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Addicted to Distraction

nytimes.com

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Re: Addicted to Distraction

#101

Post by lfowles »

ThomPete wrote: post #76
spooningtamarin wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Kids don't live in a vacum. Sure. They don't, but when they are just starting school they still don't know much about what is possible, and out there. > No one is talk about giving them freedom to do what they want. Little bit of guidance won't hurt. There is nothing intrinsic in child's wishes. No one is blocking their inner genius by guiding them to pay attention to learning maths instead of painting, or dancing,…

What do you mean they don't know what is possible? They are exposed to all sorts of of things way before they start school. Through friends, parents friends, family, media etc. Nobody is saying guidance is bad. The point is when the guidance become constant. It's not about some innner genius, it's not even about finding what you are are good at. It's about finding the engine that will allow you to become good at some…

Example: I knew literally nothing about any of the engineering disciplines until junior/senior year of highschool when a careers quiz directed me towards them.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#102

Post by whyenot »

I realize for many people this is not going to be an option, but what has worked for me is to do more work "offline." Write drafts with pen and paper, instead of composing on a screen, if I have something I want to read, I print it out.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#103

Post by intrasight »

And here I am being distracted by Hacker News. But I am ok with getting distracted once an hour by checking what is new on Hacker News.

During working hours, I've blocked all sites that I find distracting - except for Hacker News. NYTimes is blocked so can't go read the referenced article. With so many sites self-blocked, I end up getting the TL;DR summary here on HN, and find that works most of the time. The discussions here are generally of high quality!

Of course this is no solution for self-distraction. I can still Google some topic of interest. But that is a more active process as opposed to a "reflex" distraction.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#104

Post by amelius »

Scarblac wrote: post #99
scep12 wrote: post #33

I recently wrote a chrome extension that helps me curb my "compulsion loop." It's pretty simple; each time the browser loads a website that has potentially distracting content (think: twitter, FB, reddit, hacker news, rotoworld, etc) that I tend to over-visit in search of new tidbits, the extension keeps track of my visit and the text content of the page. The next time I visit, I do a text comparison that checks how…

I've been fighting this kind of thing for decades now (it started with Usenet), and when reading this and stuff like the Shallows... This is going to be a huge health problem ten years from now (it must be already the largest productivity killer in the workplace), and great solutions for this will be profitable some day.

Yes, it is a huge problem. One funny way to look at the problem is that if you told someone twenty years ago that in the future there would be a TV set on every desk in every office, this person would not have believed you. Yet, the actual situation right now is much worse than that.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#105

Post by Disruptive_Dave »

scep12 wrote: post #33

I recently wrote a chrome extension that helps me curb my "compulsion loop." It's pretty simple; each time the browser loads a website that has potentially distracting content (think: twitter, FB, reddit, hacker news, rotoworld, etc) that I tend to over-visit in search of new tidbits, the extension keeps track of my visit and the text content of the page. The next time I visit, I do a text comparison that checks how…

I may be misunderstanding, but isn't this like a heavy drinker having the bartender put more water than beer in his glass when he heads to the local pub? This doesn't seem to be treating the actual issue at hand (lack of self control, lack of training of the mind, etc.) is what I'm getting at. Not meaning to crap on your build, as it certainly seems cool. Maybe this could be viewed as a training tool, but only if it's part of a larger strategy.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#106

Post by nommm-nommm »

ThomPete wrote: post #74
nommm-nommm wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It's not unusual in my circles that kids are both playing football, taking piano lessons, learning french on top of their school and homework. We are filling our kid's time with all these structured activities to "enrich" their lives. To give them a leg up in the adult world. To make them smarter and well rounded. We fill our houses with a whole bunch of "enriching" toys. This is extremely misguided. The majority of…

Exactly! Boredom is very very important early on. It's something you have to internalize and become familiar with and not fear. Way too many adults try and make sure their kids aren't bored IMO and thus the kids start fearing it because they never learned what a powerful engine for reflection and thinking it actually become. Thats something you have to train.

Kids can get cranky and annoying when they are bored. It's so easy for an adult to give them an iPad when they are on the train to shut them up (so to speak). The less they learned to deal with these feelings themselves the more they begin to "need" the iPad for idle time and the more cranky and annoying they can get without it. Its a positive feedback loop.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#107

Post by jawarner »

g_delgado14 wrote: post #42
TillE wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd be willing to bet that a significant majority of "internet addiction" (are people still talking about that ?) or "game addiction" is actually just a symptom of depression.

Couldn't you say the reverse? One might say that depression is a symptom of internet addiction.

I'd argue both are true. Trying to escape a personal problem only makes it worse. This creates a sort of negative feedback loop.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#108

Post by [deleted] »

amelius wrote: post #104
Scarblac wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been fighting this kind of thing for decades now (it started with Usenet), and when reading this and stuff like the Shallows... This is going to be a huge health problem ten years from now (it must be already the largest productivity killer in the workplace), and great solutions for this will be profitable some day.

Yes, it is a huge problem. One funny way to look at the problem is that if you told someone twenty years ago that in the future there would be a TV set on every desk in every office, this person would not have believed you. Yet, the actual situation right now is much worse than that.

[deleted]

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#109

Post by ThomPete »

lfowles wrote: post #101
ThomPete wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean they don't know what is possible? They are exposed to all sorts of of things way before they start school. Through friends, parents friends, family, media etc. Nobody is saying guidance is bad. The point is when the guidance become constant. It's not about some innner genius, it's not even about finding what you are are good at. It's about finding the engine that will allow you to become good at some…

Example: I knew literally nothing about any of the engineering disciplines until junior/senior year of highschool when a careers quiz directed me towards them.

Sure how many kids that are exposed to those do you think are going to start working towards being engineers when they are 5?

There is a big difference between finding an interest and then finding a career.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#110

Post by maneesh »

I used to suffer from massive unproductivity. So I began to run experiments.

Among them, I realized that accountability and a human being next to me aided in productivity. So I did what any normal person would do. I hired someone to slap me in the face.

http://hackthesystem.com/blog/why-i-hired-a-girl-on-craigsli...

The results were mindblowing. My productivity quadrupled. I got Important (but non-urgent) work done fluidly, and easily.

I posted the article online and it went viral. Many people thought it was crazy, but others understood.

So I decided to take it a step further. What if the world could improve as well as I did? Unfortunately, slapping doesn't scale, so I tried to build the next best thing.

Pavlok --- the wearable device that uses vibrations to reward good behavior, and a mild electric stimulus to reduce bad behaviors.

My first app was a Chrome extension that allows me to choose which sites I want to blacklist. If I spend 5 minutes on Facebook, it will beep my wrist. If I spend 30 mins on Facebook, I receive the electric zap --- and the longer I stay on line, the more powerful the zap becomes.

People use it in hundreds of ways. To beep loudly when they enter facebook. To vibrate if they bite their nails. To send a zap to wake them up (shocking alarm clock --- it just works).

It's actually pretty freaking amazing to see what our users are doing with it.

Anyway, I thought you all might be interested --- what do you think? Could you see yourselves using the chrome extension to train away your bad habits?

http://buy.pavlok.com is the site to check it out. or on Amazon: http://amazon.com/Pavlok-1/dp/B011U2QYO2

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