Internet addiction and the habit of book reading • Hacker News Board

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#101

Post by brewdad » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 8:55 AM UTC

camillomiller wrote: post #93

Fannon wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I come from where you come from. However, I have mostly (60-80%?) retained my ability to focus on reading without distraction. But there has been something lost and sometimes it feels like an uphill battle to retain your ability to concentrate on one thing at a time. Would be curious what makes a difference here? I did some conscious choices, not sure how they contribute but I have the impression that each of them…

Very relatable list. Kindle also really ignited my love for reading again this year. I think it tricks my brain a bit into thinking “oh, it’s an electronic device anyway” :D Another thing that helped, was a bit of a challenge with my partner, reading books in bed together, and having reading dates, when we would just snug on the sofa reading each other their own book.

I really like the idea of a reading date but I also know that neither of us want to read or hear every detail of what the other is reading. Our book interests are quite divergent, although we do enjoy sharing an interesting passage or description of what we are reading every now and again.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#102

Post by rlt » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 8:55 AM UTC

makeitdouble wrote: post #80

bambax wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Addiction exists, though. I often browse Twitter for no particular reason. Six months ago I changed my year of birth for something like 2017 because I was annoyed it was compulsory. That resulted in an immediate suspension, as Twitter forbids minors to use it (rightfully so); the suspension would only be lifted if I submitted an ID. At first I thought "who cares?" But then I found myself in want of browsing the (few)…

> I get nothing out of Twitter. Absolutely zero value. Still, apparently, I can't live without it. That's a problem. Knowing nothing about you, the way this sentence is put is the most disturbing part. If you can’t live without it, at least it fills a hole in your life and that’s as much value as you could expect from anything. How many things do you do in a day where you can put a crystal clear value on it? I mean,…

Life expectancy isn’t the only metric we should care about. Life satisfaction is arguably more important.

…as I sit here on my phone at 1 am, responding to comments on HN for no particular reason other than worthless internet points, I guess, moderately depressed and anxious, despite having an objectively pretty great life.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#103

Post by penguin_booze » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 8:58 AM UTC

aero-glide2 wrote: post #81

Zircom wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I bought a Kindle and that was nice, but I'm terrible at remembering to bring it with me when I leave the house, and the (admittedly small) effort of having to connect it to my computer to load epubs onto it is enough friction to stop me from doing it in the first place a lot of the time. I usually obtain them from less than legal sources and buy a hardcopy if I like it. For awhile I was buying ebooks straight from t…

Last time I used a Kindle, you could just email a book to your Kindle email address and then the book would appear in the library. Much easier than physically connecting to copy books.

I consume most of my content within the browser itself, For long reads, however, I regularly send the content over to my Kindle via. 'push to kindle' [0]; sometimes makes for a good bed time read.

[0] https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#104

Post by camillomiller » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 8:59 AM UTC

brewdad wrote: post #101

camillomiller wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very relatable list. Kindle also really ignited my love for reading again this year. I think it tricks my brain a bit into thinking “oh, it’s an electronic device anyway” :D Another thing that helped, was a bit of a challenge with my partner, reading books in bed together, and having reading dates, when we would just snug on the sofa reading each other their own book.

I really like the idea of a reading date but I also know that neither of us want to read or hear every detail of what the other is reading. Our book interests are quite divergent, although we do enjoy sharing an interesting passage or description of what we are reading every now and again.

Let me clarify: we just snug together reading our respective books in silence with a cup of coffee :)

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#105

Post by allendoerfer » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 9:00 AM UTC

Only having read some of the comments - which btw. are often the best part of a HN submission. It is not like we are only getting the fluffy part, just because we are trained to go for the meat, when authors often had to literate a whole backstory before getting to the point. This ability is what makes a great information worker like a developer. So despite only having read some of the comments and finding it hard to start reading a book, I have no problem to keep my focus on difficult professional problems for very long hours (>10).

So I don’t think it is attention span in general. Might be just your mind being trained for things you value.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#106

Post by estaseuropano » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 9:01 AM UTC

bobiny wrote: post #100

I read less books than when I was school age. I have a couple that are sitting in Books app that I read a few pages at a time. I think the “problem” is twofold: 1) phones are too much 2) too many books 1: using a book used to be easier than computer. You had to turn it on, wait, sit in a chair. With book it’s just grab and start reading in any position. People were/are reading standing up in Moscow metro. Computer wa…

I find your point 2 very odd on both counts. First, I would find it pretty surreal to walk out of a movie theater because of 1-2 minutes of exposition. You literally spend more time walking from the booth to your seat or watch advertisements before the movie starts then the few noments of on boarding for those that don't know the universe.

Second, there are literally millions of books published each year. Yes many are bad fiction or bad nonfiction but there is an incredible wealth of books that use each page well. E.g. I read 'Sex, Power, Suicide' by Nick Lane a few weeks ago and there was not a single page that felt wasted - every page i learned something new. Similar with e.g. Hans Rosling's book. And there is much fiction where each page matters in driving the plot.

Tl;dr: choose good books.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#107

Post by rlt » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 9:03 AM UTC

Millennials and especially Gen Z are thought to have higher rates of depression and anxiety than previous generations. I would be very surprised if social media weren’t a factor.

Despite making a career in tech I believe some of what we’re doing is very harmful to culture, mental and physical health, the environment, and democracy.

At some point I would like to focus on mitigating these problems.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#108

Post by zeristor » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 9:18 AM UTC

“ In an essay he published in The Guardian (which is by now removed from their website, following a massive Twitter campaign against the novelist mainly because of his opinion on techno-consumerism), titled “What’s Wrong with the Modern World?” ”

https://archive.md/85tep

Just wanted to use the archive.md site the way it was intended rather than circumventing the jaws of cookies.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#109

Post by jcun4128 » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 9:20 AM UTC

I used to read a lot of books but now it is hard. Sometimes I can get into something and the pages fly. Often though I space out, my eyes move but I don't read the words, it's not great.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#110

Post by Broken_Hippo » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 9:21 AM UTC

dougmwne wrote: post #17

An aside, I find it a bit interesting that at some point we stopped talking about internet and game addiction. It used to be a hot topic, but I guess now that we are all completely addicted after decade of intense behavioral experimentation, none of us are interested in reading about it anymore.

It was a hot topic because we make hot topics out of the "doom" of [insert new/cool thing here]. We've villified reading, chess, video games, television, dungeon and dragons, driving, dancing, and so on - and vilifying it all goes out of fashion.