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We’re creating a culture of distraction

joekraus.com

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Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#31

Post by pirateking »

GuiA wrote: post #29
pirateking wrote: post #24

Perhaps some of the most enlightening years of my life were towards the end of high school, when my computer died. At the time I was going through a youthful phase of freeing myself from worldly attachment. I just didn't bother fixing it or getting another. All my electronics and possessions, save for my stereo system, some books, and writing tools were packed away or sold. I wore pretty much the same clothes every d…

Your story reminds me of Thoreau's motivation for Walden (highly recommended to anyone who hasn't read it). With this in mind, it feels like the sentiment expressed by the author of the posted link, yourself, and many others (including myself) might just be a constant of humanity, no better or worse now than it ever was (much like many other things; for instance adults saying that teenagers are more disrespectful tha…

Funny you mention. Walden was one of the books I read during that period of my life, and it heavily influenced me.

Also related, the idea of Degrowth (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Degrowth).

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#32

Post by agpen »

Alienation is the word being sought after here, not distraction. Alienation is the defining characteristic and goal of late capitalism, because alienation drives consumption.

Everything about the suburban commuter lifestyle is characterized by how it further alienates us. Homes are disconnected walled gardens inside other walled gardens, training us to fear what lies outside. Transportation is done in individual disconnected boxes to jobs that are spread far and wide and businesses that are giant faceless boxes surrounded by oceans of parking lots. Genuine communal shared experience and community interaction is replaced by tv culture. Individual interaction is replaced by 140 character soundbytes and bumper sticker philosophy facebook statuses.

None of this is an accident, and none of it is even terribly recent, it's just the culmination of endless efforts to alienate you from the people around you and increase your anxiety and fear because it means you'll buy more shit to try and fill that void.

This is Marx 101 stuff, I recommend David Harvey as a starting place if you're looking for an examination of present society along these lines.

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#33

Post by navs »

While this was certainly not a manic episode I did go through a period where I threw out or sold many of my possessions. I decided to leave all my electronic items at work. This included my laptop, netbook, computer monitor and various other gadget doohickeys from a lifetime of impulsive Thinkgeek shopping. Now I have a cluttered desk at the office and virtually nothing at home. But not having a computer at home has been incredibly liberating. Four weeks ago I lost my smartphone and seeing as how I don't have a computer at home I couldn't check my emails, my messages or log into Skype. All I had was an old iPod shuffle filled with Melanie Safka songs. Those few days without my phone and without any way to connect to the internet were the two greatest days of this year. I read comics from the comic book store, took a walk around the city and at night when the city noise gets too much, I put on my little earphones and listen to Melanie on my iPod.

I eventually got my phone back thanks to a honest taxi driver and on occasion, I've simply left it at work choosing instead to go home with only my trusty iPod.

I haven't done this in the past two weeks and think I'm about overdue. As for Hacker News as a distraction, I love this infinitely useful HN newsletter[1] by Kale (@duck). Avoid HN for the week and dedicate one day of the week to just reading through the stories posted in the newsletter. I've noticed I tend to pay more attention to the posts and there's less chance of me making impulsive comments.

[1] http://www.hackernewsletter.com/

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#34

Post by navs »

kordless wrote: post #10

Everything in moderation! Check out http://thedigitaldetox.org . There are those of us who have been thinking about this problem for a while!

If there's a local New Zealand version of this, sign me up! I'd love to meet fellow hackers away from our hacking tools.

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#35

Post by navs »

brianjesse wrote: post #19

When I take my kids places, I take the sim out of my iphone and put it in a dumbphone I got off ebay. It's like a time warp.

Ah but that cursed SMS still exists on dumbphones. I'd like to see alternatives to the John's Phone[1] which just gives us the basic calling functionality, all we really need.

[1] http://johnsphones.org/

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#36

Post by lmm »

whatshisface wrote: post #22

We created our distractions, and we will surely limit them if doing so becomes worthwhile. If a company that banned non-enterprise smartphones during work hours was more profitable than one that did not, if the difference was great enough, the banners would quickly overtake everyone else. This is where culture comes from.

Right, but it's posts like this that are the culture that starts us on finding a way around our problems.

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#37

Post by jlundberg »

pirateking wrote: post #24

Perhaps some of the most enlightening years of my life were towards the end of high school, when my computer died. At the time I was going through a youthful phase of freeing myself from worldly attachment. I just didn't bother fixing it or getting another. All my electronics and possessions, save for my stereo system, some books, and writing tools were packed away or sold. I wore pretty much the same clothes every d…

"our culture, especially our technology, is too heavily skewed towards consumption over creation" - This really cuts it to the core!

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#38

Post by tatsuke95 »

jlundberg wrote: post #37
pirateking wrote: post #24

Perhaps some of the most enlightening years of my life were towards the end of high school, when my computer died. At the time I was going through a youthful phase of freeing myself from worldly attachment. I just didn't bother fixing it or getting another. All my electronics and possessions, save for my stereo system, some books, and writing tools were packed away or sold. I wore pretty much the same clothes every d…

"our culture, especially our technology, is too heavily skewed towards consumption over creation" - This really cuts it to the core!

>""our culture, especially our technology, is too heavily skewed towards consumption over creation" - This really cuts it to the core!"

Perhaps, but I don't buy it. In my opinion, our technology has enabled us to "create" on levels never seen in history. The ability to "have an audience" at your fingertips has provided everyone and their mother with a platform to generate media, be it music, literature, movies or graphic art.

Re: We’re creating a culture of distraction

#40

Post by migrantgeek »

We’re not creating anything. We’ve always found ways to distract ourselves.

Life is a horrible place underneath fishing, video games, Twitter, hiking, stamp collecting, sports, coding, horticulture and everything else we’ve invented. It would be impossible to live with the knowledge that you’re going to die and have nothing to take your mind off things. That’s why solitary confinement really is torture.

I had the “get rid of all my possessions” phase too. I sold everything and lived out of a 28-liter backpack in South America for 18 months. What did I learn? That everyone just wants a distraction. Often with some combo of drugs, booze, sex and music. Yeah, sometimes I climbed mountains or got cultural and moved in with a local but it was all done to keep my mind off death.

It’s all the same crap. Even criticizing others for their preferred distraction is in itself a form of distraction.

I like cheap red wine, vicodin, and PlayStation myself. Sometimes I suck down caffeine and crack open Knuth to read up on data structures but I don’t feel it’s any better than the former. Whatever keeps the dopamine flowing is fine by me.

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