Use of internet, social media, digital devices plateaus in US | Hacker News Reader

Use of internet, social media, digital devices plateaus in US

pewresearch.org

79 pointsprostoalex36 comments

I stopped using Facebook and Twitter. Same as majority of people who did the same, I report being happier and more productive.

I've noticed a significant dropoff in activity on Facebook. Not that I use it much either, but I might check it once every day or every other day, and I keep seeing lots of old stuff in my feed. Now it's gotten to the point where I keep seeing "There are no more posts to show" or some such message when I get to the bottom of the page, which is sight to see for sure. That site is truly dying, at least in my realm of it.

In the meantime, I've made it my job to gradually unlike and unfriend nearly everything, which has been made much easier and apparent by the fact that Facebook now shows what other things people have in common with you. (too little too late, mark)

I stopped browsing general news, unless somebody alerts me to something important. I find that it makes me slightly less annoyed with the world, not sure I am more happy or productive.

But for Twitter and Facebook I found that as long as I unfollow people, mute certain words and otherwise weed out the garden, I am more relaxed, more informed about people I do care about, and I get to see more cool stuff.

Since quitting, do you have any insight into what was making you unhappy about using them?

I ask because I've never felt that social media has made me unhappy (beyond some "FOMO" from seeing cool stuff my friends are doing.)

Moreso than FOMO, I've found that the stimulation addiction loops one gets into are the worst part.

Did you also stop using all Facebook products (Instagram and WhatsApp)? Many of the people I know who are proud of quitting Facebook are happily snapping pictures daily for Instagram or chatting regularly on WhatsApp.

>Many of the people I know who are proud of quitting Facebook are happily snapping pictures daily for Instagram or chatting regularly on WhatsApp.

If you are implying (through the use of "proud of x, [but] happily doing y") that this is some sort of contradiction, I challenge that implication. WhatsApp and Insta are entirely different products by the same company, which scratch different itches. Not everyone changes their social media habits based on a perception of moral failing by the company that purveys those services -- that appears to be something rather unique to a subset of individuals. Some people just want to be happier.

Quit Facebook two years ago, not using Instagram, using WhatsApp because my mom doesn't use Signal.

Whatsapp serves a different purpose (chat) than Fb/Insta.

Potentially viable alternatives (Telegram, Signal, etc) are emerging for Whatsapp compared to none for the other two.

They're different use-cases and segments. I'm not on Facebook because I don't need racist screeds from friends of friends (or sometimes soon-to-be-former friends). I am on Instagram because I like dank memes and pictures of food. I'm not trying to stick it to the man, I'm just valuing a different type of content and enjoying the different medium more.

I deleted messenger, Instagram and app, but not WhatsApp. Sadly it's not replaceable yet :(.

Why not replaceable? iMessage seems like a perfect replacement.

Edit: for Android devices, Signal is just as easy to use as WhatsApp.

Only if 100% of your contacts use iPhones.

Signal is far more annoying to use and is less consistent about notifications. Accordingly, most people are hard to motivate into switching (or installing yet another messaging app).

Not replaceable in a sense that there are some people that are only reachable over WhatsApp and Messenger.

Messenger is so much better than the default SMS app on my Android device that I can't get rid of it. I don't know if it's just US Cellular crapware, Samsung crapware, or Android core crapware, but the system default is garbage.

That's what happens to any product or technology eventually. It's market saturation. Whether it was the TV or walkman or nintendo of the past, or the internet, social media and smartphones today, they all plateau. And then the new tech comes along and then that grows exponentially until it plateaus. Rinse, repeat.

Explosive user growth in "free" SAAS and social media starts to taper towards a limit.

Public companies, pressured to maintain that revenue trajectory, compensate reduced growth by squeezing more value from existing users.

This tends to lead towards more obtrusive advertisement, aggressive data collection which, if not carefully implemented, leads to negative publicity and attrition.

The struggle in 2018+ is to find what we collectively considers "acceptable privacy", or in other words where is that line between what valuable personal information folks will offer up and what's considered generally creepy.

"The shares of U.S. adults who say they use the internet, use social media, own a smartphone or own a tablet computer are all nearly identical to the shares who said so in 2016. The share who say they have broadband internet service at home currently stands at 65% – nearly identical to the 67% who said this in a survey conducted in summer 2015. And when it comes to desktop or laptop ownership, there has actually been a small dip in the overall numbers over the last two years – from 78% in 2016 to 73% today."

It's like mobile phones - everyone who wants one (in the US) has one. You can't keep expecting a rise in usage numbers on anything, as eventually you'll hit maximum usage which is very rarely 100%.

Broadband internet is still not available to large chunks of the population. It’s really three groups those who can’t afford it, thouse who don’t want it, and those who can’t get it.

Bingo. I am still struggling with 200k dsl I happily pay 75 a month for. And I consider myself lucky as most of my neighbors are too far from the DSLAM for any connectivity. The rural are the new underclass in america. The amount of hate and incredulity of anyone who does not adopt an urban lifestyle I see on HN is astounding.

I’d say that most people nowadays do not really need broadband if they have a good enough cell phone plan.

Lots of people don’t have great cell phone coverage where they live. I’m within 50 miles of a major US city and I have a spotty cell signal. Also data limits/throttling.

It's hard to blind-trust certain statistics for a simple reason, many use mobile internet when on train/bus, waiting something in line out of their homes etc, however they really use internet at home/work from a PC. In terms of time many may spend more time on a mobile devices not because it's their primary platform but because of today inefficient/poorly organized life etc.

Such scenario is hard to track statistically.

FWIW, I'm in Western Europe, and "social media"-free (besides occasional use of HN) for about good five plus years. Not that I was a ravenous user before that.

Happy to report that overall well-being, reading pleasure and concentration levels have measurably increased. (I "just" need to continue to peacefully sustain it.)

PS: Normally, at this hour I would be at my Dutch class; but tonight it was "interim feedback day". And it was done in 40 minutes, instead of the regular 3 & 1/2 hour lesson; hence I'm coasting here. :-)

What I find interesting is that tablet use increased slightly from 51% to 53% over 2 years, while tablet sales across the industry are on a decline [1] with the exception of a few companies such as Apple and Huawei.

This wasn't addressed in the Pew survey, but (purely speculation here), I wonder if it's being driven by an increase in older people using tablets rather than laptops/desktops, due to the larger screen sizes tablets offer over a smartphone with similar capabilities.

Anecdotally, I've started to see older people (in their mid-40s to 60s) bring iPads to meetings instead of laptops to take notes, email, and browse the web.

[1] https://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS44191918

Was never a heavy social media user, however, Twitter is nice for getting local government updates.

FB is just gross.

With this finding, I hope we can get back to developing atom based solutions as opposed to bit solutions (reference avc.com).

The coming AR computing epoch will again increase the hours/day we’re staring at (through?) screens.

Not for me. I've been steadily reducing my screen time outside of work on purpose. AR/VR sound like a nightmare when I think about how pervasive obscene advertising will become.

Good point about adverts. I’m so used to using ad blockers that I had completely forgotten about them.

In the absence of adverts, I can easily believe I will be a heavy user of augmented reality, as I already find the limited form on my phone extremely useful (translation mainly, but I have also used AR as a ruler, and a previous employer’s main app uses it to tell hikers what the nearby hills are called).

Forgot about advertisements? They are literally everywhere. On clothes, on cars, at the bottom of your shopping cart, at the gas station, on the plane, even in the baggage screening bins.

Other than branding, there isn’t any on clothes or cars around here, and only very occasionally on cars in the last place I lived (and even then 3:1 in favour of the advert being a hand written private sale offer for the car itself). Likewise, none on shopping carts or in gas stations around here. The only adverts I’ve seen in aircraft (unless you count in-flight menus) are in RyanAir aircraft, which I avoid. None in any baggage screening bins I’ve used either — those have all been plain grey no matter the airport or country.

I presume from you saying “gas station” that you’re in America. The EU doesn’t generally have as much advertising.

Do you mean for work, home, or both? I'm definitely interested to see how AR comes into play in the workplace, for home I think Americans already watch television or are on electronic devices most of their waking hours outside of work (can't find the article but know it was a few hours a day at least) so I'm not sure how much of an impact it'll have there

It sounds like ML, just like Glass might be a flop based on yesterday's HN ML review post. Though, it could be like the Newton, it's GOING to happen, but it will take another 25 years of technical innovation.

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