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

Dumber phone

nomasters.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–347 of 347 posts

Re: Dumber phone

#341

Post by laurieg »

usaphp wrote: post #53
laurieg wrote: post #49

I really recommend unplugging for a few days. It helps you notice how you are interacting with technology. I spent 4 days on a tiny island (population 11) a few years ago. I was there with one friend and we decided that there would be no screens and no watches/clocks for the whole time. You very quickly adjust to not having it. Easily within a day. We ate when we got up, and then again later on. We went to sleep soon…

> You very quickly adjust to not having it. Easily within a day. We ate when we got up, and then again later on. We went to sleep soon after it got dark. Not sure why do you need adjusting to eat when you wake up and sleep after dark, and how technology prevents you from doing that in your usual life?

I think most people live life based on a schedule, to a greater or lesser degree. The schedule is informed by clock time. I get up at this time, I eat lunch at that time and so on.

When I was on the island I felt like I was much more in tune with my internal needs. I was trying to paint a picture of the experience with my comment, rather than give a prescriptive handbook of what to do.

Re: Dumber phone

#342

Post by hawski »

konraditurbe wrote: post #293
hawski wrote: 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 also use Firefox but did not know about the Automatic reader mode, thanks! I used Dark background with White text extension which loads images. I can't get Automatic reader mode to work on Firefox Beta from Play Store, any ideas? I turned on all pages in the extension settings. BTW Termux has w3m and Links2 on the repo.

On the extension's page there is a mention about missing API in Firefox. I don't know when it will be added.

Links may be in Termux, but it's not the graphical one. But I will check it out.

Re: Dumber phone

#343

Post by MacroChip »

I've been solving a related problem: help you use websites for what you want and nothing more. How many times have you gotten on Facebook to send a message and stayed there for too long? It won't happen again. Currently works on Gmail, Facebook, and YouTube. I'll be testing it on Firefox mobile this weekend. https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tunnel-focus/hbekj...

Re: Dumber phone

#344

Post by SirYandi »

jonahhorowitz wrote: post #255
adhambadr wrote: post #122

Checkout our phone www.blloc.com . I think its exactly what we thought of, dumbing down the smartphone to the bare essentials without missing out too much. we don't have it perfectly communicated (working on it), but we're trying to find the middle between a "smartphone" and full blown detox. We got inspired from some of our friends who went "dark" and didn't work out; we were as product designers sick of snapchat, g…

The problem is I would never use Uber, but I use Lyft all the time. Other people probably have other limitiations and that's why a generic smartphone works better for the general use case.

They're just android apps so I doubt you'll have any issue adding your own apps when this thing gets through to release

Re: Dumber phone

#345

Post by russdpale »

raz32dust wrote: post #258

I disable most notifications, and even the ones that are turned on are silent ones. I keep the phone aside on the table almost all the time, and consider myself a relatively mild user of the smartphone. Where I really miss the phone and feel handicapped without it is when I have to quickly look something up on google/dictionary. e.g, if I have a quick random question about why something is the way it is, what causes…

try this: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=co.siempo.phon...

Re: Dumber phone

#346

Post by mcovey »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #326
mcovey wrote: post #321

I own a smartphone, but I use it like I'd use a tablet - wifi only, at home. My primary phone, the only one I take with me to work most of the time, is just a pay-as-you-go flip phone. In fact, I didn't downgrade to this from a smartphone. I've never had a smartphone with phone service, that I carry around with me or use. Maybe I don't know what I'm missing. Maybe I don't want to know. The only real thing I wish I ha…

Seems like a 7" tablet would be a better use case if you don't need pocketability.

I like being able to use it in bed with one hand, and occasionally to have pocketability, to bring it to things where I'll have to do a lot of waiting, like doctor appointments or being a passenger on a long ride.

I looked into small tablets a while ago and found that the selection was pretty limited and none of the few that looked reasonable could easily run LineageOS.

But a phone with no SIM card or plan is basically just a really small tablet anyway.

Re: Dumber phone

#347

Post by white-flame »

watwut wrote: post #301
white-flame wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are these some sorts of business communities where you're actually working for a tangible reward to further your career? Even if they are, this sounds really crazy and wrapped around an axle to me, if this is your steady state level of interaction, especially if this is multiple communities you're talking about. If you're bootstrapping yourself as part of a marketing or sales push, you can dedicate a time slot to wor…

This assumes that only things worth any value in life are those with "tangible reward to further your career". I dont really agree.

No, I'm simply saying that if they're killing themselves by maintaining such a high-stress & rigorous involvement, they should at least be getting something out of it and should ensure that that extreme level is short term, because it's not healthy.

If they're doing it only because they kind of fell into it as baseline socialization shifted, they need to step back and reconsider things because it's not healthy.

Post reply on HN