone around me knows I read a lot, so of course what better present for my birthday than an e-reader, right? Wrong. I can't use that stuff. It puts me in the Distracted Mode, whereas when I do serious reading, I need to be in the Focused Mode. E-stuff automatically flips on the Distracted switch. You know - the stumbleupon links, the reddit cats, the endless outpouring of youtube video mud. Old school books do the opposite. Also, meditation is pretty much the polar opposite of twitter-driven thinking. Things like The Long Now Foundation, and the book called Anathem by Neal Stephenson, are direct reactions and backlashes to the twitterification of the modern mind.
Eleopteryx 13y ago
A few months ago, I had a brief exchange over Twitter with an artist from perhaps my favorite band: https://twitter.com/edwarddroste/status/343418176454926337 https://twitter.com/edwarddroste/status/343418176454926337 "Maybe they're trying to catch your latest tweet?" was the reply that I wanted to send, but I didn't want to come off as cheeky to someone I revered. Is the article not a distraction in itself? Sure enough, I came upon it this morning while I was browsing Twitter from my bed. The article itself is over 2000 words long; some of those words being a transcript from a 15 minute video. Now here I am commenting on it; taking up additional time from my day to formulate these points rather than attending to other things; reinforcing the dissonant relevance and irony of the points that the article is making. This article on distraction is a distraction in itself, and my viewership was predicated on finding it on a distracting service used from a distracting device. I found it and read it because I didn't have anything subjectively better to do at the time. I'm OK with this.
diydsp 13y ago
interesting point about the notifications from cellphones being random (and thus addictive like gambling). Perhaps mine would be less random if I were to use the "different sounds for different people" feature...
jackmaney 13y ago
Hmmm, this appears to be an insightful article. I think I'll read it thoro--oooh, coffee's done!
- yaddayadda 13y ago
  I do love my latte in the ... squirrel!
normloman 13y ago
It's not simply that we're constantly hunting for information. It's that too much information is crap. We use Facebook to find out what our best friend watched on television this week, read some blog about "10 secrets of successful entrepreneurs" (they really aren't secret), then head over to our favorite news site to have our political opinions affirmed by pundits. The advertising revenue model gives the media incentives to make lots of cheap, addictive information. They don't have an incentive to make quality information. So we get what we pay for. I have vowed to spend less time consuming and more time doing. It's hard. I cave in often. But I recommend it.
- aestra 13y ago
  We use Facebook to find out what our best friend watched on television this week rather than calling up our best friend, going out to dinner with them, and taking about what they watched on TV this week. Faceboook is very superficial interaction. I liken it to people shouting into a crowded room.
- Florin_Andrei 13y ago
  > The advertising revenue model gives the media incentives to make lots of cheap, addictive information. It's the fast-food equivalent of information. It's cheap, readily available, seemingly fulfilling, and creating lots of problems later down the road. > I have vowed to spend less time consuming and more time doing. Yup. I've taken up hobbies that require making and building stuff in the real world. It's quite amazing what you can accomplish that way.
qwerta 13y ago
Phone can be switched off. The real problem are open-plane offices.
- Florin_Andrei 13y ago
  Nah. There's a reason why god invented headphones. :)
  - brador 13y ago
    To save others some time: Inventor of headphones: Nathaniel Baldwin.
- yaddayadda 13y ago
  How do I get an office in an open-plane? Although, wouldn't TSA be more of a problem than phones?
mattjaynes 13y ago
I battle with this and one thing that's been helping me a lot is "Letting It Cool". By that I mean that I delay reading "new" things until they've had a chance to lose their "newness". I've found that newness is a false signal for value. Just because something is new, we tend to errantly assign extra value to it. You can combat this by removing the new quality from the item by putting it somewhere where it can "cool down". For me, I save all the articles I want to read for the weekend. I just email the articles to myself and they go in a special folder and that's where they cool off for a few days. When you first start doing this, it is surprising how much some articles lose their perceived value over a few days. An article that I was really excited about when I first saw it will often induce a "meh" a few days later. On the other hand, some articles still retain their value and appeal several days later. I end up spending far fewer hours a week reading articles because of this method. It also helps to keep me focused since I don't let my mind wander to other topics during my work day. This also works for other things like movies, tv shows, facebook, etc. If you want to see the true value of something, delay enjoying it until the newness has worn off. It helps reduce what you consume and increases the quality of what you do. If your goal is to produce more and consume less, then this strategy can really help. http://devopsu.com/blog/productivity-tip-let-it-cool/ http://devopsu.com/blog/productivity-tip-let-it-cool/
doubt_me 13y ago
This is one of the major problems pointed out in Noam Chomskys manufacturing of consent (1992). Its a really nice documentary. I think the entire thing is uploaded to youtube
javajosh 13y ago
This post is dripping with irony because it is, itself, a form of distraction. Why? Because it doesn't offer any objective evidence for it's assertions. It is prescriptive distraction, a kind of modern, well-meaning form of muckraking that is a kind of politically passive aggressive post-apocalyptic self-help piece. (Don't get me wrong, I love writing these sorts of things as much as the next guy, but I keep them in my private journal.) The older I get the more skeptical I feel about any of my own attitudes that I don't have clear objective evidence for, especially the kind of vague forebodings that motivate this sort of piece. There are entire "hidden worlds" out there, where people are motivated by completely different things. "Ours is a culture of distraction." Which culture? There are so many cultures in the world, and even in the US, and even in Silicon Valley. Yes, I too see people walking around with their eyes downcast at their phones, consumed by far-away happenings. And it certainly feels like "we" are more disconnected from each other. But these are feelings, and should be treated as an impetus to look more deeply into the fact of the matter, rather than rush to diagnose and treat an ailment which you don't understand on any objective scale. And indeed, the first and best place to start looking is within yourself, and within your own life. Because the flip side to recognizing any kind of pan-cultural doom is living the alternative. That's the really cool thing about culture, is that it is not enforced by law, you can indeed break from it in very meaningful ways. An article documenting your experience breaking from the culture, with the implicit message that you found something lacking and went on a search to find it, would be far more valuable than subjective analysis. Because, as fun as your subjective analysis is to read, without action it is merely distraction.
mathattack 13y ago
I hope the irony of this story being posted on Hacker News isn't lost on everyone. :-)
krispycement 13y ago
Posted the guy on the blog with the RSS, twitter, email links prominently at top right. There is an assumption that those things he laments are functional parts of today's and tomorrow's world. Maybe he's just really boring and people would rather watch a stream of bullshit tweets than discuss the weather with him... because he seems a bit of a malcontent or judgmental. One person's distraction is another's attention and purpose. It's the outsider watching the 'distracted' trivializing the value of the benefits that the actor is receiving. How smug. Context is everything. Opinions are nothing. Smartphones only fail at optimizing the bandwidth of purposeful living in so much as those information flows have not been built out. If people are anxious about the next packet that comes to them, it might be that they feel unsatisfied with the company and activities before them. People aren't being distracted by the devices. They are hunting for higher purpose.
Lagged2Death 13y ago
Several times, this article mentions the notion - without really explaining it - that we have "anxiety of being understimulated." I think I understand what the author means, but I'm not sure that's quite right. I agree with the main points that the author is making, but I wonder if this "culture of distraction" is really a symptom of an even larger problem. Consider the possibility that many of us are simply highly anxious just about all of the time, and that the distractions presented by wired life are things we seek out for relief on purpose. That is, that the distractions aren't the cause of the anxiety, but a symptom. Maybe checking in with Twitter over and over again isn't "stimulation," maybe it's more like a narcotic. It helps us block out genuine, serious anxieties about money, jobs, work, family, and the future in general with easily-digested, glittery trivia. One possible reason to think about the problem this way - although it may sound like a big change in subject at first - is antidepressant sales, which have been climbing for years and now stand at record levels. Clearly, for whatever reason, we've built a way of life for ourselves that leaves a huge percentage of us desperately unhappy and stressed out for an awful lot of the time. Perhaps the explosion of smartphones and tablets, of portable, pocketable "brain stimulation" is, for many people, a form of self-medication. When you have a moment of downtime, and you have a chance to think about just how screwed you and your family are if your name comes up in this next round of layoffs, you can instead reach in your pocket and check out the latest celebrity scandal. When a free moment strikes and you find yourself wondering what sort of fascist nightmare future-US your children are going to be stuck with, you can instead check out the latest shiny aspirational gadgets. Regardless of the cause, the "culture of distraction" is still a real phenomenon worth fighting, I think. But maybe we can fight it more successfully if we understand the causes more completely.
- zxcvvcxz 13y ago
  Good point, it can be a symptom of something larger. I think with ubiquitous communications and globalization, the world is just more competitive. This is very stressful, and can cause anxiety and depression. Anecdote: I was just playing board games with my friends the other night. After 1.5 hours, I started panicking and feeling anxiety, so I excused myself. It felt wrong I guess, taking that much time off of work/study. Someone else might be outdoing me, right? Heh. I gotta say, I definitely didn't get this a decade ago. For anyone who feels similar sometimes, it's important to develop methods to bring your mental state to something more manageable. I like to remind myself that even if this is true, the anxiety feelings aren't going to help me "compete" anyways, so might as well be calm and move on.
spindritf 13y ago
> One step, I think, is to take a weekly holiday from your devices. You have just lost. Denying yourself something is not a viable way to avoid it. (Don't think about elephants.) There are only two solutions here. Either become someone else, change yourself so that you do not crave it any more, or displace it with something else. If you want to be fit, or at least less flabby, the psychologically viable route is to tell yourself "I am the kind of person who does 50 pushups after getting out of bed in the morning." Or, "I am the kind of person who cooks his own low-carb meals." And then actually become that person. If you don't want to stare at your phone in a public place, displace that behaviour with something else. "Instead of mindlessly browsing HN, I'll go talk to that cute chick at the end of the bar." Or even just "I will meditate, I will think about nothing but my breathing while waiting for that coffee." Though that might be even weirder than playing with your smartphone.
- pachydermic 13y ago
  Sure, but maybe you only have so much willpower to work with (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_depletion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_depletion). It's really interesting how it really is just as easy as making a decision, or just telling yourself something, but so many of us fail so often to do that kind of thing. This is something that bothers me deeply. This failure to do what we know we ought to demonstrates the tension which comes from this struggle between thinking we're really in control when we might not be. Interesting conflict there. Definitely worth thinking about - or ignoring entirely. Anyways, that doesn't have any impact on other people doing the phone thing. It's a lot easier to not be nose-deep in your phone when other people are engaging with you. I find that most people settle into the "trance" based on whether other people are on their phones. The people who start the "trance" are often preoccupied or just plain rude. Another facet to this is that we just don't know where this is going. Is it a step forwards or backwards. Hard to say that it looks like a good thing, but many of us didn't grow up with it - what will the story be like in 50 years? None of us has a clue, to be honest. Anyways, I think what it comes down to is the "responsible use" cliche. There are so many constructive things you can do with technology. But here we all are, reading these comments which don't matter and are just random people screaming into the void. Shit.
zwieback 13y ago
I'm sure there's some danger in all this distraction but I also think that people really weren't that interesting and interested before smartphones. Smart and creative people will always find ways to do smart and creative things but lots of people just look for distraction in whatever form they can find. The point about kids is an important one, though. Smartphone-parents do set a bad example for their kids.
apostate 13y ago
Mindfulness meditation[1] is an old but very effective way of training the mind to recognize distractions. I agree with the article that the opportunities for distraction are at an all-time high, but the human brain has not changed much in the last few millenia, and the problem of being distracted is almost certainly as old as the first time a person desired to contemplate something. To someone who wishes to devote a significant portion of their day to contemplation (e.g. a Buddhist monk), any distraction can be a setback, and the so-called "monkey mind"[2] is awfully persistent. Being able to recognize that you are being pulled away from your object of focus is the essential first step to reduce both the frequency and length of distractions. This is one of the goals of mindfulness meditation. Personally, I have found that the simple act of being able to catch myself in the midst of a distraction has improved my ability to focus. After spending time practicing mindfulness, I have developed a wonderful skill of being able to "switch off" a racing mind and pull myself back down to the task at hand (or to simply pull myself out of an anxious state of mind and into a pleasant one). Importantly, practicing this during 15 minutes of daily meditation has enabled me to do this during any of the other ~1000 waking minutes of each day. The first time I noticed myself do this "automatically" outside of meditation, I was amazed that I was able to cultivate such a skill. If you are interested in a good primer on mindfulness and how to actually go about meditation, I recommend Mindfulness in Plain English.[3] I recommend it whenever the subject comes up and I'm sure very few people read it, but it had enough of an effect on me that I would not want others to miss out. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness_of_breathing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness_of_breathing [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_monkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_monkey [3] http://www.urbandharma.org/pdf/mindfulness_in_plain_english.pdf http://www.urbandharma.org/pdf/mindfulness_in_plain_english....
- rk0567 13y ago
  Another one : http://www.siyli.org/take-the-course/siy-curriculum/ http://www.siyli.org/take-the-course/siy-curriculum/
joshdance 13y ago
You can't blame a "smartphone" for the distraction. It is merely a tool. People don't like to think or create, they like to consume. The smartphone is the best tool for consumption. I try to chose when I want to interact with my phone. Sometimes that means ignoring texts or calls, and turning off notifications. Not perfect but it is a start.
crux 13y ago
There's nothing really new in this talk but I have to say it was well-delivered. Well enough that I want to really resolve to keep my phone in my pocket whenever I'm with someone - even if they get up from the table. It's of course unconscionable to start tapping around while you're in the middle of a conversation, but I'm very well-acquainted with the impulse to check facebook or email as soon as a friend goes to the bathroom. I'll really try to capture that valuable mind-wandering time.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
Millennium 13y ago
What is this "are creating"? We've had one for decades. We've refined it tremendously over the last 50+ years, by taking advantage of new technological achievements, but the fundamentals have been in place a lot longer than the article's author seems to think.
- smacktoward 13y ago
  Yeah, Neil Postman wrote about this same basic issue in his book Amusing Ourselves to Death (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death), and that came out nearly 30 years ago.
floobynewb 13y ago
I experience this. But my addiction is for information, technical articles, scientific papers in mathematics, physics, machine learning, biology. Now I can do it all on my phone anywhere, anytime. Texting and social media are of little interest to me... Do you think this is still something I should worry about?
jawr 13y ago
I just wanted to say that Joe Kraus did an awesome job at keeping my attention and presenting his ideas. It is extremely odd how much people rely on phones, but I think it's deeper that that and it's actually the internet that is the fundamental issue. Yes, it's a great resource; it's a great source of entertainment, knowledge and potential power. But for something that could be described as intangible it seems to be quite detrimental to us as a society.
dnautics 13y ago
to play devil's advocate (I don't necessarily believe this; I just don't know) - why is this necessarily a problem? For example, one possibility is: Over time, an increased culture of distraction will through social selection filter itself out into "improved multitasking ability". There are always growing pains associated with any seismic shift in society, especially those created by technology. What makes this one different, or are you someone who laments that time given over to learn cursive is now used to teach children to type?
tekalon 13y ago
Distracted from what? If we're distracted from socialization, its probably that whoever we're socializing isn't that interesting. No longer thinking/pondering? I use those mindless games to 'ponder'- They are simple enough it doesn't take much mental process to play, but leaves enough for me to think about what needs to be thought out (problems, the day, world problems, etc). The same arguments he's made have been made about books for centuries.
drewsears 13y ago
tl;dr
j_s 13y ago
When "The Net Is a Waste of Time"[1] (an editorial by William Gibson) was discussed[2] on Hacker News: > The winning quote: "[sic] surfing the Web is a procrastinator's dream. And people > who see you doing it might even imagine you're working." > - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5262229 [1] http://www.nytimes.com/1996/07/14/magazine/the-net-is-a-waste-of-time.html http://www.nytimes.com/1996/07/14/magazine/the-net-is-a-wast... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5261676 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5261676
dpweb 13y ago
More first world problems..
adamconroy 13y ago
Is it that much different to reading a newspaper/mag/book or watching the shop's TV while waiting for fish and chips? I'm the first to be pissed when people I'm hanging out with start fiddling with their phone but I'm also the first to fiddle with my phone if I have a spare minute waiting for something and there is nobody to offend. When going out to dinner or a bar, I like the idea of everyone stacking their phones on the table. Everyone time someone can't resist touching their phone they have to shout a round of drinks.
diminoten 13y ago
Distraction and technology are related, insofar that technology allows for distraction, but it does not mandate it. The mistaken assumption is that a person must be "distracted" by one's phone, when that may not be the case at all. Since when was reading a magazine being "distracted", or reading a book being "distracted"? Why is playing a video game considered a distraction? The facts presented in this article, and the conclusions drawn by this article are orthogonal. Yes, we're bad at multitasking, and yes, people out in the world are buried in their phones more and more, but the connection between multitasking and looking at my phone isn't there. Besides, why do I have to be particularly good when I'm playing Angry Birds or reading HN? I don't care if I'm performing 10 IQ points or 40% worse than if I were checking my text messages in a park by myself. The article makes another false assumption that we must always be at our best whenever we do something, which is also untrue. Sure, I could use my slow, deliberate mental system to make all my choices, and I'd be immensely slow but very accurate. Or, I could use my fast, intuitive mental system to make quick, if less accurate decisions that usually get me where I want to be, or in a position I want to be in. I don't need to use my whole brain to hold a conversation with a friend, and I don't need to use my whole brain to wait in line for fish and chips. There is an anxiety towards seemingly doing nothing, and it's well founded. The author talks about anxiety like it's the enemy, when in reality it's a necessary motivator.

166 points by mmariani 13y ago

This resonates so much with me and my kids. On Saturday when school is out, they'll spend 80+% of their day engaging with one screen or another. And during my non-work time, blogs and forums (ahem), online news and magazines are where I end up spending a lot of time...

aestra 13y ago
Maybe your family should try what the person in the video has, a weekly "non-screen" day where everyone turns off their cellphones, computers, and TVs. Your kids might object at first, but it will be good for them in the long run.
- tekalon 13y ago
  Wouldn't that just open up the family to be 'distracted' by something else? If the family wants social time, yes, there should be a social time set up for games or mutual activity, but otherwise it will just open up for kids to be distracted with books. I've heard very social parents complain that their kids rather read than go play with other kids (and been complaint since books/learning has been around). I knit to keep my hands busy when watching anything or in church listening.

contextual 13y ago

This is why I walk. I don't drive, or even have a car. I do my best thinking when I walk and my mind is free to roam. VOW of NOW[1], Summon the Warrior[2] and my upcoming Self Experiments[3] are all products of walking and gap time. Not only does walking spark creativity, but I've met a lot of new people this way. [1] http://vowofnow.com http://vowofnow.com [2] http://summonthewarrior.com http://summonthewarrior.com [3] http://selfexperiments.com http://selfexperiments.com

return0 13y ago
I think driving is a less distracting experience than walking
- contextual 13y ago
  Walking provides a potent combination of fresh air, exercise and the freedom to explore that driving never could.
  - agumonkey 13y ago
    I mostly agree but vehicles shields you from the environment which is nice too. I don't know how many people function this way but being in my own physical bubble makes my brain expand.
    - Karunamon 13y ago
      Unbelievable, and you get downvoted for this. Folks, you've all had ideas come to you in the shower, yes? The heat, the warmth, the isolation from all else tends to make it a great place to just relax and think. Now imagine a mobile climate-controlled bubble with no noise but whatever you put on the radio or barring that, the constant background of rubber rolling across asphalt, and you get that same effect.
      - agumonkey 13y ago
        Who was downvoted ? All in all there are different environment which helps thinking. Long walks put your body in long term effort, releases endorphins which helps inspiration, or at least relaxation. Isolation helps too, be it showers, cars, toilets ... whatever works.
- agumonkey 13y ago
  It's contextual. If you walk or drive in a disrupting location you won't be able to wander or think. Taking the bus works sometimes when they're almost empty. One disappointing thing I learned is that the less efficient is biking, I thought I'd be able to day dream while riding but it's the fastest path to injuries.

casca 13y ago

While I agree that this is a phenomenon, it's too soon to tell how it will play out. It's not possible to be meaningfully productive if you're unable to focus, so this could just be a function of the ages which are represented. Perhaps they'll learn through the requirements of higher education? I've regularly espoused that the biggest advantage to hiring someone with a degree is that they've shown that they can complete a pointless task that they don't enjoy. Direct link to video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzpX0TLKS9Q http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzpX0TLKS9Q

speeder 13y ago
Not necessarily, some people might finish a degree and get access to broadband and smartphones after it for example.

julianpye 13y ago

I think part of this trend has to do with the fact that many people tend to have fear/anxiety issues, when they have nothing to do. We have lost the capability to truly relax, even to bore ourselves. When we are not active, we worry, so we constantly distract ourselves from these feelings of anxiety. Another example - a few years ago there was a huge trend of housewives playing Hidden-image games. It turns out that these games were so simple that people could do them in parallel with other tasks such as being on the phone, but they created a level of 'noise' that kept them from worrying about their lives. It's quasi electronic self-medication.

metl_lord 13y ago
I think that a good deal of that fear/anxiety comes from the fact that people are expected to be more productive. If someone doesn't respond to an email immediately, we think the are not working or are being lazy. I've recently noticed that I will often think about and come up with a solution to an issue at work while driving or eating dinner. I suspect this happens because I'm not being distracted by the problem. It also bothers me a little. If I worked in a factory assembling widgets, I would not be able to take my work home. You can't leave your brain at work if your job is mostly mental work.
- TausAmmer 13y ago
  Usually encountering problem and not solving it almost instantly, I switch to something else, switch off from original problem, come back few minutes later, either fix it instantly or go away again. Stop thinking about thinking, that is one of greatest issues.
- dbecker 13y ago
  I think that a good deal of that fear/anxiety comes from the fact that people are expected to be more productive. If someone doesn't respond to an email immediately, we think the are not working or are being lazy. A quick but possibly meaningless e-mail response doesn't constitute productivity. The expectation you describe is just one of availability (or working), while ignoring productivity or presenting real solutions.

queeerkopf 13y ago

earlier discussion on HN: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4710217 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4710217

speeder 13y ago

I desperately need to fix this. Since I was a kid I was known to quickly get bored, and then read something, annoying teachers. But back then I could sit still at home and make levels for my favourite games hours at end Now since I got this goddmn.smartphone for professional reasons ( got phone in 2011, but work making smartphone games since 2008) I am getting more and more easily distracted and anxious, there was even a day recently that I spent the whole day looking at Facebook, Wikipedia, Wikis, tvtropes, hn, newspapers, and other random shit, and when it was time to go home, I noticed that I never even opened my IDE :(

a8da6b0c91d 13y ago
> smartphone for professional reasons The digitally tethered to work thing is a killer. I was very happy not having a smartphone and not having internet access in my home for a couple years recently. To use the internet I would get dressed and go to the apartment building lobby. This arrangement was very productive for me and calmed my mind. When I was in my apartment I had undisturbed focus. But professional demands required I get wired up. I quite dislike it.
mhurron 13y ago
So basically your issue is you lack self control. Sounds like a personal problem.

noptic 13y ago

TL;Look a cat!!!

darkxanthos 13y ago

I'm not convinced this is new. How would one go about showing that it is?

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

yesbabyyes 13y ago

"All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone." - Blaise Pascal Also, Louis CK on smartphones: http://gawker.com/louis-c-k-s-explanation-of-why-he-hates-smartphones-is-1354954625 http://gawker.com/louis-c-k-s-explanation-of-why-he-hates-sm...

martinwnet 13y ago
Immediately thought of the same Louis CK bit from Conan. Pascal's quote is revealing and shows that this problem is by no means a recent invention. Though I would wager that new technology has made it much, much easier to quickly distract ourselves from idleness.
- darkxanthos 13y ago
  I would argue technology has made it more obvious.
bjhoops1 13y ago
I knew someone would beat me to this. :) Even as an introvert, I rarely have moments of sadness and loneliness like this any more. I kind of miss that, and enjoy it when one does sneak its way into my life. It's really hard to regularly decide to leave the phone and "do nothing" over "doing something", even though we probably all know that the thing we're doing with our phone was really not that important.

mdup 13y ago

The funniest part is that this "culture of distraction" is so neglictible today compared to what it will be in 50 or 100 years. "Remember 2013 when we didn't have those lenses showing continuous news feed? When we didn't have 360° vision camera wired directly to our brain? Back then our attention span was sooo high"

gz5 13y ago

I think our human desire for constant attention, feedback, approval, communication, collaboration, instant satisfaction, etc. has always been there. But now technology has caught up. Perhaps though the pendulum will swing back the other way if technology enables us to get too much instant, constant attention?

Loughla 13y ago
I don't think it's 'perhaps', as much as 'eventually'. One defining characteristic of human (USA at least) generations is their absolute burning desire to find fault in the social norms of the previous generation. It stands to reason that the next generation or the one after will take it a step back from smart phones and everything instantly accessible simply because that's what their parents or grandparents thought was cool. You're already seeing this - hipsters are entranced by the pastoral - city chickens/livestock, city farms, etc.
Florin_Andrei 13y ago
There is also a human desire to consume lots of sweet and/or salty, or fatty food. It has always been there, and for good evolutionary reasons. But then the fast-food technology caught up. And now watch the results.
nly 13y ago
Personally I think it's more likely that we'll adapt over the next few generations to cope with it, than it is that a conscious effort on our part will reverse the trend. People underestimate the rate at which social behaviours change. I'm 27 and have younger cousins who have completely different social conventions and understandings in and out of school than what I experienced. Much of that is due to pervasiveness of the net and mobile. It's really bizarre.

FrojoS 13y ago

My personally theory is, that this development has been going on for thousands of years. As we find better ways to deliver messages, e.g. horses, pigeons, telegraph, telephone, eMail, twitter, our time horizon has apparently been shrinking accordingly. Think about the cathedrals which took hundreds of years to build. The mindset that was required for such undertakings seems almost alien now.

marcofloriano 13y ago
For sure, it´s a eternal need of humankind to make things faster. In some ways, it can be good. But in other ones, it´s very bad. So our challenge right now is too start making better choices about what we should make faster and what we should make slower. Building a bridge or finding the cure for the cancer needs to be faster. But talking with your son, chilling out and hanging out with friends?
6d0debc071 13y ago
The person making the decision didn't actually have to work on the thing for a hundred years. If you think of them buying their way into heaven - or making a show of how religious they were - then it's really just a long-term insurance scheme that someone else is going to go on to manage the complexities of for them. I'm not sure that's really any different to paying a pension company that manages part of it's liabilities via long-term bonds.
AznHisoka 13y ago
I think the development has gone on as people have moved to bigger cities, and increased their exposure to other human beings. In the old days, we only interacted with 10-20 people on a daily basis(your butcher, your barber, your few co-workers, etc). Now, living in large cities, we have interact/encounter with hundreds of random strangers everyday.

david_otoole 13y ago

Careful or you will destroy all the social app crap that makes this website profitable.

alan_cx 13y ago

Just one of those observations: A while ago, could be 3 or so years, I was in my local fish and chip shop. For those who don't know, there are small take away food shops in the UK (and I guess else where) and generally you wander up, order your food, then usually wait a few minutes while your order is put together or cooked. 10 mins or so. (I like the wait because usually it means my food is being cooked fresh.) Usually I stand to the side waiting, and just gaze around, usually at the world going by out side the window. Normally the customers are not just one off people, but a couples or a pair of friends, or a parent and kids, and so on. You know, a decent variety of however people come. Usually there is a bit of a buzz of conversation and what not. This time, I looked up, and all 10 or so of the people waiting in the show were literally buried, absorbed in their smart phones, and the shop stood stark silence. The people on their own, the kids, the parents, the couples, the whole damn lot. The only sounds were of the people working in the shop preparing the food. Usually when the food is cooked, the person behind the counter only needs to mention the beginning of the order and the right person usually snaps in to action to retrieved their food, and leave the shop. This time I noticed it took up to 3 or 4 attempts before the smart phone spell was broken and the person realized their food was ready. And the weirdest thing was, as they came to, coming out of their smart phone spell, each and every one of them had that look of some one who had just woken up in the morning. Eyes blinking, rubbing eyes, the slow realization of where you are, what you are doing, what comes next, etc. I found the whole thing incredible creepy. And since then, I've seen it more and more. In fact, I have even been round people houses or in a pub, where there are a few people meeting up, and I've observed the exact same thing. Oh, add to that, railway stations, bus stops, and so on. OK, smart phones are very, very useful. Great little devices. But Im not so sure about they way people use them. Seems to me there must be something socially damaging about over use. Its like having the kid who is (exaggerate to show the point time) 24/7 in his/her bedroom on their computer. Now its like that but we can take the computer everywhere. Yeah, we can isolate ourselves anywhere.

hfsktr 13y ago
"And the weirdest thing was, as they came to, coming out of their smart phone spell, each and every one of them had that look of some one who had just woken up in the morning. Eyes blinking, rubbing eyes, the slow realization of where you are, what you are doing, what comes next, etc." I bet the same would happen if they had a book or magazine and were reading or even just staring off into space and daydreaming or watching TV. Change of context.

WickyNilliams 13y ago

Scott Adams, author of Dilbert, wrote an interesting piece on this before. He argues that we've effectively eliminated boredom and that it really isn't a good thing. Why? Because bored people are compelled to do stuff, whether it be creative thinking or seeking out a new experience. When boredom relief is cheap and readily-available then we lose the need for these things. It's a great read: http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/creativity/ http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/creativity/

trhaynes 13y ago
John Cleese's short (13min) lecture on creativity mentions this as well. Very entertaining, too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijtQP9nwrQA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijtQP9nwrQA

cafard 13y ago

"Smoking has gone out. To be sure, it is a shocking thing, blowing smoke out of our mouths into other people's mouths, eyes, and noses, and having the same thing done to us. Yet I cannot account, why a thing which requires so little exertion, and yet preserves the mind from total vacuity, should have gone out. Every man has something by which he calms himself: beating with his feet, or so." Samuel Johnson, quoted in Boswell's *Tour of the Hebrides", entry for August 19.

lucaswoj 13y ago

This has been on my mind through internships at several major silicon valley social networking companies. There's a line of thinking in the industry that, when revenue is driven by ad impressions, driving more interactions with your product is the highest goal. This means two things: getting more users (fine) and driving more interactions per user (dangerous).

avodonosov 13y ago

Fully agree with the title. But haven't read fully - too many characters, don't want to distract that much from the current tasks :)

reneherse 13y ago

Powerful stuff. I've noticed that my "long form" mental focus has gradually declined, I believe beginning from about the time I began using a smartphone a couple of years ago. It's now so bad that if I can't improve it through developing good habits, I'll be ditching the smart phone for a dumb one, and finding other ways to curtail short-form reading and internet browsing :) A relevant plug: My brother and I are developing a web app to help with this problem of distractedness. It's a to-do list manager that encourages mindfulness by helping you monitor procrastination and training your ability to steadily focus. Launching sometime this fall: http://fleur.io http://fleur.io

Florin_Andrei 13y ago
I've found two things can keep this at bay: reading old-school dead-tree books, and meditation. I am an avid reader who is quite fussy about what he's reading. Everyone around me knows I read a lot, so of course what better present for my birthday than an e-reader, right? Wrong. I can't use that stuff. It puts me in the Distracted Mode, whereas when I do serious reading, I need to be in the Focused Mode. E-stuff automatically flips on the Distracted switch. You know - the stumbleupon links, the reddit cats, the endless outpouring of youtube video mud. Old school books do the opposite. Also, meditation is pretty much the polar opposite of twitter-driven thinking. Things like The Long Now Foundation, and the book called Anathem by Neal Stephenson, are direct reactions and backlashes to the twitterification of the modern mind.

Eleopteryx 13y ago

A few months ago, I had a brief exchange over Twitter with an artist from perhaps my favorite band: https://twitter.com/edwarddroste/status/343418176454926337 https://twitter.com/edwarddroste/status/343418176454926337 "Maybe they're trying to catch your latest tweet?" was the reply that I wanted to send, but I didn't want to come off as cheeky to someone I revered. Is the article not a distraction in itself? Sure enough, I came upon it this morning while I was browsing Twitter from my bed. The article itself is over 2000 words long; some of those words being a transcript from a 15 minute video. Now here I am commenting on it; taking up additional time from my day to formulate these points rather than attending to other things; reinforcing the dissonant relevance and irony of the points that the article is making. This article on distraction is a distraction in itself, and my viewership was predicated on finding it on a distracting service used from a distracting device. I found it and read it because I didn't have anything subjectively better to do at the time. I'm OK with this.

diydsp 13y ago

interesting point about the notifications from cellphones being random (and thus addictive like gambling). Perhaps mine would be less random if I were to use the "different sounds for different people" feature...

jackmaney 13y ago

Hmmm, this appears to be an insightful article. I think I'll read it thoro--oooh, coffee's done!

yaddayadda 13y ago
I do love my latte in the ... squirrel!

normloman 13y ago

It's not simply that we're constantly hunting for information. It's that too much information is crap. We use Facebook to find out what our best friend watched on television this week, read some blog about "10 secrets of successful entrepreneurs" (they really aren't secret), then head over to our favorite news site to have our political opinions affirmed by pundits. The advertising revenue model gives the media incentives to make lots of cheap, addictive information. They don't have an incentive to make quality information. So we get what we pay for. I have vowed to spend less time consuming and more time doing. It's hard. I cave in often. But I recommend it.

aestra 13y ago
We use Facebook to find out what our best friend watched on television this week rather than calling up our best friend, going out to dinner with them, and taking about what they watched on TV this week. Faceboook is very superficial interaction. I liken it to people shouting into a crowded room.
Florin_Andrei 13y ago
> The advertising revenue model gives the media incentives to make lots of cheap, addictive information. It's the fast-food equivalent of information. It's cheap, readily available, seemingly fulfilling, and creating lots of problems later down the road. > I have vowed to spend less time consuming and more time doing. Yup. I've taken up hobbies that require making and building stuff in the real world. It's quite amazing what you can accomplish that way.

qwerta 13y ago

Phone can be switched off. The real problem are open-plane offices.

Florin_Andrei 13y ago
Nah. There's a reason why god invented headphones. :)
- brador 13y ago
  To save others some time: Inventor of headphones: Nathaniel Baldwin.
yaddayadda 13y ago
How do I get an office in an open-plane? Although, wouldn't TSA be more of a problem than phones?

mattjaynes 13y ago

I battle with this and one thing that's been helping me a lot is "Letting It Cool". By that I mean that I delay reading "new" things until they've had a chance to lose their "newness". I've found that newness is a false signal for value. Just because something is new, we tend to errantly assign extra value to it. You can combat this by removing the new quality from the item by putting it somewhere where it can "cool down". For me, I save all the articles I want to read for the weekend. I just email the articles to myself and they go in a special folder and that's where they cool off for a few days. When you first start doing this, it is surprising how much some articles lose their perceived value over a few days. An article that I was really excited about when I first saw it will often induce a "meh" a few days later. On the other hand, some articles still retain their value and appeal several days later. I end up spending far fewer hours a week reading articles because of this method. It also helps to keep me focused since I don't let my mind wander to other topics during my work day. This also works for other things like movies, tv shows, facebook, etc. If you want to see the true value of something, delay enjoying it until the newness has worn off. It helps reduce what you consume and increases the quality of what you do. If your goal is to produce more and consume less, then this strategy can really help. http://devopsu.com/blog/productivity-tip-let-it-cool/ http://devopsu.com/blog/productivity-tip-let-it-cool/

doubt_me 13y ago

This is one of the major problems pointed out in Noam Chomskys manufacturing of consent (1992). Its a really nice documentary. I think the entire thing is uploaded to youtube

javajosh 13y ago

This post is dripping with irony because it is, itself, a form of distraction. Why? Because it doesn't offer any objective evidence for it's assertions. It is prescriptive distraction, a kind of modern, well-meaning form of muckraking that is a kind of politically passive aggressive post-apocalyptic self-help piece. (Don't get me wrong, I love writing these sorts of things as much as the next guy, but I keep them in my private journal.) The older I get the more skeptical I feel about any of my own attitudes that I don't have clear objective evidence for, especially the kind of vague forebodings that motivate this sort of piece. There are entire "hidden worlds" out there, where people are motivated by completely different things. "Ours is a culture of distraction." Which culture? There are so many cultures in the world, and even in the US, and even in Silicon Valley. Yes, I too see people walking around with their eyes downcast at their phones, consumed by far-away happenings. And it certainly feels like "we" are more disconnected from each other. But these are feelings, and should be treated as an impetus to look more deeply into the fact of the matter, rather than rush to diagnose and treat an ailment which you don't understand on any objective scale. And indeed, the first and best place to start looking is within yourself, and within your own life. Because the flip side to recognizing any kind of pan-cultural doom is living the alternative. That's the really cool thing about culture, is that it is not enforced by law, you can indeed break from it in very meaningful ways. An article documenting your experience breaking from the culture, with the implicit message that you found something lacking and went on a search to find it, would be far more valuable than subjective analysis. Because, as fun as your subjective analysis is to read, without action it is merely distraction.

mathattack 13y ago

I hope the irony of this story being posted on Hacker News isn't lost on everyone. :-)

krispycement 13y ago

Posted the guy on the blog with the RSS, twitter, email links prominently at top right. There is an assumption that those things he laments are functional parts of today's and tomorrow's world. Maybe he's just really boring and people would rather watch a stream of bullshit tweets than discuss the weather with him... because he seems a bit of a malcontent or judgmental. One person's distraction is another's attention and purpose. It's the outsider watching the 'distracted' trivializing the value of the benefits that the actor is receiving. How smug. Context is everything. Opinions are nothing. Smartphones only fail at optimizing the bandwidth of purposeful living in so much as those information flows have not been built out. If people are anxious about the next packet that comes to them, it might be that they feel unsatisfied with the company and activities before them. People aren't being distracted by the devices. They are hunting for higher purpose.

Lagged2Death 13y ago

Several times, this article mentions the notion - without really explaining it - that we have "anxiety of being understimulated." I think I understand what the author means, but I'm not sure that's quite right. I agree with the main points that the author is making, but I wonder if this "culture of distraction" is really a symptom of an even larger problem. Consider the possibility that many of us are simply highly anxious just about all of the time, and that the distractions presented by wired life are things we seek out for relief on purpose. That is, that the distractions aren't the cause of the anxiety, but a symptom. Maybe checking in with Twitter over and over again isn't "stimulation," maybe it's more like a narcotic. It helps us block out genuine, serious anxieties about money, jobs, work, family, and the future in general with easily-digested, glittery trivia. One possible reason to think about the problem this way - although it may sound like a big change in subject at first - is antidepressant sales, which have been climbing for years and now stand at record levels. Clearly, for whatever reason, we've built a way of life for ourselves that leaves a huge percentage of us desperately unhappy and stressed out for an awful lot of the time. Perhaps the explosion of smartphones and tablets, of portable, pocketable "brain stimulation" is, for many people, a form of self-medication. When you have a moment of downtime, and you have a chance to think about just how screwed you and your family are if your name comes up in this next round of layoffs, you can instead reach in your pocket and check out the latest celebrity scandal. When a free moment strikes and you find yourself wondering what sort of fascist nightmare future-US your children are going to be stuck with, you can instead check out the latest shiny aspirational gadgets. Regardless of the cause, the "culture of distraction" is still a real phenomenon worth fighting, I think. But maybe we can fight it more successfully if we understand the causes more completely.

zxcvvcxz 13y ago
Good point, it can be a symptom of something larger. I think with ubiquitous communications and globalization, the world is just more competitive. This is very stressful, and can cause anxiety and depression. Anecdote: I was just playing board games with my friends the other night. After 1.5 hours, I started panicking and feeling anxiety, so I excused myself. It felt wrong I guess, taking that much time off of work/study. Someone else might be outdoing me, right? Heh. I gotta say, I definitely didn't get this a decade ago. For anyone who feels similar sometimes, it's important to develop methods to bring your mental state to something more manageable. I like to remind myself that even if this is true, the anxiety feelings aren't going to help me "compete" anyways, so might as well be calm and move on.

spindritf 13y ago

> One step, I think, is to take a weekly holiday from your devices. You have just lost. Denying yourself something is not a viable way to avoid it. (Don't think about elephants.) There are only two solutions here. Either become someone else, change yourself so that you do not crave it any more, or displace it with something else. If you want to be fit, or at least less flabby, the psychologically viable route is to tell yourself "I am the kind of person who does 50 pushups after getting out of bed in the morning." Or, "I am the kind of person who cooks his own low-carb meals." And then actually become that person. If you don't want to stare at your phone in a public place, displace that behaviour with something else. "Instead of mindlessly browsing HN, I'll go talk to that cute chick at the end of the bar." Or even just "I will meditate, I will think about nothing but my breathing while waiting for that coffee." Though that might be even weirder than playing with your smartphone.

pachydermic 13y ago
Sure, but maybe you only have so much willpower to work with (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_depletion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_depletion). It's really interesting how it really is just as easy as making a decision, or just telling yourself something, but so many of us fail so often to do that kind of thing. This is something that bothers me deeply. This failure to do what we know we ought to demonstrates the tension which comes from this struggle between thinking we're really in control when we might not be. Interesting conflict there. Definitely worth thinking about - or ignoring entirely. Anyways, that doesn't have any impact on other people doing the phone thing. It's a lot easier to not be nose-deep in your phone when other people are engaging with you. I find that most people settle into the "trance" based on whether other people are on their phones. The people who start the "trance" are often preoccupied or just plain rude. Another facet to this is that we just don't know where this is going. Is it a step forwards or backwards. Hard to say that it looks like a good thing, but many of us didn't grow up with it - what will the story be like in 50 years? None of us has a clue, to be honest. Anyways, I think what it comes down to is the "responsible use" cliche. There are so many constructive things you can do with technology. But here we all are, reading these comments which don't matter and are just random people screaming into the void. Shit.

zwieback 13y ago

I'm sure there's some danger in all this distraction but I also think that people really weren't that interesting and interested before smartphones. Smart and creative people will always find ways to do smart and creative things but lots of people just look for distraction in whatever form they can find. The point about kids is an important one, though. Smartphone-parents do set a bad example for their kids.

apostate 13y ago

Mindfulness meditation[1] is an old but very effective way of training the mind to recognize distractions. I agree with the article that the opportunities for distraction are at an all-time high, but the human brain has not changed much in the last few millenia, and the problem of being distracted is almost certainly as old as the first time a person desired to contemplate something. To someone who wishes to devote a significant portion of their day to contemplation (e.g. a Buddhist monk), any distraction can be a setback, and the so-called "monkey mind"[2] is awfully persistent. Being able to recognize that you are being pulled away from your object of focus is the essential first step to reduce both the frequency and length of distractions. This is one of the goals of mindfulness meditation. Personally, I have found that the simple act of being able to catch myself in the midst of a distraction has improved my ability to focus. After spending time practicing mindfulness, I have developed a wonderful skill of being able to "switch off" a racing mind and pull myself back down to the task at hand (or to simply pull myself out of an anxious state of mind and into a pleasant one). Importantly, practicing this during 15 minutes of daily meditation has enabled me to do this during any of the other ~1000 waking minutes of each day. The first time I noticed myself do this "automatically" outside of meditation, I was amazed that I was able to cultivate such a skill. If you are interested in a good primer on mindfulness and how to actually go about meditation, I recommend Mindfulness in Plain English.[3] I recommend it whenever the subject comes up and I'm sure very few people read it, but it had enough of an effect on me that I would not want others to miss out. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness_of_breathing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness_of_breathing [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_monkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_monkey [3] http://www.urbandharma.org/pdf/mindfulness_in_plain_english.pdf http://www.urbandharma.org/pdf/mindfulness_in_plain_english....

rk0567 13y ago
Another one : http://www.siyli.org/take-the-course/siy-curriculum/ http://www.siyli.org/take-the-course/siy-curriculum/

joshdance 13y ago

You can't blame a "smartphone" for the distraction. It is merely a tool. People don't like to think or create, they like to consume. The smartphone is the best tool for consumption. I try to chose when I want to interact with my phone. Sometimes that means ignoring texts or calls, and turning off notifications. Not perfect but it is a start.

crux 13y ago

There's nothing really new in this talk but I have to say it was well-delivered. Well enough that I want to really resolve to keep my phone in my pocket whenever I'm with someone - even if they get up from the table. It's of course unconscionable to start tapping around while you're in the middle of a conversation, but I'm very well-acquainted with the impulse to check facebook or email as soon as a friend goes to the bathroom. I'll really try to capture that valuable mind-wandering time.

deleted 13y ago
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Millennium 13y ago

What is this "are creating"? We've had one for decades. We've refined it tremendously over the last 50+ years, by taking advantage of new technological achievements, but the fundamentals have been in place a lot longer than the article's author seems to think.

smacktoward 13y ago
Yeah, Neil Postman wrote about this same basic issue in his book Amusing Ourselves to Death (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death), and that came out nearly 30 years ago.

floobynewb 13y ago

I experience this. But my addiction is for information, technical articles, scientific papers in mathematics, physics, machine learning, biology. Now I can do it all on my phone anywhere, anytime. Texting and social media are of little interest to me... Do you think this is still something I should worry about?

jawr 13y ago

I just wanted to say that Joe Kraus did an awesome job at keeping my attention and presenting his ideas. It is extremely odd how much people rely on phones, but I think it's deeper that that and it's actually the internet that is the fundamental issue. Yes, it's a great resource; it's a great source of entertainment, knowledge and potential power. But for something that could be described as intangible it seems to be quite detrimental to us as a society.

dnautics 13y ago

to play devil's advocate (I don't necessarily believe this; I just don't know) - why is this necessarily a problem? For example, one possibility is: Over time, an increased culture of distraction will through social selection filter itself out into "improved multitasking ability". There are always growing pains associated with any seismic shift in society, especially those created by technology. What makes this one different, or are you someone who laments that time given over to learn cursive is now used to teach children to type?

tekalon 13y ago

Distracted from what? If we're distracted from socialization, its probably that whoever we're socializing isn't that interesting. No longer thinking/pondering? I use those mindless games to 'ponder'- They are simple enough it doesn't take much mental process to play, but leaves enough for me to think about what needs to be thought out (problems, the day, world problems, etc). The same arguments he's made have been made about books for centuries.

drewsears 13y ago

tl;dr

j_s 13y ago

When "The Net Is a Waste of Time"[1] (an editorial by William Gibson) was discussed[2] on Hacker News: > The winning quote: "[sic] surfing the Web is a procrastinator's dream. And people > who see you doing it might even imagine you're working." > - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5262229 [1] http://www.nytimes.com/1996/07/14/magazine/the-net-is-a-waste-of-time.html http://www.nytimes.com/1996/07/14/magazine/the-net-is-a-wast... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5261676 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5261676

dpweb 13y ago