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Doomscrolling ourselves to death

edwest.co.uk

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Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#251

Post by js2 »

Barrin92 wrote: post #197
TexanFeller wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my problems with blocking things like YouTube is that there’s so much outstanding long form content that’s not always available elsewhere. I love watching semi popularized physics lectures like from Sean Carroll but I can’t help but click on the mindless content next to it after, or even during, my wholesome viewing.

the semi popularized physics lectures are also mindless content. It's infotainment, it might be worse than junk because it disguises itself as learning. People will consume thousands of hours of that stuff and not be able to solve one physics problem. Endless exercise and fitness science videos and still be out of shape. Watch language learning content and never speak another language. Endless programming tutorials w…

I first got interested in and learned to cook from cooking shows (Alton Brown, Emeril Lagasse). Of course I had to do my own cooking, but watching them made me realize it wasn't so hard. I'm a shade tree mechanic, but without the service manual, it's helpful to find a video replacing whatever part I'm about to deal with for the first time (Chilton manuals are crap). A few years ago I needed to pull the double-oven out of my cabinet to replace the heating element... I'm sure glad there was a video for that too. What's the right form for a kettlebell swing or a push up? How do I tie that knot again?

Yeah, there's lot of junk on YouTube. You might even say 90% of it. But there's tons of useful content too if you go searching for it.

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#253

Post by ciupicri »

Lagoon3384_SWE wrote: post #175
Aurornis wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have in essence deleted the vast majority of my social media accounts years ago, but stayed a passive and rather anonymous consumer on Reddit, X and YouTube Most of the people I’ve known who struggled with doomscrolling had established a similar set of social media sites at their worst point. I think we’ve seen so many articles about how social media is bad that reference mainstream sites like Facebook and Instag…

Reddit on defaults is a crazy experience. Subs with names like /r/wowlookatthis are posting blatant "west bad" propaganda. Making USA and EU people feel bad. Yet I walk outside in Sweden and I'm in one of the best functioning and beautiful nations in the world. Yet Swedish Reddit will post "west bad" propaganda on how everything is right wing doom. I mean from their perspective, sure... but so so so wrong they are. I…

> r/Wowlookatthis is banned

> This subreddit was banned due to being unmoderated.

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#254

Post by SkyeCA »

Aurornis wrote: post #99
Escapado wrote: post #69

On a personal level I have become more anxious and it has become more difficult to deal with my tendency to procrastinate the more screen time I have and the more I am exposed to social media. I have in essence deleted the vast majority of my social media accounts years ago, but stayed a passive and rather anonymous consumer on Reddit, X and YouTube. A few weeks ago I blocked them too. I would say in totality I read…

> I have in essence deleted the vast majority of my social media accounts years ago, but stayed a passive and rather anonymous consumer on Reddit, X and YouTube Most of the people I’ve known who struggled with doomscrolling had established a similar set of social media sites at their worst point. I think we’ve seen so many articles about how social media is bad that reference mainstream sites like Facebook and Instag…

Reddit is a site which I would only recommend to someone I truly hated. It's poison on every level imaginable, more so than basically any other social media I've ever used.

People will say Twitter is worse, but the Twitter algo with actually listen to you (in my experience) when you tell it what you do/don't want to see. My feed was nearly 100% furry artwork because I refused to interact with anything else.

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#255

Post by mitxela »

SkyeCA wrote: post #254
Aurornis wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have in essence deleted the vast majority of my social media accounts years ago, but stayed a passive and rather anonymous consumer on Reddit, X and YouTube Most of the people I’ve known who struggled with doomscrolling had established a similar set of social media sites at their worst point. I think we’ve seen so many articles about how social media is bad that reference mainstream sites like Facebook and Instag…

Reddit is a site which I would only recommend to someone I truly hated. It's poison on every level imaginable, more so than basically any other social media I've ever used. People will say Twitter is worse, but the Twitter algo with actually listen to you (in my experience) when you tell it what you do/don't want to see. My feed was nearly 100% furry artwork because I refused to interact with anything else.

And it doesn't feel like poison. I haven't used Reddit in several years so I don't know how it is now, but I used to feel yucky if I visited Facebook or Instagram, but not Reddit.

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#256

Post by mitxela »

weird-eye-issue wrote: post #104
Aurornis wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have in essence deleted the vast majority of my social media accounts years ago, but stayed a passive and rather anonymous consumer on Reddit, X and YouTube Most of the people I’ve known who struggled with doomscrolling had established a similar set of social media sites at their worst point. I think we’ve seen so many articles about how social media is bad that reference mainstream sites like Facebook and Instag…

X is honestly among the worst of the worst. People give purposefully bad takes just for the engagement and it's overall super toxic Reddit is awful too, completely accurate things can get downvoted to oblivion because of the hive mind YouTube is still overall decent but mostly brainrot I habitually watch/listen to in the background to such a high degree it's hard to even imagine completely cutting it out of my life

Reddit is also botted to hell, it's the epitome of dead internet theory these days. Bots talking to bots and upvoting bots.

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#257

Post by mitxela »

Lagoon3384_SWE wrote: post #175
Aurornis wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have in essence deleted the vast majority of my social media accounts years ago, but stayed a passive and rather anonymous consumer on Reddit, X and YouTube Most of the people I’ve known who struggled with doomscrolling had established a similar set of social media sites at their worst point. I think we’ve seen so many articles about how social media is bad that reference mainstream sites like Facebook and Instag…

Reddit on defaults is a crazy experience. Subs with names like /r/wowlookatthis are posting blatant "west bad" propaganda. Making USA and EU people feel bad. Yet I walk outside in Sweden and I'm in one of the best functioning and beautiful nations in the world. Yet Swedish Reddit will post "west bad" propaganda on how everything is right wing doom. I mean from their perspective, sure... but so so so wrong they are. I…

> Wake up. All default subs are left wing crazy.

Worldnews bans you instantly if you disagree with Israel. That's a default sub, yeah? Left or right wing?

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#258

Post by mitxela »

customguy wrote: post #119
Aurornis wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't see how it's any different than opium During the marijuana prohibition days the resounding chorus in the discourse was that marijuana was not physically addictive like other drugs, and therefore we must treat it differently. There were problems with that argument if you got into the details, but it did establish the idea that not all drugs are equally harmful and therefore treating them all equally was not…

A long time ago on the forum I hang out with, I said something like "this is amazing, this is like heroin!" about whatever (not even a substance, probably something silly like a song or a video game). A guy who I knew as nothing but laid back and gracious scolded me in a way I remember to this day... not the exact words, but part of it was that he knew a couple who just handed off their new born baby for adoption to…

Do you think anyone does that for social media? Or would if it wasn't free?

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#259

Post by mitxela »

somenameforme wrote: post #107
Escapado wrote: post #69

On a personal level I have become more anxious and it has become more difficult to deal with my tendency to procrastinate the more screen time I have and the more I am exposed to social media. I have in essence deleted the vast majority of my social media accounts years ago, but stayed a passive and rather anonymous consumer on Reddit, X and YouTube. A few weeks ago I blocked them too. I would say in totality I read…

There was a time, not that long ago, when cocaine was 100% normalized. It was a regular ingredient used in everything from basic OTC remedies to, most famously Coca Cola which was Cocaine + Kola nut. And Coca Cola itself was based on Vin Mariani, a wine mixed with cocaine that was drunk or endorsed by everybody from Popes to Thomas Edison and Ulysses S Grant. It was also regularly offered for free to laborers by empl…

Methamphetamine too. You could buy it over the counter as, IIRC, a cough medicine?

And we're doing it right now with alcohol.

Re: Doomscrolling ourselves to death

#260

Post by mitxela »

Insanity wrote: post #141
FoundAnotherOne wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I quit all social media! > No for real! Even YouTube! And yet here you are

Might be nit-picking but forum != social media (to me).

I'd say the algorithm makes the difference, and HN has one, based on voting.
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