Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Disconnect. Offline only

chris.bolin.co

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 207 posts

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#191

Post by ah0h »

thinbeige wrote: post #118

Super nice idea. I remember when I was very young and the Internet was also young, maybe just two, three years, I experienced something strange. In this time we still used US-Robotics 56k modems to connect to the Internet. When I was offline my computer felt dead. Worthless. Useless. Only when I was online my computer felt right and I felt good. You have to imagine that I loved my self-built PCs even before the Inter…

I remember talking to somebody about this ages ago. I said exactly the same thing, a computer that is offline is of no use to me. Like a big expensive paperweight. That was also back in dial-up times with a 64k connection... (We had ISDN back then and i felt like a king when i discovered you could use both of our Channel Sand double the download speed! I was also pretty young back then...)

The thing is, we didn't even have internet access at home that long at that point. The transformation of my computer from a box of wonder without any connection, which i could spend hours in front of, to a mere gateway to the net, which seemed useless without connection, was very rapid and basically hasn't reverted to this day.

Needless to say i'm a pretty heavy internet user and smartphones with mobile connectivity have definitly taken that to another level. And i can't say that my attention span has benfited from that... These days I try to use the web less and get back to offline activities like reading books again.

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#192

Post by arc_of_descent »

icc97 wrote: post #179
etplayer wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Although I would prefer to be very strongly critical of the corporate model of the distributed operating system, (and particularly I'd like to relate it to Marx's concept of alienation, commodity fetishism and the tighter control of the 'free market of ideas' which turns out to be a 'free market' dominated by monopoly of Google in particular as they freqently turn out to be), I'm not sure what else I would do with a…

I found Zeal to be of some use as you can download a ton of documentation for offline use.

Nice!

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#193

Post by theHazardMan »

xtracto wrote: post #168
mck- wrote: post #85

Beauty. Almost a piece of art. I was on a plane yesterday (literally on airplane mode) and I finished a book I've been working on for a month, and prepped/wrote half of a presentation. Quite often I produce much of my writing on a plane. I find myself very productive on a plane. Especially on cheap flights that don't have in-flight entertainment. Literally no distractions for a preset amount of time. You're not only…

I always think of that... unfortunately I get nervous while flying and cannot just concentrate in anything. I usually only try to sleep, although I would love to be able to use that time to catch up on my reading and also some writing.

This is me. Coding, coding, coding, whup there's some turbulence, we're all gonna die, ok it's fine, spend 15 minutes calming down, coding...

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#194

Post by aninhumer »

avz wrote: post #55
beat wrote: post #41

For those interested in managing online time and getting ourselves offline regularly, the book Deep Work , by Cal Newport, has some very useful ideas. One that I plan to start experimenting with is the idea of scheduled internet access - allow yourself to get online only at certain times of day. This isn't just for work. Even if you're, say, standing in line at the grocery store, you don't get to pull your phone out…

> As the author points out, we've forgotten how to be bored. We need to learn to engage that part of our brain again. This sounds like a contradiction. Isn't boredom precisely the state that results when one fails to engage their brain?

I feel like this is a common semantic disagreement.

Some people want to encourage disconnecting yourself from external stimulus, and just enjoying your own thoughts, and use the word "boredom" to describe this. Whereas other people feel that "boredom" means the frustrating state of being entirely unengaged.

I sometimes wonder if people who don't disconnect very often haven't experienced much of the latter kind of boredom, and so aren't as aware of it as a negative thing.

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#195

Post by arc_of_descent »

brianwawok wrote: post #38
paperpunk wrote: post #34

I got stuck into a bad habit of browsing the internet idly anytime when I'm at home and then having to rush to get to work so I've created rules on my router to disable web access in the mornings before work and late at night before bed. It is quite effective and I suddenly do other things but I do worry that it's a psychological crutch which is just going to make self-control even harder in the long term.

If you are an alcoholic, would not having 24 beers in your fridge lower your willpower? I think it is the reverse, just like this. Not in house = fight won, so you have more willpower left for when you DO need to fight a fight (say, friend offers a beer after work). Self control takes willpower. Willpower is a finite resource (you can find studies on it. This is why after a hard day of work you are more likely to say…

I realise that I might be off an a tangent but this is a not a good analogy. If I were an alcoholic, I would rush off to the nearest drug store and get a fuckin' beer. I would not even own a fridge. :)

A book that has personally helped me is Kick the Drink....Easily! The idea is that there is no such thing as will power. The more you fight it, the more the psychological crutches grow, and then its difficult to jump off.

What the upper thread mentions is very true for porn addicts. They do this all the time. Program the router to shut off at certain times. Does it work? I doubt it.

Distraction is a very real thing. Hell, distraction is recommended as an aid for anxiety disorder :)

Get distracted, be human. Get back to work.

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#196

Post by etplayer »

s_kilk wrote: post #180
nicklaf wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Richard Stallman was largely motivated to start project GNU because he took issue with the appropriation of source code by corporations and other proprietors, which he saw as replacing the communal way of writing and consuming software at the MIT A.I. lab. My feeling is that we are seeing today a similar appropriation, not of source code (most people who use computers at this point now see them as appliances, and wou…

> John McCarthy admitted this much when he conceded that most Americans are TV watchers anyway and won't need a home information terminal to do research, and Neil Postman wrote about the negative effects of television in his 1984 book, "Amusing Ourselves to Death". Zooming out just a little, Guy Debord's "Society Of The Spectacle" talks about this same stuff on a higher level.

It's important to note though that he wasn't only talking about TV and mass media, as people frequently attempted to interpret hials book.

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#197

Post by volkk »

rocho wrote: post #184
baxtr wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree 100%. Problem is though that many airline are starting to offer WiFi connectivity. I just hope that they've built shitty systems that won't work most of the time... :)

So? If you want to be offline you go offline. It's not like someone is forcing you to use WiFi... This seems more like a self-control problem.

I thought that a lack of self control was initially the point of the parent post hence the whole "being forced to be productive since there's nothing else to do' spiel

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#199

Post by beat »

squeaky-clean wrote: post #155
thinbeige wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what I subtly questioned: How do you want to know if it's real word of mouth or growth hacking?

I've bought lots of books through HN recommendations, more often than not they're great. I do always check a bit of the poster's submission/comment history though, because people definitely do try to pitch their eBook or SaaS here.

I bought Deep Work off a HN recommendation, that included a whole bunch of follow-on comments about how great it was.

And it was well worth it.

Re: Disconnect. Offline only

#200

Post by brianwawok »

arc_of_descent wrote: post #195
brianwawok wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are an alcoholic, would not having 24 beers in your fridge lower your willpower? I think it is the reverse, just like this. Not in house = fight won, so you have more willpower left for when you DO need to fight a fight (say, friend offers a beer after work). Self control takes willpower. Willpower is a finite resource (you can find studies on it. This is why after a hard day of work you are more likely to say…

I realise that I might be off an a tangent but this is a not a good analogy. If I were an alcoholic, I would rush off to the nearest drug store and get a fuckin' beer. I would not even own a fridge. :) A book that has personally helped me is Kick the Drink....Easily! The idea is that there is no such thing as will power. The more you fight it, the more the psychological crutches grow, and then its difficult to jump o…

I respectfully disagree.

My vice is cookies. Cookies in house, I eat entire bag. Do not buy, I do not rush out to the grocery store at 11pm to buy. The high is low enough that the extra work is not worth it. So by setting that barrier high enough, it stops me from eating cookies, and I lose weight.

Post reply on HN