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

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#11

Post by DoItToMe81 » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:04 AM UTC

shankarro wrote: post #6

cosmotic wrote: post #4

What does the author think people are doing on the internet? At least some are reading.

Some are reading with great comprehension rates, most are skimming through content, and up to the..next piece.

For me, it was my school's enforced reading and book reports that taught me to skim and just pick up enough info to write a report, and the internet was ultimately what restored my capability to read and attention span, as I could find things that genuinely interested me.

Obviously, the internet has changed a lot since I was a kid, but I'm not entirely sure that there's just nobody being exposed to larger amounts of text and that few people online have interests greater than TikTok.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#12

Post by resonious » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:06 AM UTC

shankarro wrote: post #6

cosmotic wrote: post #4

What does the author think people are doing on the internet? At least some are reading.

Some are reading with great comprehension rates, most are skimming through content, and up to the..next piece.

I think this is pretty natural given we live in an information-abundant world now. Taking the time to read everything you could get your hands on makes a lot of sense when you don't have constant access to everything.

For me, there are some writings that are really great and some that are a drag. I typically skim to figure out if something is really great. If it looks good after a skim, I'll dig deep. I suspect many others are the same, though there probably are some junkies who never dig deep.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#13

Post by klyrs » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:06 AM UTC

cosmotic wrote: post #4

What does the author think people are doing on the internet? At least some are reading.

Yeah... but if I want to actually read a book, I need to put my phone in another room. It's honestly embarrassing.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#14

Post by gromitss » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:12 AM UTC

Natsu wrote: post #3

I mean, yes, I mostly read things online nowadays, but... I'm still reading, it's just on the computer now.

It’s probably shorter material and from many disparate subjects in a short time?

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#15

Post by chickenpotpie » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:17 AM UTC

chadlavi wrote: post #10

Internet is the new boogeyman. TV used to be it. Radio was it one time. Hell, _novels_ were treated this way. The one thing they all have in common is being new behavior patterns that people can worry and kvetch about.

I agree with you somewhat, but there's something unique about the internet I think is dangerous: there's no clear boundaries of when to stop. Radio stations would stop broadcasting, you reach the end of a book, and tv shows end. But, the internet just keeps going. You can just keep scrolling and clicking through website after website until you die, with very little prompt that it's time to stop.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#16

Post by EamonnMR » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:17 AM UTC

I strongly suspect that video as a medium (especially video social media, but also including TV) has been eating literacy (including text forums) for a while and will continue until we can program our video social media apps by talking and gesturing.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#17

Post by dougmwne » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:18 AM UTC

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.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#18

Post by russellbeattie » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:18 AM UTC

I have definitely replaced my book reading with the web. But I did that at least a decade ago. I still "read" a lot of books and novels, I'm just listening to the audio version now. Not as good for recall, I will readily admit, but on the other hand it does let you re-listen again with almost equal enjoyment. I've replaced all television watching - except for live sports and news - with YouTube. All movies are now watched at home.

Information consumption habits change as the media does. "Reader's Digest", among other magazines, used to be required reading for any well-read person and now it basically doesn't exist.

I assume this trend will continue apace.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#19

Post by ZephyrBlu » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:19 AM UTC

shankarro wrote: post #6

cosmotic wrote: post #4

What does the author think people are doing on the internet? At least some are reading.

Some are reading with great comprehension rates, most are skimming through content, and up to the..next piece.

How is this different from reading books? Most people are likely not "reading with great comprehension rates" when they read a book either.

Re: Internet addiction and the habit of book reading

#20

Post by TedDoesntTalk » Sat, Dec 18, 2021, 5:28 AM UTC

ZephyrBlu wrote: post #19

shankarro wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some are reading with great comprehension rates, most are skimming through content, and up to the..next piece.

How is this different from reading books? Most people are likely not "reading with great comprehension rates" when they read a book either.

If you read fiction books that way, you're not going to enjoy the book very much. In fact, you likely won't finish it.