Living Like It's 99, No Social Media, No Smartphone
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Problem with phone calls is that they are synchronous, yet quite often things callers want to resolve can be resolved asynchronously (= via text messages & emails), but you can handle those when it's convenient.
So at least I'm glad that most of my contacts send me messages in whichever messenger is convenient. We can always agree to call each other if we feel like it will be more convenient, but then it's a much different feeling then just randomly calling. Also personally 100% of "random calls" I got within last 3 years were telemarketers, so guess how often I answer the phone :-D
Edit: in general I agree strongly that dropping off social networks and in general reducing notifications noise to a minimum (and not only on smart phone but everywhere) does wonders, strongly recommend.
But yes, if someone doesn't answer and then starts a text, it should be assumed/checked whether they're busy.
I’m the opposite. I tend not to text. Most of my friends and family know this and call. When someone does text me, I remind them gently that I’m not willing to sit there trying to type on a tiny screen to have a mediocre conversation with them when they can just call me instead. I say it in a nicer way of course. It’s never a problem! I guess I’m just old but it looks like the default is shifting towards texting lately. No offense to the texters, but it’s just not my thing.
And most of the time, I love to have a phone conversation.
But, the mental state is not always there for it. I may may be in a low mood, or emotionally exhausted, or a host of other reasons why a voice conversation would not be ideal right now. When I talk to a friend I like to be able to engage with them and give them my best. Sometimes, it's just not the time.
So in such a case I would prefer to speak to them later, perhaps the next day after a good night's sleep. It shouldn't be a big deal unless someone makes it into one.
Consider how most people communicate now a days. A call is only for long conversations. No one is expecting to receive a call without a reason, out of the blue. I could certainly imagine people texting back, confused about what their friend wanted to talk about, and whether they could answer in a quick text instead.
That's not anxiety, it's just practical. No one is expecting you to call just to say "hi", they assume there must be some sort of problem that you want to talk about in depth.
It is my opinion that it is unhealthy, and that people should be aware of that and do more to be less unhealthy when it comes to social interaction.
I think it should be worked on if the person in question would rather have an easier time talking on the phone. Otherwise I'm not sure I agree.
I'm autistic and phonecalls are a nightmare given ambiguous social signalling over who begins speaking and when. Thankfully at this stage in the game most people contact me via some other communication method, the only calls I get are scammers.
Of course people don't always capitalize fully on this but I think it's a major reason why messaging has come to be preferred over calls.
Yep, that's me. I hate phone calls. I don't see phone calls as a natural human interaction at all and they make me really uncomfortable. I never pick up my phone but am almost always available for text messages.
No issues with video call or face to face chat though, so that's not that I find human interactions toxic. But phone calls are something I hate to do. They somehow feel too intrusive and too intimate.
We live largely on zoom these days, and less and less people have their cameras on and they are more like voice calls. I really don't see the difference between this and a phone call
Face chat is for friends and family; for business I don't want or need to see your face.
Cannot remember every detail when the decision conversation is done via phone call / meeting. I can only rely on written details.
Text is too often misconstrued and again emoj's don't solve this problem. The fact that emoji speak even exists is really odd to me, but I guess thats an "ok boomer" for me.
Very true. The OP doesn't understand phone calls interrupt people most of the time unnecessarily. I like texts and emails, because I can process them whenever it's convenient for me, not when it's convenient for the other person.
I think it was Stephen Fry who once said a phone call is like a person bursting into your room yelling "Talk to me now! Talk to me now! Talk to me now!" We wouldn't stand for that in any other circumstance, but when it happens through a phone it becomes socially acceptable.
Why were you buying new phones every year? This is such a non-argument. I've been using the same Android phone for almost 7 years. It does everything I want it to do. Sure, I spent a couple of days trimming down the system, and carefully selecting applications (for example, the Google Clock from 2015 weighs about 3 MB and is very fast, while the same application from 2020 is about 30 MB and is extremely slow to start, despite having the same feature set).
Android version: 10.
Android security patch level: March 5 2021.
Your device is not stock and is, therefore, an exception.
OS security patches are less of a concern for older devices because the majority of the OS was still moved into Google Play Services and as long as the apps are still updated (eg, Chrome), the risk is very low.
Sad how gadgets become ever more brittle and unreliable as they get newer.
The prospect of truly long-term support for years and years is one reason I bought a PinePhone and have been keeping track of its development. But sadly the current PinePhone has too ancient and underpowered a CPU to be useful.
as soon as I want to do video calls at reasonable speeds, it's probably in my interest to have moderately new hardware and chipsets supporting things like beamforming or other things that only more recent hardware can give me. but even here my 8 yro phone does everything I want it to so that argument kicks only in for truly ancient hardware (e.g. LTE support etc)
There have been tons of critical Android vulnerabilities over the last years that cannot be fixed by app updates, e.g. remote code execution via Bluetooth stack or MMS.
Yes. Because like windows the ecosystem is huge, and there are plenty of grandmas who don't know how or why to update things.
Much of the world can't afford to replace their phone every 2 years.
Oooh, even I shudder when reading that! :D
It's really about someone taking an undetected loan out in your name, credit card fraud is not a big deal to the regular consumer anymore.
I won't do anything with em, pinky-promise, but if something did happen, it doesn't matter, right? Just talk to Visa.
Like, why lock my car and house doors when insurance will pay for it?
Because you'll have a really hard time with a claim if there's no sign of forced entry, since many insurance policies are void in this situation?
Yes, just call them. By regulation, you're not liable for unauthorized use of credit card (specifically, credit card). As a consumer you have zero concerns about card theft.
If your attitude to security is "I can run my computer with unpatched XP with a public IP and sync it to a 7 year unpatched phone because once in a blue moon some credit card company or major business can leak my account data there too", then sure...
Might as well ask me to name "one" covid victim, lest they're all "actors".
My uncle, for one, had a randomsware attack 3 years ago, crippling his (small, construction services) company for weeks.
You are aware that there are tons of malware attacks, computers controlled as bots (doing mining, DDoS, etc.), ransomware, etc, right? Or is this some episode of the Twilight Zone?
https://www.csoonline.com/article/2923557/many-ransomware-vi...
https://krebsonsecurity.com/2019/12/ransomware-gangs-now-out...
https://www.securityweek.com/google-sophisticated-apt-group-...
https://www.securityweek.com/sierra-wireless-says-ransomware...
I don't use Google/Samsung Pay either. They literally do the same thing as the credit + debit card in my wallet. But their advertisements would have you believe they've somehow reinvented consumer finance.
Phone operating systems have so many issues that there's no way I'll trust them with any important data.
I am using an HTC Desire 826 from 2016 running Android 6, while my father is using a Galaxy Note 3 Neo running Android 4.3.
I personally don't have much issues with regards to not having security patches.. the phone itself does most of what I want, although I am having issues with other things unrelated to security patches -- it's getting a bit sluggish, the 16GB storage does get annoying, and the battery barely lasts two hours of web browsing. Also, it no longer accepts SIM cards for whatever reason. But it's not a big deal to warrant spending money (I don't get called at all and I do have a dumb phone that I go out with for emergencies. Besides, I no longer get annoying messages and calls from my carrier)
Similarly, my father's is doing alright, and the issues he is facing are unrelated to security patches -- many apps don't support Android versions older than 6.. some of them are essential things like Google stuff. YouTube and Gmail for instance outright don't work, and Chrome occasionally brings up messages along the lines of "Please update your Chrome version". But nothing is caused by not having security patches.
What am I missing? This is a genuine question.
This issue is indicative of the larger problem ARM SoCs pose to consumers: manufacturers choose not to design ARM boards with SBSA-like features[1] because it's cheaper to do so. While x86 machines have enumerable buses for hardware discovery, as well as ACPI support, ARM SoCs don't. As a result, mainline Linux kernels won't boot on them, they require a kernel fork, and a kernel fork must be maintained. Manufacturers have no incentive to maintain that fork for more than a year or two.
As ARM SoCs take over what are considered general purpose computing devices, like laptops, devices that we once thought of as being upgradable, software-wise, suddenly aren't. Apple's M1 Macs are an example of this. To get Linux running on them is a massive undertaking, and running Linux on them in the long-term means relying on a third party to build and maintain M1-specific images in perpetuity, because the SoCs can't run the generic ARM images that ARM servers can run.
There are mitigations against this problem in Linux, like Device Tree[2] support, but that is only one small part of the big[2] undertaking when it comes to porting Linux to ARM SoCs.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Server_Base_System_Architectur...
Many people do. You'd be surprised.
What Apple mentioned in the iphone 7 reveal, which was when they made headlines for removing the jack, was that it is a bulky component that extends quite far into the phone, competing for precious real estate with other components.
I believe there is. When designing a product, one always operates within a given set of contraints. Removing one of the constraints of the design makes it easier to hit the rest of the objectives. You might argue that easier design = reduced costs but IMO that would be too loose of a definition of "costs" in this case.
Consider the lower end of the market: budget phones have cheaper cameras, cheaper screens, cheaper processors - why? Because these are indeed good targets for cost cutting. They all have headphone jacks though. To me, that suggests that cost is not the issue here.
of course it's a bigger car so more expensive to run. so buy a 5yo focus and get the best of both worlds.
Some older Mercedes might have a lower TCO than a 2018 focus, but only because the focus is disastrously unreliable.
Most Android phones run forked kernels, so even if you put LineageOS on them for security updates, they're still stuck on ancient kernels. I have phones with LineageOS on them that will never see a Linux kernel newer than the 3.0 fork the manufacturer released.
WTF. Don't do this! That's a complete sin, don't modify the device of someone else when they trust you to enter your contact information! You're violating every social expectation when installing something without their consent.
They give you their unlocked device for a specific task of entering your phone number, which already implies a high level of trust, and you instantly break that trust by unsolicitedly installing software on their device? That sounds like a quick way to lose your connection to that person.
I know I wouldn't want to have any further interaction with the person who breaks my trust right at the beginning by going out of their way and sneakily installing software on my device. Especially since they aren't a close friend of mine to begin with, because if they were a close friend, we would have each other's phone numbers already.
It's not that novel. First, more than half the world still lives like this right now anyway. Second, 1999 was barely more than 20 years ago. As late as 2003, there were still no smartphones, no Facebook, and Google was still just a search engine. Going back to the life you had 18 years ago is just like riding a bike.
At least if you never made this kind of thing your entire life, but plenty of people never made this kind of thing their entire life. My dad still has never made a social account and doesn't even have an email address. This is maybe hard to realize for someone who maintains a personal blog, but not everyone made the Internet the cornerstone of their existence.
My kids, by contrast, have grown up in a completely different world. Especially since COVID, so many of their peer interactions are through social media. They are highly dependent on devices for a lot of basic needs. Perhaps this is geared toward a younger audience that has no idea what 1999 was like - it was 22 years ago!
The article appears to agree with you, more or less:
A lot of people around me don’t understand how I can live my life like that, they tell me they will never do it. What they don’t realize is that we all used to do it, smartphones have only been mainstream these last 10 years. So unless you’re ten, you’ve lived your life just fine without it.
The ability to "just sit" is a wonderful thing. I never thought about it until early adulthood - one day I was pacing anxiously around, while my girlfriend and a friend of hers talked on the sofa, and suddenly her friend looked up at me and said "Men never just sit, do they?"
But this was almost 30 years ago, long before smartphones.
I agree it's not very healthy, and I agree many people don't understand. I personally am working on using "do not disturb" a lot more on my phone, so that only calls will get through in real-time. That said, to say "1999 was only 20 years ago" really doesn't capture _how much has changed_ in those 20 years.
I was in uni 15 years ago and the first mistake I made was trying to do course readings of JSTOR/ScienceDirect papers directly on the screen. I thought I'd be saving paper, as after all the readings amounted to 500 or more pages per course.
After a semester of destroying my eyes and being unable to remember key details, I thought "screw that". Printed out every single reading after that. It took until 2017 to have a consumer product like the ReMarkable that's large enough to comfortably display PDFs and allow for marking up with a pressure sensitive pen.
It blows my mind just how good the reMarkable is, and how long it took to happen.
After using ebooks for the past decade, I cannot go back to using one without a backlight. I still use backlight at a bare minimum, but a complete lack of it seems like a serious oversight. Looking forward to remarkable v3, as I expect them to address this, given how simple and requested this feature is.
And Frontlight.
That being said, it's an absolutely amazing device, it really is digital paper. If you enjoy reading technical papers, it's totally worth it, I've read more papers in the two weeks since I got it than in the two months before.
And the notetaking, oh the notetaking. I can now write notes much more easily, and they are automatically digitised so I can find them later, and on different devices. It's incredibly good, I suspect where I'll love it the most is for interviews, as it's much easier for me to write than it is to type (and feels much less rude also).
Ebook readers rock.
I too have no social media nor smartphone, but this made me cringe...I TOTALLY understand his pain-point and it's tough to not be on Whatsapp, but to go above-and-beyond for privacy reasons, and then install an app on someone's phone without their consent?
But it is a great article! I love the watch and it's something I'm going to look into for myself!
I shudder to think how cumbersome a lot of things were just five years ago.
Things I use my smartphone for every day, or very frequently - versus what I had to do before:
Sending money via apps - Had to go to the bank and do a bank transfer, or login to my bank on my computer, and do a wire transfer from there. I can also pay for stuff in stores, via apps, so I don't need to have my bank/credit card on me.
Electronic signing and 2FA - Had to carry an external login chip/dongle.
Listen to music - Had to carry an iPod or similar
Take photos - Had to carry camera or video camera, and transfer the stuff to my computer
Record audio - Had to carry some physical audio-recorder
E-tickets - Had to purchase physical tickets/cards, and get them re-filled in stores
E-drivers licence - Had to carry my physical drivers licence, which could lead to fine/penalty if I forgot my wallet at home
Maps - Had to look up maps beforehand, buy a print, find a public map. Same goes for directions.
Real-time public transit maps - Wasted so, so much time standing outside, waiting for the bus or whatever, not knowing if it was late, or I was too late.
Coupons - Had to bring physical coupons to store.
And the list goes on. I haven't even mentioned the most obvious things, like being able to read emails everywhere, or getting in contact with anyone, almost everywhere.
Sure - one can/will get dependent to phones, and losing it can be extremely stressful.
But the net result has been overwhelmingly positive for me, as far as convenience goes. I "side hustle" by buying/selling stuff, both domestic and international, and the sheer ease of how things work today is just incredible. 90% of that business happens through my phone, because that's the fastest way.
That said, I don't know if there's really a point to these articles anymore. The people who CAN do this, and want to, will just do it. For most of the population meanwhile, trends and FOMO will keep them glued in place until the next corporate SOMA comes along. Put another way, I don't think you can really write an article like this without preaching to the choir. I didn't avoid social media because some article convinced me it was a good idea. I just have a (mildly) weird personality and somewhat unusual priorities, and staying off social media was one inevitable result.
- All of my personal relationships have normal adult boundaries based on what we bring to it today, and don't operate on precedents set when we were in middle school.
- Freedom from the awareness of people talking about me and the urge to influence that conversation.
- I can try things and really suck terribly at them until I'm good enough that I don't anymore, and do them for the pleasure of doing them instead of whether they get me approval and likes.
- I'm a refreshing person to be around because the perceived problems of the world seem alien and silly in my environment.
- I can engage deeply with complex ideas and problems without being assigned to a "side."
The downsides are things like when I have an idea for a product or do something creative, I absolutely lack a channel to put it into to get fast feedback and refine it.
It can be a chore for people to "explain" you in business contexts when you don't have a bunch of pictures of your food they can just look up and confirm that you, too, are the sort of person who takes pictures of their food, which creates risk you can't be trusted to just get it that people take pictures of their food now, or you don't value the same things they do. I literally eat 3x+ a day, so it's not like an exotic holiday for me, though I guess with the internet being global, that's not true for everyone, so I can see why they take the pictures. Having to explain why I don't take pictures of it is social friction like being vegan 20 years ago.
Anyway, it's a balance, and there are good reasons to stay on it, and sacrifices if you leave it. It's just a disequilibrium right now.
Without caring what side you are being assigned, it might be more accurate to say.
I think you are spot on here. The first thing I look at when reading a comment on HN is the comment, I rarely notice the less opaque tiny piece of text at the top indicating which user said what.
I've been wondering whether something has happened to a few remote acquaintances of me who have suddenly stopped posting.
If you plan to quit facebook et al, that's awesome, but maybe post a final status saying "I'm not dead, get in touch via mail or phone".
I disabled all kinds of popups and notifications. I still use Jodel which is fun and anonymous (as much as anything these days).
I get mad when reading LinkedIn so I only go there once a week or so. There is nothing noteworthy on linkedin.
I use Reddit for news only - private subreddit.
I guess that forums are the only kind of interaction that interests me.
I just wanted to say that cutting the connection to social media doesn't have to be 100%. Being selective is enough for me.
Everything else is spot on though. I go days without looking at my fairly selective twitter or reddit. HN is probably the only thing I check daily, but if I'm busy I might not even do that.
The point is use the tools and don't let them use you. Social media, smart phones, etc... are what you make of them.
The job offers are crap. I'm not going to move to Switzerland or Germany for 3 months gig and I don't want to work for Uber. I stopped responding to recruiters as they don't understand that I really don't want to do Java for some crappy bank. I would rather starve.
End rant.
HN is great. People are usually nice and often I learn something new about a topic that I didn't know.
Like the other person who replied, LinkedIn made me angry, but I still returned to it when I ran out of things to check. Now there's nothing there to check.
It worked so well that I did the same with Facebook.
What does this mean?
My boy is in a private day care (Danish: dagpleje) - they have a private FB group where they post pictures for their parents to see most of the days.
But yeah, sure, sounds great for the tiny number of people who don't require any of the above.
I like taking pictures, i like looking back on them. I use them for painting inspiration too. I don't really need to be a photographer though with a dslr or whatever is cool now
I think you can easily travel, have a wide network of far flung friends, be involved in niche hobbies, look for a new job, and keep up with modern trends & cultures - all without a smart phone and social media. If you have a laptop & internet connection - you're good to go! This allows you to tap in when you want on your own terms instead of the other way around.
I moved abroad a couple years ago and needed a way to get involved with the local ex-pat community. One guess where all of their organizing and communicating was done.
Want to bootstrap a home business, like so many mask-makers have done during the pandemic? How do you get your initial traction without friends and family on the social media networks?
If people want to opt out of the modern world that's fine, but let's not pretend they aren't missing out.
Most people actually need none of that stuff. I think there's a lot of illusions that come with social media. Having 500 Facebook friends you chat with two times per year is not friendship in a real sense of the term.
What many people are looking for arguably these days and what has somewhat been lost is lifelong, strong bonds and real conversations between people you have unconditional trust with. Having two of those is better than a million Instagram followers.
Same with 'keeping up with culture and trends'. Like what does that actually mean. Is anyone really better off when they follow Kim Kardashians daily drama? Is hooking into every trend really producing independent, smart, autonomous, strong-willed people? There's value in disconnecting and spending time with yourself and alone that many younger kids in particular don't have space for any more.
"There's value in disconnecting and spending time with yourself..." Right, but using social media does not stop one from enjoying personal time. Why would it? Again, it is additive.
I'd also point you to my other comment about unique communities and opportunities that only exits on the established social media platforms.
okay I'll invite you the next time you're at a bar or cafe to pay close attention to how many people look at their phone instead of focusing on the person they're with.
Time and attention are precious, we don't have a lot of it. It's the opposite of additive, it's the scarcest thing in the world, because attention and time are the only thing you cannot make more of. Every moment spent on following trends, liking dog pictures, getting that additional hit of dopamine from getting some more followers or a notification alert is a signal that disrupts focus and draws your mind away from relationships or things that matter.
>unique communities and opportunities that only exits on the established social media platforms.
An opportunity that only exists on a social media platform and is intermediated by some third party is terrible and takes agency and control away from you. You can do a business without social media, you can find subcultures and local communities in almost all places on the planet, where you can make real and lasting connections rather than superficial digital ones.
That seems like a personal problem you are trying to hoist on to me. If my friends engage in behavior I don't like I can tell them, or find different friends. But for me, this is rarely a problem.
"...a signal that disrupts focus and draws your mind away from relationships or things that matter."
Again, you seem determined to tell me what should matter to me, which will get you nowhere and seems like an oddly invasive way to engage with someone.
As for your last comment, I don't think you read my other comment as I suggested. Some niche communities organize online. Sometimes that online space is an established company like Facebook. You could create an alternative or try to migrate the existing community, but first and foremost you must meet the community where it is. Or, you miss out on that community. Maybe it's fine for some hobby you can take or leave. Maybe it's more difficult if that community is for a rare medical condition, for example.
Notifications and the constant desire to check for replies have really hindered my productivity in ways unimaginable. Now, without distraction, I can get meaningful work done. Hugely beneficial and transformed my whole manner of working.
I've done this with pretty great results. Actually, I will do it again right now.
I only recently went back, but instead of any of the big networks I went with a Mastodon account from social.coop. It's similar to Twitter, but the lack of retweet-comments makes me less likely to make snarky replies to things then feel bad about it and wonder why I said something I wouldn't normally say in real life afterwards.
For me, I have achieved mostly the same goal by just not using social media apps. No reddit, no twitter, no fb, no linked in, no whatever. I browse reddit and HN on my computer, thats pretty much it. I use my smartphone pretty rarely but when I do need to use spotify or maps or podcasts or some special app, I still can. And you can still text, which like the author noted, is important.
So, I say to the author - work on your self control and discipline! Just don't use social media anymore! It's really not hard! I think the trick is to not use it at all. You can't just "use it in small amounts".
Have a non touch phone. Why are technology which is additive and invades your privacy called smart?
Why is a smart phone with gps tracking smart for privacy? Smart tv? Smart speaker? Privacy?
I was very digitally involved and was one of those early adapters and regular beta-testers of new software, including hardware, etc.
People are surprised when I don't carry my phone most of the time, not giving out my phone number when ordering tea; some are even angry when I say "no phone calls"[1]. I use the phone primarily as a camera.
One of the best things was to disable all notifications[2] except for the must-haves such as Calendar.
I still use electronics and digital devices, and mediums, but I have dumbed them down far enough. I will continue to prune and minimize my attachments.
2. [2014] https://brajeshwar.com/2014/missing-step-productivity-activi...
Technology however works actively against people like me: my bank was recently acquired by a bigger one in which users must authenticate through an app for online banking operations. I'm not willing to use highly unsecure platforms for banking, which means all Android/iOS/Windows cellphones on planet Earth, therefore when yesterday I was asked if I wanted to activate that service I hit the "remind me later" button, hoping to never see the day it will become mandatory.
A couple other things I've thought about, more on the social media angle, are (1) starting a personal web site again, and (2) a different kind of social media site. For (1), I've already got a little VM that runs my email and some quickie web apps I threw together. Why not stand up a personal site too, like a lot of us used to have, where I can share all the stuff I'd normally be putting on Instagram, etc.? Obviously that's adding friction for folks too, but I'm less concerned about that stuff getting ignored.
For (2), and bear with me because this is going to sound a bit woo-woo, I think a social gratitude list could be really powerful. Maybe not a big hit, but definitely powerful for people who would use it. I say this because I used to be on an email list with some friends where everyone would write ten things they were grateful for that day and then send it to the list. Now, if this is not a practice you're comfortable with, you're probably dry-heaving right now; I did too at first. But once I got past the fact that it's not very cool, I found that it was a fantastic way to keep up with folks. (That's in addition to the mental health benefits, which I think are evidence-based but I'd have to double-check that to be sure.) Amazingly, I didn't even notice a tendency for it to degrade into performativity or attention-seeking. Overall I just think it would be a structure that would enable some of the positive aspects of social media while discouraging or eliminating the negatives.
There used to be nice dumb phones with physical qwerty keyboards. They were wonderful for texting. It's a real shame they're not made anymore.
This is an issue for me too. I know the meme is "your real friends will still make the effort and call you / hang out with you / whatever", but I don't think it's that simple— we (especially in the pandemic, but really always) rely on social gatherings/media as a proving ground for acquaintanceships, a place to banter back and forth and onramp a relationship to the point where it would be not-weird to actually arrange an intentional activity or get-together.
And the reality is, when I've had acquaintances fall off my social media radar or be otherwise difficult to get ahold of, I just can't be bothered. When every person but one is in a FB Messenger group chat, and one person wants to be texted-with about what the plans are, that person inevitably gets left behind.
So maybe there's some FOMO going on here, but I don't think I'm at a place in my mid-thirties where I'm ready to effectively shut the door on those opportunities.
Plus I don't find social media AT ALL toxic and I only spend maybe a half hour a week total on it. OTOH I find people complaining about social media being toxic is becoming extremely toxic.
I feel like it may constitute a separate device class than a dumb-phone but I don't know how much is marketing versus reality.
but I realized I barely talk on the phone, I just use it for texting. Thinking old blackberry format would be better, as I prefer the keyboard.
If your goal is to overcome a phone/internet addiction, or just disconnect, then the LP2 will definitively help you achieve that! Your going to have to give some stuff up (No Spotify, no Directions yet), and deal with texting that worse then a smart phone but better then a number pad. But to me its definitely worth it.
I think the LP2 will eventually provide the same stuff that the original author gets from his Garmin watch and GSM Calls phone, which is pretty neat!
Very solid devices for cutting back internet dépendance or for traveling without but still having the basics.
I'd imagine heat tolerance and impact resilience would be more important than slimness and lightweight for these devices if they're intended to be used like say, at a foundry.
1- https://smile.amazon.com/CAT-Rugged-Phone-Factory-Unlocked/d...
Try looking up other KaiOS phones. There aren't many.
What I did do was get a Pixel 4a and install GrapheneOS on it. The only apps on the phone are one to sync my CalDAV/CardDAV and the other for my one-time passwords.
I can use a browser if I'm desperate.
It's been the best decision I've made by far.
Is it the truth, though? It probably varies by people. My opinion is social media is cancer. A cacophony of opinions that no one really cares about. And yet here I am, sharing my worthless opinions and reading other people's comments. It's addictive.
But a smartphone is simply amazing. It's my flashlight, my GPS, my book reader, my video player, my music player, my learning tool, my communication tool, my note taker, my camera, my personal assistant... it's basically a full fledged computer.
Often with features blocked for the convenience of the companies raking in cash from people addicted to vomiting their thoughts online. Why can't I save images and videos in the browser anymore? Used to be real easy, now browsers try their best to hide this feature, Reddit and Imgur have redesigned their shit to actively block downloading the source files, and other platforms require you to log in (no Facebook minions, I don't think I will). But it's an easy thing to solve... for now.
I'm trying hard to decouple the damn thing from the Internet, though, it should work in the middle of nowhere imo. Why in fuck's name do I need an Internet connection to send files between my laptop and my phone? Local transfer tools are worse than those made for the cloud bullshit that everyone fell for. Ridiculous.
People now watch videos and listen to music online. No, give me my files, I want them available anywhere, anytime. Perhaps I'll need an Internet connection for the flashlight next. This sounds like old man talk, "I want it the way it used to be", but really, too few people notice the risk of losing everything digital if someone cuts a fiber cable somewhere or some automated system decides to terminate your account. Or if you simply travel to some country where getting a prepaid SIM requires a cavity search and you don't have money for the roaming mafia.
But I'm getting sidetracked. In short: Reduce or remove social media and keep your smartphone :)
But...you clicked the thread. You had a [rough] idea of what type of commentary to expect. Not some endless feed of things an algorithm thinks you'll like/hate/buy. I think of HN as more of a niche community. If we see a story about "acme widgets", I like to read the comments to see what experts have to say.
Divorcing the smartphone completely is doable but I'm not sure I want that pain. That's mainly because of niche apps I depend on, contactless payments, and it's my primary camera, not because I talk on the phone with people shudder. The smart watch is worth looking into, but still would need the niche apps and the contactless payments and the camera, and a GoPro would not fill my camera needs.
When my current phone is paid off I do intend to look into alternate ideas like this because There's Got To Be A Better Way (tm).
Examples like posting pictures of meals and the idea that people use social media to fool people into thinking your life is exciting. I think the types of people interested in making these posts realize that the social media mainstream considers it passé at this point.
It’s a small candy bar phone but maybe not square enough to fit in your wallet.
Obviously signal-cli is never going to be a solution for the mass public, but using it is an option for some HN readers – this is a "news for nerds" website.
The smartphone itself is not the problem. The problem is you if you can't stop browsing on it.
So yeah, I agree. My smartphone also handles 2FA, PayPal and bus tickets. None of that is harmful to me, but very useful, and giving it up just for living without a smartphone seems pointless.
Yep, that's why I have none of these installed on my phone. I read reddit only when I'm sitting at my laptop.
You can get a dopamine hit without those apps. A little harder, but still within reach.
The further you are from dopamine laced activity the better. Sure there are exceptions.
I guess they didn't live through the instant messenger wars. How did they not expect this would happen?
Yikes. I love signal but if I handed someone my phone and they tried to install an app, even while explaining it, I'd be pretty annoyed with them. Someone else holding your phone is a pretty vulnerable place to be now a days.
All can be dealt with via moderation/account choices etc. Also, when did this take place? Not during the pandemic I don't think. Big factor there
Realized I was heavily depressed, and that the stuff I was reading online was having a really negative impact on my mood everyday. Capitalism Bad, Black Lives Matter (what black people went through made me sad, not the movement becoming prominent), Coronavirus all around the world. Reddit and Twitter were a cancer on my brain.
I deleted them, after a twitch content creator killed himself and it sent me into a spiral, I didn't realize that the parasocial relationships were that strong.
Like the OP, I went through a pretty severe withdrawal period, it actually got worse before it got better, and I had to go speak to a therapist, because I couldn't even get up to go to work. I'd lost my lifestyle, and these senses of "community" that I had.
I can happily say I'm better now, but I'm also thinking of discarding my smartphone. Buy a dumb phone, carry it around with me, while leaving the iPhone at home on wifi for entertainment purposes (Chromecast controller, or watching on phone). I've started watching Twitch and reading reddit more regularly the past couple of months and it's starting to worry me again, might need to do another cleanse somehow, and I can't exactly delete accounts that don't exist, so I need to delete the device that I'm accessing it on.
Break that cycle, don't give up the ground you've gained.
Sounds like a complete sociopath to me.
Probably a good thing that they don't use social media...
Highly unlikely scenario you're painting.
Also, "calling people without asking"? It's a little extreme to place this social norm you have on the whole of society.
Learn to say no. I.e. someone calls, say "I can't talk right now" or don't answer and respond (when you're able) with "I can talk at x time"...
I've been listening to the Cortex podcast recently. It is a productivity podcast by CGP Grey (youtuber) and Myke Hurley (runs a podcasting company). There is a big focus on the tech they use and how they make the most of it. There is a large focus their phones and iPads.
They both would probably agree that the garden-path with modern smartphones is a distracting mess. But where they differ is that assuming that means all hope is lost. They are quite advanced users of the systems they use but the basics can be done with only a bit of effort and will make a big impact.
* Go through your apps and purge ones you aren't using anymore.
* Go through the apps you chose to keep and explicitly set the notification settings for them. A lot of distracting apps are distracting because they use notifications to remind you that they exist.
* Remove time-sink apps from your home screen. You'll use them less if opening them takes more effort.
* Use the spots where time-sinks apps used to exist for apps you want to get into the habit of using. You'll have a few days of muscle-memory to exploit to your benefit.
* Take a look at what your calendar and reminder apps can do and start making use of them. They consider these two apps to be the core of the productivity software, and the basic apps will serve people for a long time.
* Look at Screen Time (or the Android equivalent) and see what it can do to further help you. You can set app limits and notification free periods (with exceptions). An interesting metric that is worth periodically checking is Pickups. This tracks what is the first app you switch to after unlocking your phone. It can be handy for identifying troublesome apps.
There is a lot of simple stuff that can make a big difference. That entire list can probably be done in the time it took me to write this. It seems so weird then to see how much of Hacker News is utterly defeatist and doesn't try.
If this did make you curious about the podcast, two episodes I think would make good jumping in points would be:
* #101 Productivity 101: An attempt to cover all the basics for someone just getting into productivity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eSCldom1Yc https://www.relay.fm/cortex/101
* #109 State of the Apps: This is a yearly overview of the apps they are using and what they get from them. They include screenshots of their homescreens in the shownotes which can make some useful inspiration. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIiOfhlBB4A https://www.relay.fm/cortex/109
One thing I realized that doesn't get talked about much is that I was watering lots of dead flowers. It turned out that my posts on Twitter and Instagram were prompting others to interact with me. Without those regular prompts, I never again heard anything from those who used to comment on my posts. Without me posting first, in six years no one has reached out to find out what I've been up to or if I were even alive.
This is a wonderful term for the phenomenon, thank you.
It's a middle ground. I can't completely get rid of a smartphone because I'm into motorcycle touring and GPS is essential to me. I'm trying alternatives to Gmaps, but it's pretty awkward and uncomfortable.
One thing that I've done is no notification tone, and I've disable notifications for whatever selected IM apps I've got on my phone
Retreating to the past isn’t controlling your addictions, it’s giving up. You can own a smartphone, use social media, without it taking over your life, you just need self control. As the world changes you’re gonna be stuck grasping at a past that no longer exists. It will be lonely.
I think the biggest benefit of living like in 99s, just like the author pointed out is a "Peace of mind".
Also, regarding:
> Retreating to the past isn’t controlling your addictions, it’s giving up.
as if addictions were a good thing. You can also look at it this way: choosing self controlled addictions over "giving up" a device over a dumber one.
Oh no, the horror!
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