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Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

theguardian.com

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Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#51

Post by underlipton »

There seem to be a lot of comments cluck-clucking about personal responsibility, and government intervention is bad, and the way this is written is off-putting, and-

And no acknowledgment about how many on here can't really give an unqualified opinion because of where their paychecks originate. I can, though, and here it is:

We've done this before, with cigarette companies, treating them with kid gloves and trying to avoid disrupting their business, and people kept getting sick and dying in droves until government finally acquiesced and committed to a full-court press. Laws making smoking inconvenient, and massive public service campaigns, and taxes, and more. You need to make a decision: are you going to continue building a livelihood off the suffering of your neighbors, and your family? Or are we going to do something about this, collectively?

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#52

Post by anolog0 »

yabatopia wrote: post #35
anolog0 wrote: post #9

Why is it that every time this moral panic is written about, there are no solid studies to back it up? Surely, if there was really a society-wide epidemic of focus, there would be some clear metric for focus which researchers would have 20-30 years of data and studies on, right? This should be a very testable hypothesis, so where is all the hard science on it? Even in this article, the author just takes some statemen…

No need to panic: there is some research available. I found this article on The Verge an interesting read: Why note-taking apps don't make us smarter, https://www.theverge.com/2023/8/25/23845590/note-taking-apps... . It links to an article in the New York Times, citing a study that lasted approximately 20 years. (No direct link, because paywall) Gloria Mark, a professor of information science at the University of Cal…

Thanks for the response. That's an interesting study, but is it implying that we spend less time on websites because our attention spans are worse, or our attention spans are worse because most websites are more easily scanned, digested, and moved on from? Obviously the web itself has changed a lot in the past 20 years, not just people's supposed attention spans.

Honestly, ignoring that entirely, I don't see why we would have to measure attention span through a metric like duration spent on websites. Is it really so hard to measure it just by giving people a task and paying attention to when their focus shifts from it? And, supposing people are generally just as good at sitting down and doing a task as they were 20 years ago (so long as they don't get interrupted by their phones), is there something else people mean when they talk about attention spans getting worse?

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#53

Post by sph »

WalterBright wrote: post #48
Aurornis wrote: post #23

All of these supposed revelations that companies try to make products that people will use were supposed to empower people to break free from these addictions Yet anecdotally, these narrative seem to give people more excuses to engage further with their addictions of choice. I’ve heard so many variations of “It’s not my fault I use so much (Facebook|TikTok|Reddit), don’t you know they have people employed to make the…

In our modern society, everyone is a victim and it's always someone else's fault. My opinion that people in America do have choices and their lives are the sum of those choices inevitably elicits a lot of rather angry responses. All the people I've gotten to know over the years are all where they are as a result of their choices. The interesting thing about deciding to own your choices is it's empowering - you can ch…

Everything is easy if you trivialise it enough. This is why self-help books are America's #1 genre and literary export.

Real life, on the other hand, is a tad more complicated. The rule of thumb is don't waste time with people that think they have all the answers. Either they're lying to you, hopelessly naive, or have no real life experience.

> Drug addicted? Treatment is available

> Criminal record? Start your own business

> Unhappy with your finances? Learn how to invest

I mean, seriously? You forgot "poor? Become rich."

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#54

Post by ajb »

WalterBright wrote: post #48
Aurornis wrote: post #23

All of these supposed revelations that companies try to make products that people will use were supposed to empower people to break free from these addictions Yet anecdotally, these narrative seem to give people more excuses to engage further with their addictions of choice. I’ve heard so many variations of “It’s not my fault I use so much (Facebook|TikTok|Reddit), don’t you know they have people employed to make the…

In our modern society, everyone is a victim and it's always someone else's fault. My opinion that people in America do have choices and their lives are the sum of those choices inevitably elicits a lot of rather angry responses. All the people I've gotten to know over the years are all where they are as a result of their choices. The interesting thing about deciding to own your choices is it's empowering - you can ch…

Responsibility does not mutually exclude. I'm a bit disappointed in a compiler engineer not being alive to the logic of that. So many political arguments (in both directions) based on this bogus reasoning, that A can affect an outcome, so therefore B who exerts influence on it has no responsibility. Doesn't work that way.

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#55

Post by Albert931 »

kwanbix wrote: post #47

What would companies do when the people they hire cannot perform because of this addiction? What would companies do when people cannot earn money to pay for their services because of the addiction? What would they do when people do not have money to buy their phones? This is like drugs all over again. And companies, such as Facebook, Google, Snapchat, etc., do not care at all. Will we transition to a world of very sh…

Regarding to this I personally predict that in the future there will be a massive increase of unemployment because of the decrease of Attention spam among the young population, which will lead to more people failing in their education and them not being able of developing any abilities that are important for labor (Like discipline)

Either that or there will be a decrease of professionals.

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#56

Post by johnea »

Aurornis wrote: post #23

All of these supposed revelations that companies try to make products that people will use were supposed to empower people to break free from these addictions Yet anecdotally, these narrative seem to give people more excuses to engage further with their addictions of choice. I’ve heard so many variations of “It’s not my fault I use so much (Facebook|TikTok|Reddit), don’t you know they have people employed to make the…

These are not mutually exclusive choices.

I own my choices, AND I blame the corps for a LOT of the damage done in the world today, especially loss of attention span.

More guns in slack jawed drunk idiot's hands --> more shooting

More eye candy apps in people's hands --> more slack jawed idiots

People can only "choose" among the choices in front of them, and most people choose not based on what's going to be best for them, but on "what's popular".

For discussion's sake, let's just call this phenomenon "monkey brain".

The fact is that 1st world IQ is in decline because an increasing amount of the population can't pay attention.

I personally don't buy the argument that it's genetic. It seems quite clear this phenomenon is being driven by social norms.

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#57

Post by guntars »

Zetice wrote: post #42
guntars wrote: post #37

It sounds like her son has ADHD (and her too likely as it’s mostly genetic), just like me and millions of others. No, it’s not an epidemic. Social media and phones in general are the perfect “solution” for brains that are in a constant craving for stimulation. I don’t want to get into the whole personal responsibility vs evil companies dichotomy, but something that has helped me tremendously is wasting time on my own…

From a practical perspective it’s definitely your problem if you need a car…

I can still get a car just fine by keeping the app open and seeing how far the driver is. The point is that some apps really do benefit from real time notifications, but it’s too tempting for PMs at those companies to not abuse it because of the metrics that they are evaluated on. Pretty sure the apps report back if the notifications are turned off so that’s my form of feedback into those same metrics.

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#58

Post by llamaLord »

Aurornis wrote: post #23

All of these supposed revelations that companies try to make products that people will use were supposed to empower people to break free from these addictions Yet anecdotally, these narrative seem to give people more excuses to engage further with their addictions of choice. I’ve heard so many variations of “It’s not my fault I use so much (Facebook|TikTok|Reddit), don’t you know they have people employed to make the…

I tend to have a view somewhat similar to this IMO.

My way of managing this stuff has been to straight up block the worst offending services on all my devices (Facebook, Twitter), and use tools to restrict the amount of time I can access the others that I know steal my attention, but i've consciously decided I get enough value from to make a small amount of theft worth it (reddit, hacker news, etc).

I get 15 minutes a day on Reddit and HN (each), but all "traditional" social networks are flat out blocked.

It's exactly the same style I would use if I had a traditional addiction I was trying to manage. Use tools to make it impossible to access the things that feed the addiction the worst, and other tools to force moderation with the things that make my life a bit better/more interesting, but could lead to slippery slopes.

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#59

Post by WalterBright »

sph wrote: post #53
WalterBright wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In our modern society, everyone is a victim and it's always someone else's fault. My opinion that people in America do have choices and their lives are the sum of those choices inevitably elicits a lot of rather angry responses. All the people I've gotten to know over the years are all where they are as a result of their choices. The interesting thing about deciding to own your choices is it's empowering - you can ch…

Everything is easy if you trivialise it enough. This is why self-help books are America's #1 genre and literary export. Real life, on the other hand, is a tad more complicated. The rule of thumb is don't waste time with people that think they have all the answers. Either they're lying to you, hopelessly naive, or have no real life experience. > Drug addicted? Treatment is available > Criminal record? Start your own b…

I specifically wrote it wasn't easy.

Re: Attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen (2022)

#60

Post by jabroni_salad »

kwanbix wrote: post #47

What would companies do when the people they hire cannot perform because of this addiction? What would companies do when people cannot earn money to pay for their services because of the addiction? What would they do when people do not have money to buy their phones? This is like drugs all over again. And companies, such as Facebook, Google, Snapchat, etc., do not care at all. Will we transition to a world of very sh…

I think as long as quarterly numbers are rewarded, they'll continue to be optimized.

You get what you measure for, after all.

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