Live data from Hacker News

Dumber phone

nomasters.io

111–120 of 347 posts

Re: Dumber phone

#111
post #44

For me it's the browser. What I did yesterday on Firefox for Android: - installed uBlock Origin (also First Party Isolation and HTTPS Everywhere), - disabled JavaScript via about:config javascript.enabled, - and added .css| rule to uBlock Origin (I would still like to disable CSS entirely, this only half works). Basically I would like to have "links2 -g" [0] for Android. There is also an extension for Firefox to auto…

Have you already seen this?

https://surf.suckless.org/

It's webkit, not firefox-based, but works great with tiling windowmanagers.

Re: Dumber phone

#112
post #27

Personally, I find my smartphone addiction gets worse when I turn off all notifications. Because then FOMO takes over and I spend tons of time digging into apps to make sure I didn't "miss anything". For me, it works much better to intentionally choose the notifications I get to be the things I really want to be interrupted by. I wish there were an AI or human secretary who could make those judgements on a per-notifi…

My problem is being bothered to check notifications over the course of hours when I'm programming. Snapchat, twitter, text message, facebook message. All while I'm trying to figure out why my middle-wear isnt working. I catch myself shitposting on instagram instead of running my app.

Try Pomodoro time management approach

Re: Dumber phone

#113
post #80
post #65

I don't own a smartphone, simply because it's not convenient. I've had one from my previous job, it was Iphone 4 IIRC. It was bulky, I had to charge it every day, and when I enabled maps or a browser it got hot quickly. Now I'm using Nokia 106. It lasts 2 weeks on one charge (1 week if I'm listening to radio/podcasts a lot), it's much smaller than iphone, never gets hot, and I'm not afraid to drop it. I dropped it se…

I am glad this works for you, but for example the only function I could use on a dumbphone is alarm. I never call anybody and I send SMS messages only when the network coverage is too poor so it falls back. I use GPS all the time for public transport, I doubt a standalone GPS does that. What about photos, tablets can have decent cameras but phones are usually 2-3 generations ahead.

Smart wake-up alarms that detect when you're entering light sleep in the morning are the only way to be happy.

I used to have a Jawbone bracelet that did that by slowly increasing vibration. It was even better. But the setup I have today with my phone under the pillow works.

Re: Dumber phone

#114
I think the behavior of people who write computer music using realtime DSP environments is oddly similar. Yet it's instructive because I don't think electronic composers are in any way "addicted" to their environments.

> You keep using your phone after it’s no longer needed to solve a problem.

There is a large amount of electro-acoustic musical output where the purpose was obviously to employ a particular piece of technology or software, rather than the technology/software being a means to realize some musical concept.

> You spend more and more of your time on your phone to get the same effects

The amount of time feel giddy by getting basic sounds out of the computer is rather small.

The amount of time to get something that sounds "professional" is months if not years.

The amount of time to get a timbre as compelling as an electric guitar is so great that you'd probably have to become a full-time filter designer and stop composing.

> You feel strange when you don’t have your phone.

> You can’t stop yourself from using your phone, even if you don’t want to.

I heard about a composer who pushed to get an electronic piece on a concert that was otherwise acoustic. (This composer had written acoustic pieces.) The organizer gave in and made an exception for this composer, who ended up eating the tech people's time trying to set up the AV equipment and scrapped the piece at the last minute because he couldn't get his laptop to work.

> You have a hard time giving yourself limits. You might say you’ll only use “so much” but then can’t stop and end up using twice that amount. Or you use it more often than you meant to.

I once heard a composer say that the average CPU load of their piece looked to small, so they added "stuff" to the piece to get a more impressive-looking workload.

> You’ve begun having trouble doing normal daily things without your phone.

I remember having a conversation with a composer who got up, ran to get his laptop because he wanted to write a convolution kernel.

> You drive or do other dangerous things (like use heavy machines) while you are on your phone.

Luckily for society this one doesn't apply.

> You borrow money to pay for your phone.

Or for a fancy Mac plus hundreds or thousands worth of proprietary software.

> You hide some phone use or the effect it is having on you from others.

Well, that one doesn't even really apply to phones.

The overall point is that maybe people initially do stuff like this because they're insecure and don't want to miss out.

Re: Dumber phone

#115
post #8

Another more extreme step I've heard others take is to put their device in one of those locking cookie jars: https://www.thekitchensafe.com

I like this, but I don't $50 like this.

Re: Dumber phone

#116
post #64
post #44

For me it's the browser. What I did yesterday on Firefox for Android: - installed uBlock Origin (also First Party Isolation and HTTPS Everywhere), - disabled JavaScript via about:config javascript.enabled, - and added .css| rule to uBlock Origin (I would still like to disable CSS entirely, this only half works). Basically I would like to have "links2 -g" [0] for Android. There is also an extension for Firefox to auto…

I think you can have links on Android using something like Termux [ https://termux.com ] (but you probably won't enjoy it that much on a small screen with a touch keyboard).

elinks actually kind of supports touch input in Termux. I tend to use it when I'm in a spot with very bad data coverage and need to check something. It's surprisingly usable.

Re: Dumber phone

#117
I changed my phone's language to Japanese (which I don't speak very well).

Instead of mindless tapping buttons, now I have to think about every action I take. It makes using my phone tiring, so I don't use it very often.

Re: Dumber phone

#118
post #21

I adhere to a lot of these rules myself and have recently noticed peers doing the same. Another I'd add that really makes the phone boring is putting it in grayscale mode. On iOS: Settings > General > Accessibility > Display Accommodations > Color Filters > Grayscale. Then you can set the Accessibility Shortcut to Color Filters, and when you triple click the home button your phone goes grayscale. I don't have it on 2…

I set my Android device to grayscale for a while. I liked it but for the video player and one photo app I would like to have colors. Does anyone know how to do this? I have tried to do something with Tasker but couldn't figure it out.

I figured it out after a few minutes poking around.

You'll need some way to set "secure" settings – if you're not rooted, the easiest way is via a Tasker plugin called AutoTools. Once you've set that up, create a task with an action of "AutoTools Secure Settings", then configure it as follows (under "Custom Setting" in the AutoTools menu):

    - setting type: secure
    - name: accessibility_display_daltonizer_enabled
    - input type: toggle
    - value: 3
That task then toggles greyscale mode, so you can hook it up to an application context or whatever. (Switch the value to 1 if you want a task that always enables greyscale, or 2 to always disable.)

If it doesn't work, diff the output of `adb shell settings list secure` from a PC with greyscale mode enabled and disabled, and use whatever name you get there.

Re: Dumber phone

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not for me. However I seem to differ from may orhers who agree with you that I am not curious enough to miss the kitten posted next door nor the fancy meal plate of random strangers, intermingled by advertisment or is it already the other way round? Without these notifications I stay more focused and get less stressed.

Same here. I don't need a notification for every single "like" I get on Twitter/Instagram. In fact, it's similarly rewarding when I come back to the app and see a bunch of notifications waiting, knowing that they didn't distract me.

even in terms of sheer dopamine, i find it rewarding to see a bunch of new notifications at once. to me push notifications feel more like an annoyance than a dopamine hit. i keep them turned on for sms because it's useful as a way to contact me immediately, but they're off for everything else, including email. (i never turned them on for twitter or facebook because i discovered back in the 90s that i was happier turning them off for email)

Re: Dumber phone

#120
post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I lived in the time when slot machines were standing on the street in the open in Russia, and yes, mentally infirm people were wasting themselves on them. Normal people not. Plenty of "normal people," even intelligent ones, are addicted to smartphones (though the degree of addiction varies). Smartphone slot machines are subtle enough to snare people would wouldn't be taken in by a traditional slot machine, even tho…

>you're labeling a ridiculously large fraction of the population as "mentally infirm." Well, to me it feels that people from parts of the world where one has no state institutes to fend them, tend to have more acute sense for somebody trying to abuse, fraud or attempt to extract money from them. Other than "pocket slot machines," people living there have to care about many more malignities: black mackler trying to st…

> To a very average proletarian parent in Russia or China, and likely in much of the world outside of nanny state countries, it is glaringly obvious that Goog runs an equivalent of a slot machine business. And they take a 100% right conscious decision to block apps and google pay on their children smartphones.

[citation needed]

I'm extremely skeptical that any population as a preternatural ability to detect novel forms of scams and exploitation. The smartphone slot machines are novel in that they steal your attention, which people were not primed to be as sensitive to as attempts to steal money.

While I'm not very familiar with Russia, I have a little more familiarity with China, and I don't detect anything there that makes me think that the Chinese are more resistant to smartphone addiction. If anything makes them different, it's the preexisting cultural emphasis that children should be studying or cramming for high-stakes tests pretty much all the time to the exclusion of pretty much everything else. That has nothing to do with a "more acute sense for somebody trying to abuse, fraud or attempt to extract money from them."

Post reply on HN