[phillipamann]

This article speaks to me and what I've been preaching to others for a while now. I got high speed internet in 1999. I was 13 years old. I am now 29 on the cusp of 30 and I think that this experiment has been detrimental to me rather than beneficial. I am currently in the process of doing what Fry talks about. While I can not be absolute and still want to visit some sites and some communities, I am trying to treat each website as if it were a magazine subscription or something I have to buy and own.

I like to live a minimalist lifestyle at home and prefer owning as few things as possible. I know many others feel this way too. However, with the internet and computing, ownership is abstract. I become overwhelmed and anxious under the deluge of files, apps, notifications, settings, and upkeep required for it all. I know I am not alone in this. Below is a quotation I loved from Deep Work by Cal Newport:

"These services aren’t necessarily, as advertised, the lifeblood of our modern connected world. They’re just products, developed by private companies, funded lavishly, marketed carefully, and designed ultimately to capture then sell your personal information and attention to advertisers. They can be fun, but in the scheme of your life and what you want to accomplish, they’re a lightweight whimsy, one unimportant distraction among many threatening to derail you from something deeper. Or maybe social media tools are at the core of your existence. You won’t know either way until you sample life without them."

Newport, Cal (2016-01-05). Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World (p. 209). Grand Central Publishing. Kindle Edition.

[bloaf]

I've been thinking about this sort of thing for a while now. I can't help but think of things along the lines of "good fences make good neighbors."

Essentially, I feel like we've built ourselves digital houses that have no walls. All we have to do is to look around us and we'll see advertisements, social media, news reports, porn, and scholarly journals. The problem is that finding information has become easier than deciding what information we want to find. I think that in order to have a healthier relationship with the internet, we need houses with walls, and a fence. I should not be able to just glance around and see everything at once, because everything at once is overwhelming. I should have to get up and walk to the door, or down to the mailbox. Imposing those kinds of small costs to information access would, I think, go a long way to reducing the anxiety and distractions that currently blow through our digital houses.

[vasilipupkin]

by what algorithm have you determined that it has been detrimental? how do you know that algorithm is accurate?

[phillipamann]

I did this by reflecting on my own life. I reflected on my habits and behaviors. I thought about how my life was before and after this. I thought about this even more compared to when I became a smartphone owner and when I was not a smart phone owner. There is no algorithm for this. There is no correct answer and that's the point. Some people love being connected to 10 social networks and constantly checking them. Some people don't. I am of the later group.