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The benefits of staying off social media

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Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#211

Post by rootusrootus »

nobody9999 wrote: post #193
halfmatthalfcat wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. Just an anecdote for thought.

>I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. I grew up in NYC and have lived in a variety of places around the US. To a certain extent, your observation about NYC is valid. But only to a point. In NYC, if you're walking down the (very crowded) stre…

> As such, if you ask a lot of folks who are online, you're more likely to get responses like "Why would you want to talk to someone else?" because the folks who actually like interacting with other humans in person are doing that instead.

I think this is hugely important to remember. Many regular people don't spend much time on social media. Of the ones that do, maybe 1 in 100 (or less!) actually ever post anything. It is an extremely biased source of data.

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#213

Post by nobody9999 »

trutannus wrote: post #200
emodendroket wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friendship is a two-way street and you may find you have few friends after all if you insist that they jump through hoops to get a hold of you.

I don't think asking "just text me instead, I don't have Facebook" is really that high of a bar. Frankly, someone who's going to cut contact because they don't want to text me isn't really worth the effort in the first place.

>I don't think asking "just text me instead, I don't have Facebook" is really that high of a bar. Frankly, someone who's going to cut contact because they don't want to text me isn't really worth the effort in the first place.

Exactly. The way I look at it is this:

   I want to be around folks who want to be around 
   me.  And not all of those, either.

   If you can't be bothered to stay in touch, then 
   you obviously don't want to be around me.

   I'm perfectly willing to make the effort.  It's 
   really not that hard.

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#214

Post by rootusrootus »

renewiltord wrote: post #98
ipdashc wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Where people consider talking to someone a chore. This bit in particular really hit me. I've noticed a rising trend around the Internet (or maybe I was just blind to it before), mostly on Reddit, of people who really do seem to consider any sort of real-life social interaction a chore and an attack. I forget the exact context, I think the conversation that stood out to me was about someone in a gas station or somet…

Internet people are usually a lot angrier than real world people. Hard to explain but they always seem a bundle of neuroticism and mental pathologies. HN is no exception. I find that when I participate I also start mimicking this behavior and insulation is required. Fortunately, nothing happened to small talk. I’m a talkative fellow and people still react cheerfully and converse with me. One can only suppose that eve…

> Internet people are usually a lot angrier than real world people.

Out of 100 people who read a comment, 99 of them move on even if they found it provocative. So the 1 that bothered to reply is the angriest of the bunch.

Yeah, I realize that I post too much on HN, but I don't feel that angry. More like a know-it-all motormouth who types fast enough to pollute a pretty big swath of the 'net in a short time. But I do think that the effort to participate online filters for motivated people, and frequently that's going to be some form of anger. "Wait a second, be right there, someone on the Internet is WRONG!" (paraphrased from an ancient comic)

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#215

Post by halfmatthalfcat »

nobody9999 wrote: post #193
halfmatthalfcat wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. Just an anecdote for thought.

>I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. I grew up in NYC and have lived in a variety of places around the US. To a certain extent, your observation about NYC is valid. But only to a point. In NYC, if you're walking down the (very crowded) stre…

Yeah I never met to disparage or imply people who live in or are from NYC aren't anything less than amazing.

I love NYC and New Yorkers, consider myself one. New Yorkers are deeply misunderstood and it's usually taken for rudeness when it's just the nature of living in such a big and bustling city.

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#216

Post by pkdpic »

alehlopeh wrote: post #144
chartpath wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This resonates with me a lot as someone who gave up music and university for programming in my early 20s. And yet, mediocre content abounds in the media. How should that be explained?

I think it’s because content by definition is mediocre, otherwise it would be called art.

Excellent point / mic drop : )

But one thought this thread is provoking is related to this well-intentioned but self-destructive (imho) 20th century cultural narrative that talent as a prerequisite for art creates a tyranny where certain people are allowed to express themselves with dignity while the vast majority are not.

Sometimes I like this narrative, sometimes I hate it. But regardless it undeniably had the effect of leveling the playing field while retaining the same old gilded-age toxic celebrity hierarchy, which simply seems to have had the effect of letting the wealthy and powerful silently dominate cultural / artistic production, which this thread already started to touch on a bit.

Ie, the now fairly ubiquitous experience of walking into an art museum, seeing a blank canvas propped on the floor next to a neon light. Thinking "Anyone could make that so whys this person rich and famous for it?" Shrugging, leaving and not going back to an art museum for another decade.

I enjoy that kind of art in the right context but it clearly has a destructive effect on peoples natural ability to care about art and have a healthy creative practice themselves.

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#217

Post by burkaman »

kreeben wrote: post #114
dijit wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Drugs, if taken properly, are no harm". Correct in theory, but we universally agree that illicit drugs can be damaging to your life. -- even in some cases taking them not seriously enough can cause addiction and serious issues stemming from that. We just need to figure out if Facebook/Twitter/Youtube are paracetamol, codeine, vicodin, cocaine or heroin.

We should also try and figure out why certain, much more damaging drugs than the ones you listed, are permitted while those that you did are not. >> we universally agree that illicit drugs can be damaging to your life We absolutely do not.

Always happy to hear other perspectives, but I genuinely don't think I've ever heard someone say "drugs cannot damage your life in any way". I would be pretty surprised if more than 1% of people believe this.

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#218

Post by streamofdigits »

q1w2 wrote: post #174
streamofdigits wrote: post #129

We are stuck in the twilight zone. I have never seen a serious defense of the dystopic status quo of current tech. I would have loved to. If you read an honest, intelligent argument (that comes from a recognizably human psyche, not a lawyer, or a cynical, amoral capital accumulator) it can "open your eyes". It can convince you that your view is missing an important angle. That can be liberating, exhilarating even as…

Calling it "evil" is too simplistic. I prefer to think of current tech much like genetic diversity on a highly accelerated scale. The evolution of what survives has little intelligent design. What works; works. What starves or causes damage to attract gov't regulation; dies or mutates. What we are seeing is the chaos before an equilibrium is formed. We see the complex interaction of governments, corporations, cryptos…

I actually don't see chaos, or mixing or any real competition between alternative DNA pools. What I see is a very orderly exponential expansion (into a regulatory vacuum) of a viral tech mode that successfully short-circuited many parts of the old "system" to finance its growth and in the process renormalized and redefined what is moral business (or actually any business) in the digital age.

It is possible that countervailing forces will eventually show up. But I am not holding my breath. The new pattern is now entirely systemic. There are some loose ends here and there as people must "adjust their expectations" around e.g., financial and medical privacy, but you'd be surprised what innovative types of smoke and mirrors you can cook up when you are swimming in a fresh multi-billion wave every per quarter.

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#219

Post by trutannus »

nobody9999 wrote: post #213
trutannus wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think asking "just text me instead, I don't have Facebook" is really that high of a bar. Frankly, someone who's going to cut contact because they don't want to text me isn't really worth the effort in the first place.

>I don't think asking "just text me instead, I don't have Facebook" is really that high of a bar. Frankly, someone who's going to cut contact because they don't want to text me isn't really worth the effort in the first place. Exactly. The way I look at it is this: I want to be around folks who want to be around me. And not all of those, either. If you can't be bothered to stay in touch, then you obviously don't want…

> I want to be around folks who want to be around me. And not all of those, either.

This is a great distinction that I think a lot of people would be happier if they followed. Just because someone wants your time does not mean you have to, or even should, provide it to them. Wanting to spend time with you is a basic prerequisite, but is not the only criterion.

Re: The benefits of staying off social media

#220

Post by nobody9999 »

halfmatthalfcat wrote: post #215
nobody9999 wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. I grew up in NYC and have lived in a variety of places around the US. To a certain extent, your observation about NYC is valid. But only to a point. In NYC, if you're walking down the (very crowded) stre…

Yeah I never met to disparage or imply people who live in or are from NYC aren't anything less than amazing. I love NYC and New Yorkers, consider myself one. New Yorkers are deeply misunderstood and it's usually taken for rudeness when it's just the nature of living in such a big and bustling city.

>Yeah I never met to disparage or imply people who live in or are from NYC aren't anything less than amazing.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I certainly didn't feel you were disparaging anyone.

If my comment gave that impression, my apologies.

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