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My Day Away from Reddit

unsupervision.com

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Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#61

Post by panda888888 »

t-sauer wrote: post #46
bborud wrote: post #31

I quit visiting Reddit daily 6-7 years ago. The reason is very simple: I asked myself what value Reddit provides in my life. What will I remember from yesterday's browsing? Or last week. Or last month. Am I really going to miss out on anything? I made the same exercise with several online newspapers. If I can't remember what I read yesterday, whatever I read was probably a waste of time. I stopped reading at least 3…

I don‘t remember most of the things I‘ve read on reddit but I definitely remember the games, books, music and shows I discovered through reddit. Or that it helped me to keep up to date when covid appeared. Or how I kept up with the developments in the Ukraine last year. While lots of reddit browsing is time wasting, it also enabled a lot of discovery for me that I didn‘t get elsewhere so far.

I agree 100%. I've learned many useful things that are hard to learn elsewhere, like personal finance and cooking.

Sure, I can look up recipes pretty much anywhere on the internet, but the community for cooking tips has been awesome. (Simple example: "you should add nutmeg to make alfredo sauce taste better")

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#62

Post by noduerme »

asim wrote: post #55
noduerme wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> There is no time for reddit when you're living your real life Except if you're drunk and lonely, and all the bars are closed. Then it's a real problem. The real nasty thing is, so many people are living in a world now where they act like there's nothing better to do on the train, when there are people all around us we should be paying attention to and interacting with.

I don't drink, but I know what loneliness and depression feels like. And those are the times I ended up in those places just looking for an iota of connection to save me. We're crying out for help and no one will help us. > so many people are living in a world now where they act like there's nothing better to do on the train I'm guilty of this too, but when I look up and see 3-4 people staring down at their phones I…

I appreciate this comment - I'm going to walk outside and do the same.

Tonight I did talk to real people (strangers at a bar) and had a good long conversation about the world. We need that. But also just to look away from the screen and see each other, That is most important. Thanks.

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#63

Post by rkangel »

KnobbleMcKnees wrote: post #49
bborud wrote: post #31

I quit visiting Reddit daily 6-7 years ago. The reason is very simple: I asked myself what value Reddit provides in my life. What will I remember from yesterday's browsing? Or last week. Or last month. Am I really going to miss out on anything? I made the same exercise with several online newspapers. If I can't remember what I read yesterday, whatever I read was probably a waste of time. I stopped reading at least 3…

If you're visiting r/funny and r/memes 99% of the time sure. But it also has great hobbyist communities. r/functionalprint and r/fixmyprint are amazing for 3d printer enthusiasts, for example. It's a bit like criticizing the library for stocking copies of MAD magazines.

I agree with everything except the last sentence. Reddit does want to push you towards the use of /r/all (or similar) because that's they get more time in front of your eyeballs. The design of the product is pushing you towards that view of everything, so that you end up doing the endless-scrolling thing.

I'm interested by the direction Lemmy (or a similar system) might take. At the moment it's a Reddit-lite clone, which is completely reasonable because that's what people are looking for. But maybe with a different set of incentives (presumably more user-centric), over time it might morph into something different?

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#64

Post by reddisbad »

panda888888 wrote: post #60
bborud wrote: post #31

I quit visiting Reddit daily 6-7 years ago. The reason is very simple: I asked myself what value Reddit provides in my life. What will I remember from yesterday's browsing? Or last week. Or last month. Am I really going to miss out on anything? I made the same exercise with several online newspapers. If I can't remember what I read yesterday, whatever I read was probably a waste of time. I stopped reading at least 3…

I absolutely do waste time on Reddit, but I've learned so much about helpful topics: personal finance, cooking, parenting, etc. Personally, I need some time each day to relax, which involves passive content consumption. Between watching TV, reading the news, or reading Reddit, I would argue that Reddit is the "least bad" option. You're right that I'm not getting that time back, but it's not time I would have used pro…

>I need some time each day to relax, which involves passive content consumption.

"Passive content consumption" is a very recent phenomenon which doesn't allow our brains to relax and process information. It merely maintains the state of over-stimulation.

You need it a lot less than you think! Go and do something else, like stare out of your window, or sharpen your kitchen knives, or fix your todo list.

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#65

Post by sureglymop »

deergomoo wrote: post #18
Havoc wrote: post #3

It did highlight to me how often I circle back to Reddit almost subconsciously when idling surfing the internet. Will need to do something about that…

I uninstalled Apollo yesterday and I’m kind of embarrassed at how many times since I’ve tried to open it without even thinking about it. It’s only when the app isn’t there that your brain snaps out of it and you wonder what the hell you’re doing.

I did the same with other social media apps like Instagram a while ago. What I realized is that since then, I am filling up the time spent on those platforms otherwise. Now I am constantly refreshing hacker news or my YouTube subscription feed instead. So while it's still procrastination it's at least a little more productive and without ads.

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#66

Post by mnky9800n »

bborud wrote: post #31

I quit visiting Reddit daily 6-7 years ago. The reason is very simple: I asked myself what value Reddit provides in my life. What will I remember from yesterday's browsing? Or last week. Or last month. Am I really going to miss out on anything? I made the same exercise with several online newspapers. If I can't remember what I read yesterday, whatever I read was probably a waste of time. I stopped reading at least 3…

I quit after I finished my PhD and suddenly I had a lot more free time. And actually, if you go back you notice it's actually a lot of recycled content anyways. And the conversation isn't interesting nor is the content driving any kind of positive thought process. Life is much better without Reddit. I would rather go swim laps in the pool or something. Even the argument about the small subreddits being nice isn't true. Because it's people who would rather talk about their hobby then do it. Which is fine. But it's not for me.

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#67

Post by Octabrain »

bborud wrote: post #31

I quit visiting Reddit daily 6-7 years ago. The reason is very simple: I asked myself what value Reddit provides in my life. What will I remember from yesterday's browsing? Or last week. Or last month. Am I really going to miss out on anything? I made the same exercise with several online newspapers. If I can't remember what I read yesterday, whatever I read was probably a waste of time. I stopped reading at least 3…

Agree. Right after reading your comment, I went and run shreddit (https://github.com/andrewbanchich/shreddit) over my now unexisting account. I think is time for me to get good habits again and wake up from the enchant of "social media".

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#68

Post by insickness »

A few years ago I noticed the phenomenon where I would walk outside and couldn't for the life of me remember what I'd been doing for the few hours. It happened a few times and then I realized that this happens when I was on Reddit (or other similar online endless scrolling).

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#69

Post by disparate_dan »

I posted this already on a similar thread. I’m very aware during deliberately not visiting Reddit these last two days, that I’m missing the ‘dopamine hits’ from the controversial posts and outrage bait more than the loss of information and discovery.

Re: My Day Away from Reddit

#70

Post by Mandatum »

bborud wrote: post #31

I quit visiting Reddit daily 6-7 years ago. The reason is very simple: I asked myself what value Reddit provides in my life. What will I remember from yesterday's browsing? Or last week. Or last month. Am I really going to miss out on anything? I made the same exercise with several online newspapers. If I can't remember what I read yesterday, whatever I read was probably a waste of time. I stopped reading at least 3…

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