Making Quieter Technology | Hacker News Reader

Making Quieter Technology

nicolasbouliane.com

143 pointsnicbou124 comments

I was able to read about half the article before a black box appeared with text saying I was an “engaged reader.” After clicking on the question mark icon in the black box I was taken to a page where it was explained how the author has hidden “achievements” throughout their site and asks if I, the reader, can find them all.

This feels like the exact thing the author is rallying about in this post — technology designed to keep us in front of our screens.

Haha I forgot about those entirely! It was a fun time killer from a few years ago, not a way to keep you hooked. I don’t have any tracking whatsoever on this website, so I wouldn’t notice if you engaged more.

> It was a fun time killer from a few years ago, not a way to keep you hooked

What's the exact difference?

I don’t know if you’ll engage more and I don’t care either way. I post repair instructions for a 16 year old car and recipes for my own reference. You are on a personal website.

> You are on a personal website.

I'm not demanding you take it off, I'm just making a conversation. I'm curious about the difference between "being hooked" and "time killing" from your perspective.

Right now, it seems that the difference is "whether or not the creator cares about the amount of user interaction". Which is fine, makes sense (since most toxic of forms of "engagement tools" are driven by metrics user interaction) but kinda hand-wavy - anyone can pretend to "not care" and keep doing it.

It just means that it doesn’t support a metric. It’s just there because I wanted to build something fun. I agree that it’s a bad experience, but I wasn’t exposed to it in so long that I forgot it was there.

Here's what I figure:

Whatever thing we're talking about, be it online media or TV shows or an activity or whatever, there's a thin line between "fun" and "addictive" - in order for anything to be "addictive" it must also be "fun", or otherwise nobody would get addicted to it. Even more - the more "fun" a thing is, the more "addictive" it gets.

In online media, engagement tricks have got a bad reputation (at least with HN-visiting crowd) because of the companies who pour huge budgets into "engagement research", A/B testing, dark patterns, and all the other stuff we hate.

However, discarding all fun things because they might be addictive would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. So it is important to draw some kind of line between "fun" and "addictive".

Right now, the absence of user engagement data collection seems to be a good rule of thumb. So in conclusion, your widget is okay.

---

I apologize if my question has offended. I did not mean to imply your personal work is "bad" in any way.

No need to apologise. It was delightfully ironic to have achievements there, regardless of intention.

In the end, you have to ask yourself who it benefits, and at whose expense. Intent matters a lot. In this case, there's no case for growth hacking. It would be different if I hosted this post on a professional website.

I run a content website, and I constantly need to remind my business partners that I answer to my readers, not to them. If you perceive the internet as a giant conversion funnel, users become a lot more like cattle: a commodity whose well-being is only considered in support of profit. The incentives are all geared towards squeezing users.

I think in this context, 'time killing' is for the author of the feature, not the client of the website.

I.E it was done because it was fun and the author had some free time, not as a 'time-killer' for people visiting the website

Can we stop making people atone for their sins for offending the delicate sensibilities of HNers?

That was certainly not my intention, I apologize if anyone feels that way because of my comments.

I liked the post - heads up that you can make your Reddit front page even better by enabling compact links in settings. This makes old Reddit look like Reddit from 2008, it’s great.

Wow, there are lots of interesting settings on old.reddit.com. I didn't realise that I could hide comments with a low score for example.

That is some irony there.

If you want people to be engaged, delivering content that respects them is the only step. Engagement measurement and mechanics that interfere with that only serve to reduce that respect.

Sounds like you'd consider most K-12 and undergraduate level education to be un-engaging, which I'm not sure I disagree with, haha.

That's an exercise for the reader!

> I should be the user, it should be the tool, not the other way around.

> A good operating system: Mac OS. Windows has become so user-hostile that I refuse to get near it. Linux breaks the rule above: a person's primary task should not be computing, but being human.

That's certainly understandable, although it can also be contradictory with your goal of having quiet technology that leaves the user alone.

MacOS can be opaque and annoying at times, especially when there are no settings for something you want or need, but piles of "social" settings junk you don't need. Recently macOS wasted my time to find a way to map the begin and end keys of my K380 keyboard, which wasn't even an issue with Linux. No settings for that, it's still getting in my way.

It also takes some effort to silence it; I routinely get popups about my screen time, suggestions and whatsnot. All those are distractions and wastes of time I don't have with Linux.

Otherwise I use a slim stable distribution (Debian stable) with a tiling WM and mate-settings-daemon: few processes running, few updates, and I feel in actual control of the machine. It's really leaving me alone, wastes little of my time and feels quieter to me than macOS.

Anyway, you're posting this on HN so I guess you assumed that kind of answer.

Yes, I expected it. It was offensive enough for someone else to quit reading. I found my OS of choice. To each their own.

For your keyboard issue, have you tried Karabiner-Elements?

I eventually found a solution: an actual configuration file to write in a new folder, followed by a reboot. Totally undocumented, of course.

https://medium.com/@elhayefrat/how-to-fix-the-home-and-end-b...

What seems appalling to me is that Apple never deemed necessary to map Begin/End, nor to provide a setting to do so.

The hardware can be annoying too with the lack of connectivity, or the minimalist, mostly unlabeled keyboard that requires konami codes for brackets, tilda or pipes (fr layout).

On the software side, I should add to that my daily gripes with the clumsy and slow window manager, the forced (slow) animations, the lack of jails or containers, the need for extensions (sometimes payware) for menial tasks such as setting the battery charge thresholds or putting the scroll wheel back to the "natural" direction, but I would digress.

macOS constantly bugs me with little annoyances and wastes of time I never have with Sway, and I have no control over them. I guess I'm just not the target audience.

I’ve been working on a uBlock filter list to hide sticky features from common web sites.[1] If I ever use someone else’s computer, I’m always amazed at what a distracting mess the “real” web is vs the filtered version I use.

I’d happily welcome anyone’s improvements to the list; my only goal is to help people regain control over their time.

[1] https://github.com/bkazez/distractionblock

Me too!

https://github.com/nicbou/focused-blocklist

Good work, I used to use block element from uBlock for sites I frequently visit

May I ask why no recent updates to the project?

> Technology's default mode is to constantly call for my attention.

"Technology" has no need for your attention. Developers do. Right from it's origins in the 60's and 70's, driven by early science fiction, programmers wrote anthropomorphic code to act as a proxy between users and their vicarious ego interactions.

> Hi! I'm OMNICOGNITRON-ZX1, ENTER YOUR NAME...

> fuck off

> I do not understand "fuck off". YOU MUST ENTER YOUR NAME!

Weizenbaum, irritated that his secretary found this more engaging than a conversation with him, forged "The Computer" typecast as some sort of laconic, overbearing and demanding "Rogerian" nurk.

> Say more about why you'd like to smash me to a thousand pieces

Douglas Adams captured it best in his lampoon of the (fictitious) Sirius Cybernetics Corporation's marketing drive for GPP (Genuine People Personalities). Marvin the Paranoid Android properly describes the whole project (which today includes Siri, Alexa and suchlike) as "Ghastly and depressing" [2].

Computers as "demanding" objects is firmly wired into our culture, and developers play along to it as if it were entirely natural.

[1] https://hitchhikers.fandom.com/wiki/Genuine_People_Personali...

[2] Marvin was himself a GPP

I loved The Computer in the HGTTG movie. I wanted to give my rooted robot vacuum a similar voice.

> Computers as "demanding" objects is firmly wired into our culture

There is a counter-movement to create calm technology, stating that the best interface is no interface.

https://calmtech.com/

https://www.nointerface.com/

There are two totally different kinds of technology noise I dislike:

1. Why do so many gadgets have to beep? Microwaves, washing machines, …

2. Engine noise. Some cars/motorbikes are specifically designed/modified to be loud because that’s what the customer wants. Some small/uninsulated engines (eg in a cheaper motorbike/scooter) are also loud.

> Engine noise. Some cars/motorbikes are specifically designed/modified to be loud because that’s what the customer wants.

Then there are the cars that aren't loud, so they play recordings of engine noise over the audio system.

BMW has apparently gone as far as making the fake engine noise user-configurable, except that you can't turn it off. Because if you don't want to be forced to listen to fake engine noise, you're not the type of customer BMW wants, I guess. You probably shouldn't be allowed to vote or own property either.

I think this is a case of some misguided product managers (and since German car companies are known to be huge bureacracies - no wonder). It seems like there is a great important safety aspect to it - that first you can hear that the vehicle is moving (there is an audio cue), and second is the affordance that you pressing on the accelerator has an effect (that the accelerator/electronics is not broken) - idem for braking.

Interestingly enough, railway engines had this problem solved a number of decades ago when they started using mechanical speedometers based on a clock. When the vehicle would start moving, the speedometer would start ticking. The faster you go the faster the ticking. Seems like electric cars need something similar (it does seem like a very useful safety feature to be honest).

> When the vehicle would start moving, the speedometer would start ticking. The faster you go the faster the ticking. Seems like electric cars need something similar

This would effectively prevent many people from listening to music in the car. It would not be tolerated.

Which brings up the point that people very frequently choose to drown out the engine noise. That obviously limits how useful the engine noise can be, though of course it isn't very useful anyway. You cannot fail to sense that the car is moving if your eyes are open. You cannot fail to sense whether the brakes are working even if your eyes are closed.

No, these are regulations for the blind. Laws, mind you. For a reason. So the blind don't walk out in front of a car. I agree with these laws. That being said, the noise should NOT be heard inside the car.

> No, these are regulations for the blind.

No, they aren't.

> Laws, mind you.

No, they aren't.

> For a reason.

Nope.

> That being said, the noise should NOT be heard inside the car.

If you're going to admit that you're talking about something completely different, why say anything at all?

This is noise played inside the car for the occupants, totally unrelated to safety sound played outside. I'm not sure if anyone besides BMW does this.

If you're gonna be driving a car and creating noise pollution for everyone outside it, you don't get to have peace and quiet inside of it.

Hotter take: horns should be louder inside cars than they are on the outside

> Hotter take: horns should be louder inside cars than they are on the outside

I don't care if it is equal volume or a little taser zap when exceeding some threshold, but a sacrifice must be paid to the gods of annoyance in order to restore balance.

Playing engine noise is one of the most ridiculous thing I've ever known. I love BMW noise. I owned old BMW and I loved its sound. But I loved it because it was produced by engine that I loved, not because it was produced by some stupid subwoofer. I have no idea how would anyone buy that tech and I lost my faith in humanity that BMW did not go bankrupt with this move. I know that the only BMW car I would ever buy is E34, it was last BMW worth those letters.

If you had pets and an EV, it might be useful, at least on startup.

Oof. Now is probably your last chance to get a decent naturally asprirated I6 BMW without all that nonsense.

I've said it before. I'll say it again (and get downvoted heavily again, because fanbois...) but

BMW is an Intelligence Test.

If you bought one, you failed.

That's a much cleverer way of putting it then my 'there no good argument for a BMW, ever'.

Engine noise inside the vehicle is horrible and I don't know why anyone would want it. Engine noise outside the vehicle probably reduces the rates at which collisions occur.

Lots of motorcycle riders claim this: "Loud pipes save lives".

In my anecdotal experience, as the owner of both noisy and quiet motorcycles, there is very little truth to that. My noisy motorcycles have just as many "Sorry mate, I didn't see you" incidents as my quiet ones. On the other hand, looking like you might be an evil baby-eating biker (cruiser-style bike, black leather, open face helmet with a beard and sunglasses, blatantly disregarding road rules) does seem to have a probably statistically significant reduction in other road users treating you badly. People don't "not see you" or "not hear you" they judge you as not being a danger to them - perhaps subconsciously, perhaps consciously, but I have strong suspicion that lots of people do look and see you, but their heads categorise you as either "just a tiny fucking motorcycle, I'm insured so I don't care if they bounce off my car" or "I'd better not annoy _that_ guy, he might reach through my window and rip my head off and then go home and murder my family and pets".

I could _maybe_ see an argument that especially quiet vehicles (electric for sure, but a lot of modern ice cars as well) might improve pedestrian safety with a little bit of "fake engine noise" being projected at low speeds where pedestrians are likely to be around, but 105db straight through pipes do not improve anyone's safety at 25mph+ in my experience, they just annoy people. (And I say that somewhat hypocritically, as the owner of a Ducati with aftermarket and louder than stock pipes, but which fall a long way short of 100+db straight through Harley Davidson pipes.)

I'll add my data points as well. I've had several bikes, one with a loud aftermarket pipe installed by the previous owner. Of all of them, the one that was noticed the most was the larger sport-touring bike with relatively quiet stock mufflers. Visual presence seems far more impactful than increased volume.

> "I'd better not annoy _that_ guy, he might reach through my window and rip my head off and then go home and murder my family and pets".

Do people actually think that? I always thought they were just cosplaying.

> I always thought they were just cosplaying.

Many of them are, over here we call them "Hell's Accountants". The mid life crisis "I wanna be a bad ass" demographic.

But we also have the actual gunfighting bikers that they're cosplaying as, and the cops and media love talking it up every time they get into a brawl with each other, so it's a common enough fear for people that still take main stream media as gospel...

The loud pipes save lives motorcyclists also tend to have the smallest helmets allowed by law.

Defensive driving and good protective gear save lives. You dont need to make my walls shake.

I say this as a motorcyclist. These people are about to get us banned from many places.

> Microwaves

Something that always bugged me. It's loud enough that most people can tell if the microwave has stopped even from another room and many models will keep making noise for minutes after, even if you just want to let the food cool down. Meanwhile you'll rarely find a toaster that beeps.

They often have a hidden setting to mute now, once upon a time I pulled open the cover and removed the buzzer out of annoyance.

Solved this by manually removing the piezo from the microwave of a flatmate... so annoying.

My washer and dryer sing an entire tune when the cycle ends. Annoying as anything. Most of the microwaves that I've owned only beep when the timer is done, which I like. I do have one in my kitchen that beeps every minute or so and it is annoying. Thankfully, I have a second one in my office that does not.

LG? Mine have buttons on the front panel that quiet them entirely.

My no-brand Chinese battery charger plays half an 8-bit Mozart symphony really loudly when it is done charging. Luckily it seems to have died prematurely...

My old washing machine had a very loud mechanical buzz that nearly gave me heart attacks

Shortly after our son was born, my wife and I went thru basically everything in our house and figured out how to turn off all the extraneous beeps and noises so we wouldn't inadvertently wake him up from a nap.

We found most (not all!) devices typically have a way to turn this stuff off. Sometimes can turn off the exterior signal lights too.

The other thing we did that we ended up really liking was removing our doorbell. We live in a fairly urban part of our city and that really helped cut down on the random noises.

I endorse getting away from as much news as possible. I made that choice after the 2016 US elections, and it has been a big, sustained improvement in my quality of life. I've found that if something is important, I'll hear about it from friends, family, or co-workers. Hearing about important things from people I trust is way better than hearing about them from news outlets trying their hardest to keep me hooked. Sometimes I get the bewildered, mouth-agape reaction of "you haven't heard of this???" but it took a surprisingly short amount of time to feel no embarrassment about being out of the loop and simply responding with, "nope! please tell me all about it."

And, it is amazing just how much you do not miss it. Once the stream of news is gone - you wonder why you ever fell into it in the first place.

I am in the same boat with other people bringing the important news. Some times it might actually be relevant.

News nowadays reminds me of the Serenity's prayer.

Grant to us the serenity of mind to accept that which cannot be changed; courage to change that which can be changed, and wisdom to know the one from the other.

Most things in the news, we cannot change.

A friend of mine is very stressed about the current geopolitical situation, and follows the latest developments every few hours. I'm roughly aware of it. Our impact on the situation is exactly the same.

From the draft: I followed 20 years of news about Afghanistan, and all I got out of it was talking points. No facts, no nuance, just pre-chewed talking points from people one lesson ahead of the class. I recently went on a deep dive about Afghanistan, and boy was I misinformed.

Remember the early days of covid? How much of the information was accurate and useful? How much of it was just speculation or filler content? Would you be in a different place if you just let the most important information surface to you?

I did the same and share your conclusions. I have family members who literally get panic attacks over news of events they cannot control— and they keep right on consuming it.

Someone once said that if you want to kick the newspaper habit, just read last month’s newspapers. You’ll quickly realize how useless and / or misinformed the content is.

One thing that has been frustrating me is how many lights, and bright ones, are on everything I buy these days. A single tiny LED is lighting up entire rooms enough to navigate without tripping on anything in the dark.

Black electrical tape to the rescue

lol, I've done this a bit, but it makes everything look broken

A dot of black permanent marker seems to work well. Blocks out enough light to remove the distraction, while still allowing enough to indicate something working.

These, sometimes, look a little better than electrical tape. I haven't used this brand, it was just the first one I found. [1]

[1] https://www.amazon.com/FLANCCI-Blocking-Stickers-Dimming-Bla...

I've been sticking these things on everything. Not this particular brand either, but I doubt there's much difference between brands.

It allows enoughlight through so you can see what's going on but not enough that will illuminate the room or distract you just by being there.

I never thought to look for that before! Amazing. I currently have a lot of black electrical tape over everything.

That only helps when the device doesn't have an LED that's inside an open casing and so ends up visibly shining from every hole in the device and/or through the thin plastic itself.

these are the worst, or when they are on a button like my monitor

Black masking tape. It's not opaque enough to block the light entirely; this means you can do a few layers to dim it to taste. Once that's sorted, a quick trim with an x-acto blade will tidy up the edges and make it all look intentional from a distance.

Sometimes I still want to see the LED. In this situation, I use blue painters tape, and keep adding layers until the LED is at a reasonable level. You really need to check this in a completely dark room to get it right.

I cannot sleep with gadget lights on, and LEDs are the absolute worst. They're usually easy enough to block out as other commenters have said, but it's so annoying to get into bed, finally comfortable, and then BAM fucking LED that I have to now get up and deal with.

> One thing that has been frustrating me is how many lights, and bright ones, are on everything I buy these days.

While I am sympathetic to this, I'm lucky enough that it doesn't much bother me and so I hadn't even noticed it; but I really miss the old Powerbook G4 heartbeat.

Let's just say that it's for the best that I don't know who invented the blue LED. We'd certainly have some words.

The team actually got a nobel prize so they're not so hard to find ;)

Look for "Light Dimming LED Stickers". Apply liberally, thank me later. These made one of my synths much more pleasant to use (DSi Mono Evolver).

> A good operating system: Mac OS. Windows has become so user-hostile that I refuse to get near it.

Like...? Windows annoys me at times too, but the most annoying thing to me is the forced updates. Other than that, I can't recall any time in recent memory that the OS has gotten in my way of doing something. I'm genuinely curious which specific pain points cause you to refuse to get near it.

I recently set up Windows on a bunch of new computers, and was reminded of how atrocious the process is. All sorts of widgets, telemetry, and bloatware coming along for the ride. There's a laundry list of config changes and uninstalls necessary before it quiets down and gets out of the way. Once you have it set up the way you like it, it's easy to forget all that.

If you go through that ritual a lot, or never do the deep clean, or only use Windows occasionally and only see the default setting, it's a perfectly understandable impression.

Yeah - I recently-ish set up a cheap Windows laptop as a secondary device, and oh boy. The experience has only made me more convinced that I'm happy paying for Macs.

So much garbage on an OS install I purchased separately, so many un-stoppable notifications (literally - you can't disable some of the notification-ads, because they send them through system tools!), so much junk that keeps appearing "magically" after upgrades, and then there's all the "shenanigans" around forcing Edge everywhere possible.

Win 10 may be my final version of Windows for any reason, it has clearly gotten significantly worse over the years. I'd rather wait a few years for games to be ported to Linux and OSX (or go without!) than deal with this just to play some games or write some software.

I'm curious if you bought a laptop or if you bought a windows 10 license and did a fresh install?

When I built my PC with windows 10, the experience was way different from buying a laptop with windows 10. The laptop manufacturer purposely loaded a bunch of bloatware that I had to get rid of.

I also don't launch any apps from the start menu. I usually click the search bar and then type the name of the app then hit enter. So maybe that's another area that I don't see that other people consider noisy.

A person’s main task shouldn’t be computing, but to be human. Yes things can be improved with a bit of effort, but Mac OS doesn’t require so much fighting.

I just booted a new-to-me MacBook and I only had to clean a few icons from the dock. It took me two days to decrapify my Microsoft-built Surface Go 2 before I returned it.

I use Windows to launch and run a single game, and it can’t even do that without pissing me off.

>but Mac OS doesn’t require so much fighting

That's probably because you're used to it so you're biased without even realizing you're biased, since everything is second nature to you at this point, but give a person new to the Apple ecosystem a Mac and see what happens.

When I first touched a MacBook a few years ago, during a job interview, I bombed it because, as a long term user of Windows and Linux, instead of being able to focus on coding the sorting algorithm, I was too busy fighting MacOS (some swipe gesture on the touchpad or some hot corner hid away my coding window and browser or the entire virtual desktop, and I didn't know how to restore them to get back to work).

So yea, to me, MacOS is horrible for first time users as it's full of these hidden cryptic gotchas.

There's a big difference between "I struggle to use a new technology" and "I am familiar with this technology, but it's built to serve its own ends over mine"

Maybe good technology shouldn't require (even tech savvy) users to struggle with it. IIRC Motorola (or someone else, maybe Braun, I can't remember exactly who) originally had a philosophy, which Apple later also adopted, but seems to have forgotten about lately, which stated that "if a user actually needs to pull out the manual in order to figure out how to use the product, then the product is a UX failure".

Like I said before, and I'm saying it as a fan of your work, but your viewpoint on the OS has little substance in it and can be shortened to "I just like MacOS and I really hate Windows, period", which would have been fairer to say than your original one liner which seems heavily biased, as you did not provide any arguments to why one is better than the other. Not saying Linux or Windows are better but at least I gave you precise example from my personal life where MacOS just bombs new users completely and I can in no way crown it a great UX example that gets out of your way and lets you get work done.

Each to his own of course, but for healthy debates it's good to provide some arguments and comparison points when picking out winners over losers instead of just throwing hot personal opinions around as facts. Like, you say you "refuse to go near Windows", which is fine, but how can I trust your unbiased opinion on it when you didn't go near it? Would you believe a car review from someone who didn't actually drive the car?

> can be shortened to "I just like MacOS and I really hate Windows, period"

Which is a perfectly reasonable stance. I have used Mac OS, Windows and Linux for many years each, and Mac OS is the one that supports my use case the best. If your experience differs and you picked something else, that's fine too.

There are no winners and losers, because those choices are not part of our identity. I'd be happy if we could move past that, because one more year of this debate won't settle anything.

> A person’s main task shouldn’t be computing, but to be human.

Ok that's fine. I'm not sure what part of my statement required computing vs being human. Installing an OS isn't some herculean effort, and if you're fine with Linux then I'm sure you would agree with that statement. And if you bought a laptop, "decrapifying" it is a one day thing. It's not a continous fight that you're having everyday.

> I use Windows to launch and run a single game, and it can’t even do that without pissing me off.

Why? If it's just because you don't like windows, that's fine, but I think it reads a lot better if you say that instead of masquerading your opinion as some objective fact that applies to everyone:

> A good operating system: Mac OS. Windows has become so user-hostile that I refuse to get near it. Linux breaks the rule above: a person's primary task should not be computing, but being human.

This gives me no information on what constitutes a good OS. You talk about how we shouldn't be computing but being human, and give a bunch of great examples, but none of them are OS specific:

Notifications, email, calendar, apps, social media, news and feeds, reddit, websites, and behavior.

None of these are OS specific induced noise, with the exception of notifications. And in the case of notifications I feel like a Mac requires more effort to turn them off.

Anyways, I agree with the overall premise, but I think it would have been a much better read if you had said something like: "A good operating system: Whichever OS makes you work the most productively, for me that's Mac OS."

Linux doesn't necessarily make people feel like they're computing and not being human, and Windows can be less user hostile depending on the person. Anyways, good article, I was just curious if there might have been specific instances that caused these feelings. I'm buying my first MacBook in over 10 years in November and I'm interested to see if my opinion changes :)

UX is just a feeling. Mac OS just works for me, and generally gets out of the way. Windows frustrates me because it does not respect my consent. Linux frustrates me because it offers me freedom I don't need at a cost I'm not ready to pay.

I frankly wish that we could talk about something else. It's a really boring topic and I have nothing to add. Just try it and see if it works for you.

Fresh install. I have a license from an earlier machine. The bundled junk that comes from OEMs is much, much worse, yeah.

Though Microsoft is doing everything in their power to become the biggest offender, with their near-requirement of having an MS account.

> Win 10 may be my final version of Windows

Win 7 was my final version of Windows.

I've been doing most of the stuff mentioned in the article for a decade. So have many other people on HN, who can usually figure out how to turn it off.

Windows defends me against the threat of privacy.

Quite literally, a certain GPG binary triggers Microsoft Defender.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/wdsi/threats/malware-encyclo...

I find Windows to be a very noisy and obstructive operating system. It keeps putting roadblocks in my ways. It often feels like it’s making my job several times more complicated than it should be.

I'm interested in specific cases that cause extra noise :)

I don't recall doing any extra work to reduce noise on my personal PC that runs windows. I'm unaware if I forgot about stuff I did to make that happen (it's been ~2 years since I set a new PC with windows 10 up) or if there's things that I unconsciously block that other people consider noise.

I bought a Microsoft tablet last year. I spent a whole day installing updates - like 4 hours. Then I had to force Bing to Google - not possible - and Edge to Firefox - partly possible. I had to remove many trial apps and other noise from the start menu, and a news widget from the task bar. Keeping telemetry off through many rounds of dark patterns was a challenge.

The fight against windows update had not begun yet. At that point I just returned the device. Even if you removed all the dark patterns, the root OS feels completely unpolished and inconsistent.

Aren't there ads in the task bar and start menu?

I recently had to install a copy of Windows 10 Home onto one of my spare laptops, and there are at two things that hit the "stupidly intrusive and annoying" buttons.

One: moving the mouse around on the task bar will suddenly pop up this ludicrously over-sized "Start" menu, generally featuring some "critical" piece of "news". These will often include pictures of political leaders, and such is the state of the world that these images produce a reaction like a mild form of Post Traumatic Truss Disorder. I imagine that with some poking around I could get rid of these, but a civilized OS would let me ask for them if I wanted, not simply shove them in my face.

Two: I try to avoid using this lap top except when I absolutely have to, but when I am forecd to turn the wretched thing on, I am invariably greeted with a big blue screen inviting me to "Complete my Windows set up." This apparently includes setting up OneDrive (don't need; not going to do) buying an Office365 subscription (definitely not going to do. LibreOffice is more than enough for what I want to do on that machine. Certainly not going to throw 10 pounds a month at Microsoft for no material benefit). And various other things which I also do not need and do not care about. And the options at the bottom of this screen are (I paraphrase) "Do Now" and "Remind Me In Three Days". Where, exactly, is the "I'm happy as I am; just leave things alone" button?

I am never more appreciative of my Linux desktop or the applications installed there, than after spending an hour using Windows. Linux does me the courtesy of assuming that I am adult who knows what he wants and can work out how to do stuff when I need it. Windows treats me like a sub-moronic five year old who has to be constantly distracted with toys and sugary treats.

I would like a world where the people producing the technology and the people using the technology feel like they’re on the same team. It seems like today the point of big tech is to abuse people just enough that tech can squeeze maximum value out of them without them quitting.

But then there are platforms like mastodon, which obviously have their problems but what they do have going for them is that the point of the system is to make the tech useful, not to abuse people. It seems to me the difference between the two is profit motive.

I still long for a world where no one has to work for survival. Where food, shelter, clothing, computing, transportation, medical care, and communication are all provided for free through collective ownership in a highly automated economy. In this world, more people could volunteer for things like mastodon, and fewer people would feel the need to work for places that abuse the users.

So nice to hear that other people doing are doing this as well. It's been a few years since I uninstalled pretty much all social/news apps and turned off all notifications on my phone an pc. My phone only vibrates/rings whenever there is a phone call incoming, otherwise it doesn't bother me unless I intentionally want to check if there is something new.

I did the same with the desktop(Linux, btw, for me is the OS that allows more customization and keeps out of my way, but ymmv).

So yeah, I do enjoy a lot of quite tech. Especially great to have it when I want to do some deep work for a couple of hours straight and can be confident I will have no interruptions.

I've been taking a similar route for the past decade or so. It's pretty nice. I still fall into the internet hole when I'm slouched on the couch with the tablet, I need to ponder some ways to fix that.

...ooh, Apple's "Screen Time" controls on the iPad will let me limit my time on a website, and supposedly sync to my Mac, too. Sharply limiting Twitter should break the habit of getting lost in replies and scrolling when someone links to a good tweet. Nice. Thanks for giving me a reason to examine my own habits around the Internet, Mr. Bouliane!

There’s no complete fix. Sometimes you have to relax. It’s just about doing it on your own terms.

Oh certainly. But if I have already been quite aware that I keep falling into a particular Internet hole and I am not really enjoying it, plugging up that hole helps me be more aware of how I’m using my time, and go do something that’s more relaxing than “scrolling Twitter hoping for amusement”.

Some low-tech email things I do to reduce notifications and interruptions from personal email, while still being quickly responsive to friends, knowing when packages are delivered, etc.

* I'm experimenting with smartphone almost always in Airplane Mode and DND. I don't use it for much more than 2FA lately, and carrying for emergencies.

* Email hoster's first pass spam filtering goes to IMAP "Junk" folder.

* Incoming email list messages from email lists that I don't need to see urgently automatically get sent to the IMAP "Archive" folder, without notification, for later handling. (I've misusing this folder for short-term low-priority inbox because random handheld clients are more likely to be set up to use it.)

* Incoming emails from most addresses not in my addressbook (except for from a few select domains) also automatically go to IMAP "Junk" folder. In practice, this gets virtually every spam that sneaks through the hoster's filters.

* Incoming emails that didn't get sent to "Junk" or "Archive" remain in my IMAP Inbox and display unobtrusive notifications briefly, and without beeping. Sometimes I notice them; sometimes the email waits until I'm on the virtual desktop with the email client, and glance at it. (And because presence in the IMAP Inbox after filters is what determines whether notification at all, that also works with random dumb handheld clients.)

* I normally check the IMAP "Archive" and "Junk" folders roughly once a day.

Work email is a different matter, and varies with the company. (Based on which media collegues use, their expectations for each, how external-interfacing I am right then with email, which SaaSes are pounding the inbox and how well they can be filtered with the mandated email setup, what's being used for urgent operations alerts, etc.).

Well written. I wonder if I would have enjoyed the previous version he mentions? Good writing comes from rewriting.

I already do a few of these things and it’s made a big difference. I should try and expand with PiHole and/or uBlacklist.

Something I’ve really loved is running NoScript! in Firefox… but I won’t pretend at all it is even remotely appropriate for non-programmers. You really need to understand JS and web design to still have functioning websites.

It would be nice to get a maintained list of “you actually need this” scripts for websites and auto block the known bullshit.

Ive often said this, I put my attention in economic terms. Your attention is worth something: cognitive power, context switching cost, opportunity cost, etc... These things add up. If some app on your phone demands your attention, don't give it to them. They are not paying you for it. If you do give your attention away for free, then hope that you are receiving something of value in return. In most cases, the immediacy of knowing about a Like or even BREAKING NEWS is just not that important.

"I made my calendar louder to check my phone less. It vibrates like an alarm until I get to it. "

macOS and iOS user here - how do you configure that?

I find that Calendar reminders are not loud enough (they give a single notification which is easy for me to dismiss by accident). When I need to really be reminded, I set an Alarm "Hey siri, set an alarm for 4pm titled 'check your calendar'"

What's your secret?

It’s an Android app called event alarm reminder. It works exactly as advertised.

iOS settings app -> Notifications-> Calendar -> Sounds

Here you can choose a longer and more annoying sound. Same with vibrations (and you can create a custom one). There is no repeating unfortunately (or fortunately).

Make sure the notification Banner Style on and set to persistent so it doesn’t auto-hide.

> I can't delete social media because my job depends on it.

Unless you are Mark Zuckerberg or employed by Facebook or Reddit, I question the veracity of this statement.

Your world will not end if you delete your social media accounts. You probably won’t even reduce your income.

Social media is invested in you believing that you simply must be on it for your business to survive. This is a lie.

I use it to follow people’s recent experience with various bureaucratic processes. These discussions happen on social media, so it’s where I look for them.

If you run a small business, you are the social media marketing department. Social media apps are a must, whether you loathe them or not.

This is a commonly held belief, that simply isn’t true.

This is a way to always be sharecropping for access to your own market and customers.

I literally know a person in this exact position. Is it not possible to imagine a business that might have to market itself this way due to the niche it's in?

The constraint was "if you run a small business", not "if you run a small business in a specific obscure niche where instagram is a literal 100% monopoly".

There are people for whom social media is a must. For each one of them, there are 10,000 for whom it is not a must, but who erroneously believe that it is.

This, of course, makes the situation worse for everyone, as they then donate free, usually exclusive content to these unsafe, walled, censored, abusive, rent-seeking platforms and make them more attractive to additional users, fueling the cycle.

Right now my soundscape is dominated by AC unit and PC PSU hum. Wouldn't mind if both of them were quieter.

I was also expecting to see mentions also about quieter vacuum cleaners and annoying appliance beeps, like the harsh microwave oven beeper. No way vacuum cleaners need to be anywhere near that noisy, or am I wrong?

Is anyone working on quieter appliances?

The Microwave Conundrum baffles me. I have in my head a picture/video of how it must have gone...

Monday-morning Team Standup at Microwave Corp. Debate has been raging for 20 minutes on what to do when the timer runs to zero on the new Model F. Finally the Product Manager calls it: "OK, let's make it beep four times. That feels about right. Oh, and let's make the beeping really high pitched so that older people and the hard-of-hearing can't actually hear it unless they're right next to the machine."

"And four times again every 30 seconds if the door doesn't get opened."

"Oh, and make sure the light inside stays ON while the door is open, because otherwise it won't rust quite as quickly..."

Somebody -- some team of somebodies -- actually spent time and mental energy deciding to make their product more obnoxious.

I don't get it.

What bothers me is the microwave could stop... wait 10 seconds and then beep.

That'd be a very good feature. Most of the time you're going to be near the microwave anyways. And 10 second delay wouldn't matter at all if you weren't.

OP, you have arrived at my exact recipe. I implemented it instinctively in 2005, right about when things went downhill. I am sure I am not alone.

We have watched the madness from the sidelines for fifteen years. Welcome home.

I'll put in a plug for linux over Apple, which consistently steers me back to technology. Apple has betrayed us since the 90s.

I avoid Windows is deliberately user-hostile. Linux is just a little more work than I'm comfortable with. I still like I would an old motorcycle: great to play with, but not to go places with minimal fuss.

I choose Mac OS over Linux for the same reason I prefer non-stick to cast iron, and synthetic to leather.

When I visited this site, I got an annoying popup about the option to enable dark mode from the page’s JavaScript. The page was already in dark mode.

Is this post meant to be ironic?

Griping aside, this article was a useful reminder to go into my devices and delete a bunch of apps (8!) and double-check my (lack of) notifications.

i have made peace with the fact that technology will evolve in the direction the masses want it. not the way i want it. i want a quiet lifestyle like author, but maybe the majority does not.

tiktok is proof that quiet is not what people want right now.

Technology has become a sort of paperclip optimizer for engagement. What we want only matters so long as we engage.

People probably don’t want to get into internet fights, but it’s how we’re wired. The machine - its workers, managers, C-levels and algorithms - found that strip mining our attention and fuelling outrage somehow boosts its metrics. So it does that.

TikTok is quieter than LinkedIn. Might be a bit controversial if I phrase it in this way. But for me it's a single player experience. I don't need to "engage" or "react" to anything. Yes, the videos are flashy and noisy, yet it never makes me feel envy, desire, regret as much as LinkedIn and Facebook do.

I think that (one of the) point(s) of the article is that it's not "the masses" that want all this noise, but the attention-craving product managers in appliance companies that want it. (And an Apple or Windows computer is an appliance, hardly at all a General Purpose Turing-Machine Equivalent.)

Silent PC?

Noise is energy waste, it should be illegal.

The really difficult problem is setting up apps to do what one actually wants them to do - the setup/menu/UI ergonomics on most of them suck big-time. Why apps are so bad in this regard ought to be the subject of much research as futzing with them wastes millions of human hours every year. Even after some 40/50 years, the IT profession essentially still programs for itself rather than what ought to be its principal consideration - the users of its services.

Keeping one's tech quiet is actually pretty simple, that is unless one needs to be at the center of attention. If one does then the job is much harder as that's the essence of how Big Tech makes its money.

My own aim isn't to hide from Big Tech completely, one can just about do so but it's generally too much trouble - my aim is to minimize interference from it and over the years I've been very successful. I essentially never see ads on webpages or on YouTube, email spam (especially targeted spam) is all but non existent, and I access the internet on my own terms and in my own time - except in special circumstances to suit myself, all notifications are either turned of of muted. Even the traditional telephone service falls into this category as I'm quite adroit at ignoring incoming calls.

Strategies I adopt vary depending on platform - Android, Windows, Linux etc. and it'd take several long blogs to detail them so here's a brief list (not in any particular order or relevance):

- Always use a collection of different browsers, use them for different jobs - ordering stuff online, news etc.

- Turn off JavaScript by default, only toggle it on when absolutely essential. This stops the majority of ads, requests to join mailing lists, etc.,etc., and the big upside effect is the huge increase in web speed (it's quite dramatic, once one gets used to a JavaScript-free web one never looks back).

BTW, there's nothing wrong with JS per se, it's just that websites use it to abuse the hell out of users, turning it off stops most but not all of that abuse. Note: websites that won't work at all without JS enabled are the ones I'd rarely want to visit anyway - that tactic goes with the territory (i.e.: low quality sites whose vested interest doesn't include you the user).

- Set all browsers to clear cookies on exit, and do not accept third party ones. Even during sessions, if you change sites/topics/interests then flush cookies, cache etc. at every opportunity).

- Set at least one browser (the one for general purpose browsing) to spoof the browser agent. Many browsers have plugins to make this job easy.

- Don't use Chrome or Edge under any circumstances. Alternatives such as Firefox, Palemoon, Brave, Lightening, etc. are much more private (or can be me so with a little tweaking/plugins). On Android, actively disable Chrome.

- Don't use Gmail (and Outlook if you can avoid it). If you must use Gmail then set it up with a spare phone/phone number that you don't use for anything else. Instead, use SMTP/POP/IMAP with programs such a Thunderbird, K-9 Mail etc.

- With Gmail, setup your Google account to be as anonymous as is possible, provide junk but believable data. Change your name, DOB etc. to realistic alternatives, if possible use an alias. Again, use separate hardware for job especially so if using an Android phone (more on that in a moment).

- Moreover, do not give your main email address out to anyone unless it's essential. Better still, use multiple email addresses for different jobs/purposes. If you're fussy even use different email clients and disposable email addresses (and where possible different ISPs) for 'worrying' once-off jobs.

- Reboot your router regularly to change your IP address, if paranoid, use all the other hiding/spoofing tricks, DNS hiding, etc.

-It hardly needs to be said but if you want to keep your tech quiet and don't want to seek attention then do not use Social Media! I do not use it - I wouldn't be seen dead on Facebook etc. (although in the past I've set up 'anonymous' test accounts both on FB and elsewhere for IT purposes (as one has to do)).

- If family commitments etc. require you to use Social Media then again use dedicated hardware for the purpose. (A rooted Android phone is often the best solution as you can remove most of the spying junk from it.)

- Use a rooted smartphone whenever possible. If you cannot root your phone then at least buy one where you can disable the Google apps and or change permissions to deny Google apps access to just about everything on your phone.

- Also, on Android, reset the ad ID regularly. Note some phone manufacturers do not allow you to disable key Google apps such as Google Play services, Google Play Store, etc. You should always check before you buy your phone.

- Install a firewall VPN on your Android phone and deny all apps with ads - in fact any app system or otherwise - access to the internet unless such access is absolutely essential to its function. ('Denying' (rerouting apps via an internet-blind VPN) means apps cannot access internet ad servers.) On non-rooted phones I'll even bootstrap the process, when, say, I cannot remove Google Play Store and Google's YouTube client apps I'll not only disable them but also deny their access to the internet in the firewall. (I use Karma FW firewall which is quite excellent but unfortunately its developer recently announced he'd be stopping further development).

- If you do internet banking with Android then if you decide to root your phone be careful. Use Magisk/Magisk Manager and be very careful not to trigger the phone's security detect fuses (a special and detailed subject in and of itself). Just be warned!

- On Android, even if you have a Google account (most of my Android phones don't) then use Aurora Store to anonymously access Google's Playstore. It's available from the F-Droid (non-Google) site.

- Similarly, on Android disable Google's YouTube client then use NewPipe to access YouTube anonymously (it's also available from F-Droid). NewPipe also bypasses ads and lets you download files (I wouldn't be without it - it's so useful and easy to use that I use it in preference to the PC to download YouTube stuff).

Again, there's much more I could add but that'll have to do for now.

With that longish list, what I've said may seem contradictory with respect to my point about keeping one's tech quiet being a simple matter but it's not so. For starters, you don't have to do everything I've suggested to keep your tech pretty quiet (alternatively, a zealot could go much further).

The key issue for quietening your tech is the degree to which you are prepared to go. It's a tradeoff between full access to the so called 'free' features from Facebook, Google et al and how quiet you want things to be.

In my case it's dead easy in that I've no need of their Social Media services, etc. However I realize others are compelled say for family and business reasons to use them. Just keep in mind that even if you must use then there are still many alternatives available to you, with care they can kill most of the internet 'noise' or at least ameliorate it to a significant degree.

The really difficult problem is setting up apps to do what one actually wants them to do - the setup/menu/UI ergonomics on most of them suck big-time. Why apps are so bad in this regard ought to be the subject of much research as futzing with them wastes millions of human hours every year. Even after some 40/50 years, the IT profession essentially still programs for itself rather than for what ought to be its principal consideration - the users of its services.

Strategies I adopt vary depending on platform - Android, Windows, Linux etc. and it'd take several long blogs to detail them so here's a brief list (not in any particular order or relevance):

- Always use a collection of different browsers, use them for different jobs - ordering stuff online, news etc.

- Turn off JavaScript by default, only toggle it on when absolutely essential. This stops the majority of ads, requests to join mailing lists, etc.,etc., and the big upside effect is a huge increase in web speed (it's quite dramatiphonelly, once one gets used to a JavaScript-free web one never looks back).

BTW, there's nothing wrong with JS per se, it's just that websites use it to abuse the hell out of of user, turning it off stops most but not all of that abuse. Note: websites that won't work at all without JS enabled are the ones I'd rarely want to visit anyway - that tactic goes with the territory (i.e.: low quality sites whose vested interest doesn't include you the user).

- Set all browsers to clear cookies on exit, and do not accept third party ones. Even during sessions, if you change sites/topics/interests then flush cookies, cache etc. at every opportunity).

- Set at least one browser (the one for general purpose browsing) to spoof the browser agent. Many browsers have plugins to make this job easy.

- Reboot your router regularly to change your IP address, if paranoid, use all the other hiding/spoofing tricks, DNS hiding, etc.

- Install a firewall VPN on your Android phone and deny all apps with ads - in fact any app system or otherwise - access to the internet unless it's absolutely essential. I'll even bootstrap the process on non-rooted phones, when say I cannot remove Google Play and Google's YouTube client I'll not only disable them but also deny their access to the internet in the firewall. (I use Karma FW firewall which is quite excellent but unfortunately its developer recently announced he'd be stopping further development).

- On Android, even if you have a Google account (most of my Android phones don't) then use Aurora Store to anonymously access Google's Playstore. It's available from the F-Droid (non Google) site.

- Similarly, on Android disable Google's YouTube client then use NewPipe to access YouTube anonymously. NewPipe also bypasses ads and lets you download files (I wouldn't be without it - it's so useful and easy to use that I use it in preference to the PC to download YouTube stuff).

Again, there's much more I could add but that'll have to do for now.

With that longish list, what I've said may seem contradictory with respect to my opening comment about keeping one's tech quiet being a simple matter but it's not so. For starters, you don't have to do everything I've suggested to keep your tech pretty quiet (alternatively, if you're a zealot you could go much further).

The key issue for keeping your tech quiet is what you are prepared trade by way of 'free' features from Facebook, Google et al. In my case it's dead easy in that I've no need of their services - Social Media and otherwise. However I realize others are compelled say for family and business reasons to use them. Just keep in mind that even if you do have to use then there are still many alternatives available to you, with care they can kill the internet 'noise' or at least ameliorate it to a significant degree.

> A good operating system: Mac OS. Windows has become so user-hostile that I refuse to get near it. Linux breaks the rule above: a person's primary task should not be computing, but being human.

This is where I closed the window

> This is where I closed the window

Just telling us that you simply didn't read the article is probably a significantly less valuable contribution to HN than offering your own (presumably contradictory) experience, expertise, or opinion.

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