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Comment by tayo42 | Hacker News Reader

Idk if it's just terrified, but I think we're addicted. This probably sounds ridiculous but I recently blocked some apps and sites on my phone and actually felt a little off for a day, like my sleep was weird. I think there was a slight withdrawal from the constant bombardment of stuff. It is helping kill my Facebook habit. I don't even really like the site, I just check it impulsively. It's weird.

Reddit is another one, the infinite scroll I think is addictive. Trying to kill that habit. But there is useful information on there so it's hard to disable it completely.

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Yep. I deactivated Facebook and it took a week or so to get used to not having it. I feel a lot better without it that I will probably delete it. I do want to keep messenger so that’s one of the only reasons to keep it.

You don't need a Facebook-account in order to use Facebook Messenger.

True, but AFAIK, you can't keep your contacts (friends?) list when you delete the account and create a new one just on Messenger. An alternative is to deactivate the account [1] – this effectively removes your account from Facebook, but allows you to keep Messenger with all the contacts. (It probably also keeps other associated accounts, such as Instagram.) Although, it means that the moment you log into Facebook, your account comes back up, with all the relationships that were left off, tags, photos, etc.

[1]: https://www.facebook.com/help/214376678584711

Looking at certain sites just becomes a muscle reflex. The second I'm bored, I feel the urge to look at my phone.

If you have a large enough rotation of websites, you never feel properly bored, so you can spend the entire day mindlessly browsing.

I think it's easy to tell whether you're browsing with intent or just killing time. It's just hard to close the lid and go do something else, especially if you've been doing it for so long that you forgot what "something else" is.

Delete the mobile apps. I scrolled reddit to infinity on my phone going through news that would make me depressed. I deleted the app and have been happy ever since. I come here twice a day for 10 minutes instead and my screen time reduced by 40minutes at least. I don’t feel gloomy all the time because of news too

This is wonderful advice. I went on a news hiatus some time ago and can attest to its benefit.

FWIW I did something similar. Deleted my reddit account and now just occasionally visit specific subreddits that I used to subscribe to. I find that actually going to a subreddit to find specific content I want to look at helps break the loop of endless scrolling but I still get just as informed/entertained.

I use this app on Android to browse reddit. It limits the amount of posts so you only spend a few minutes on it. https://f-droid.org/packages/com.aaronhalbert.nosurfforreddi...

Yes, definitely. I feel this way as well. It's not ridiculous at all. Forced withdrawal is the only way to begin recovery and get back sensitivity.

People are extremely scared of the word "addiction" though. I feel the same way about sugar and basically all carbohydrates at all and it's very challenging to talk about.

I’m happy to be free from sugar since a few months. I’m adding salt in my oats instead of sugar. Or just fruits. Or cocoa powder.

Cutting carbs though, esp. fruits, is way harder.

Congratulations! I’ve been fruit free and almost vegetable free for 3 years and it’s been the best time of my life. I’ve lost over 200 pounds and kept it off for longer than I ever have in 3+ decades of weight loss attempts.

It feels like how I treat junk food and snacks: I’m welcome to have as much as I want, but I have to go out of my way to get it every time. Never stock up, which in this analogy would mean never install the native app or subscribe to newsletters or notifications.

For reddit et al, I only view it on the browser. Sure, I get bombarded by popovers and alerts telling me to install the app, but I have to work my way to get to the content if I really wanted to view it.

You can use extensions to either delete or remove the infinite scroll.

In my opinion, the infinite scroll is both addictive and fruitless. I rarely find something fun when it's buried deep in the feed. That's pretty obvious. If it was a fun post, it would've been at the top, right?

If you don't trust any extension with site-reading capability, here's a simple solution: scroll down as much as you are comfortable, and then work upwards!

I specifically bought a Wi-Fi router, the Deco, to fight my addiction to Facebook, Twitter, Reddit. I probably should add this site too.

How does it deal with HTTPS blocking? My Linksys does not handle it.

It prolly blocks DNS requests.

Not sure about how different the effectiveness is, but I use the Freedom app to block sites at schedules times on my desktop. I also have it on my phone, but it’s not as reliable on iPhone as it sometimes randomly deactivates.

I would recommend using https://old.reddit.com/ and not going past the first page :)

You might enjoy the book Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. It's helped me figure out how control the apps, instead of them controlling me.

What information on reddit is useful?

Or Facebook. I use Twitter for doomscrolling, at least it has real time info. Facebook has been utterly useless for years now.

I have taken 3 photography related courses that all have private groups on FB. I don't use FB in any other capacity but the value of those groups is probably among the highest ROIs on the internet for me (hobby wise at least).

Devils advocate: reddit can be just as useful as HN (or more so) if you only interact with subreddits you have a deep connection to.

I used to often see niche, really interesting stuff on there, although I haven't used it much lately. The Frontpage is pure garbage though.

Ah, yes, the No True Subreddit fallacy.

No need for infernal advocacy here. Reddit is to some extent the unfortunate heir of newsgroups, as well as many independent forums, so of course there is going to be a lot of interesting and useful information on it.

The thing I imagine that gives some people such a negative view is coming in contact through the brand "reddit" and being dumped into large controversial sub-reddits straight away.

A lot of people bump into a particular sub-reddit through a search result and have no idea of the dumpster fires elsewhere on the larger "reddit" site.

/r/rust

Pick a programming language or piece of popular tech, chances are good it has a subReddit of discussions and links to blog posts and announcements, sometimes with some of the creator/maintainer people posting.

Its helpful to get kind of organic opinions on things. See what people are saying if your shopping for something new. Its comes up in google searches a lot. At least there's no seo gaming on a reddit link.

Ive had some ok experiences on reddit too, meet ups, bought stuff, got free concert tickets once too. its hard to write the whole thing off. That might be a different era of reddit though. Its been a few years since I had something like that happen now that i think about it

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