The problem of algorithmic feeds gets a modest amount of attention, but I still think its not nearly enough. Addicting feeds are evil. If we ever manage to make it beyond them, we'll reflect on them with the same regret as slavery.
A quote from an author I like, Matthew Crawford: "Attention is the thing that is most one’s own: in the normal course of things, we choose what to pay attention to, and in a very real sense this determines what is real for us; what is actually present to our consciousness. Appropriations of our attention are then an especially intimate matter."
I can't really envision a solution, frankly. On a personal level, I have tried dozens of strategies to use my phone less, including deleting many of my social media accounts, and regrettably, its still an issue. My best guess is legislation that bans machine-learning algorithms on newsfeeds. But there are billions of dollars and a dysfunctional government (speaking U.S. here) motivated against that outcome.
For me, absolutely. And the fact that it’s text-only helps enormously too. The way I interact with HN is fine to me. I skim the posts once a day and read maybe one or two.
I think it's also important that HN doesn't have infinite scrolling. It's old-school: 30 items per page, click at the bottom to go to the next page.
I made a rule for myself that I would never go past page 2 of HN. So, each morning, I see 60 items, and if none of them interest me, then I just move on with my day. I think that's why I never became addicted.
The rate at which content ends up on the front page is also slower than your ability to consume it. So even if you do keep clicking, you end up on yesterday's links you've already read.
If you didn’t have that rule would you go past page 2? Frankly I just don’t find HN articles as cheaply and quickly mentally palatable as other sites. The content here is usually more cognitively demanding, so I don’t end up scrolling.
OK so in this comment, and child comments, a number of hypotheses are mentioned for why HN is fine:
* HN is text-only
* HN lacks infinite scroll
* HN adds new content slowly
* HN is cognitively demanding
My guess is that these factors are most important. If you held them constant and added a recommendation engine in HN, I doubt HN would become considerably more addictive.
I think there needs to be a culture shift. It's already happening among millennial parents where they don't give phones to kids till they're old enough or even 18.
I mean I agree, and folks my age (gen z) do police one another on phone usage at dinner, for example. I just wish there was an easier or better way to expedite this cultural shift.
It kinda reminds me of cigarettes. A similarly addicting thing that largely disappeared in the US when it became unfashionable/shameful. Is there a way to make this happen for phones, I wonder.
A quote from an author I like, Matthew Crawford: "Attention is the thing that is most one’s own: in the normal course of things, we choose what to pay attention to, and in a very real sense this determines what is real for us; what is actually present to our consciousness. Appropriations of our attention are then an especially intimate matter."
I can't really envision a solution, frankly. On a personal level, I have tried dozens of strategies to use my phone less, including deleting many of my social media accounts, and regrettably, its still an issue. My best guess is legislation that bans machine-learning algorithms on newsfeeds. But there are billions of dollars and a dysfunctional government (speaking U.S. here) motivated against that outcome.