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Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

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Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#41

Post by siegecraft »

prostoalex wrote: post #36
brian-armstrong wrote: post #4

Some people are alcoholics. They can't exist near an open can of beer without their life going to shambles. But most people aren't and don't have the urge to binge drink. I'm not sure how this is any different. The author of this article is an Internetaholic, therefore I should cut my tether to the Internet? And what of my LTE connection?

An alcohol manufacturer rarely has an army of designers, data scientists and engineers working non-stop to make their product more addictive and measuring their success on engagement growth.

Some do

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#43

Post by haswell »

brian-armstrong wrote: post #4

Some people are alcoholics. They can't exist near an open can of beer without their life going to shambles. But most people aren't and don't have the urge to binge drink. I'm not sure how this is any different. The author of this article is an Internetaholic, therefore I should cut my tether to the Internet? And what of my LTE connection?

I think this blog post is entirely too idealistic about the benefits of turning off the Internet, but I don't think comparing excessive Internet use and Alcoholism is appropriate.

Having personally been on the fringe of "high functioning" alcoholism on a few occasions, I don't think the comparison works. Alcoholism is inherently negative. Drinking alcohol in moderation may not be extremely harmful, but is still not necessarily great. While I certainly won't tell anyone how to live their life, cutting out alcohol use is still a "good" thing. Even if it's not a problem for you. Edit: I also still drink periodically because I enjoy it.

Internet use is not inherently negative. "Addiction" to the Internet may not be great, but is not necessarily all bad. The tricky thing about Internet use is that it's generally not something with negative social connotations. So even if someone is "binge consuming", one is not likely to feel negative social pressure because of it.

So I ultimately agree that he shouldn't be touting no Internet as a solution for all people, but I can't get behind the Alcoholism comparison.

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#44

Post by M_Grey »

brian-armstrong wrote: post #4

Some people are alcoholics. They can't exist near an open can of beer without their life going to shambles. But most people aren't and don't have the urge to binge drink. I'm not sure how this is any different. The author of this article is an Internetaholic, therefore I should cut my tether to the Internet? And what of my LTE connection?

I think the problem is that apparently many people default to some level of potential "internetaholicity"; it explains the insane success of something like FB after all. People take time to recognize the various Skinner Boxes and develop the kind of sophistication so many on a site like HN take for granted. MMORPG's, Mobile F2P Skinner Boxes, and messaging programs really are going right to the core of human behavior.

How many of us didn't at least go through a phase of abusive use around the internet, or games, or something like that? When you add that having an FB account and the like is often seen as ultimately normal, it starts to add a lot of pressure for some people. As someone who has always hated something like FB, it's been disturbing to see it sink hooks into so many.

That said, I saw it coming because when I was a teenager I was hooked on mIrc for a while!

SO no... don't cut your tether, you're either naturally immune or like me developed an immune system. You should recognize though, that plenty of people aren't going to have such a successful outcome playing with that particular fire.

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#45

Post by M_Grey »

siegecraft wrote: post #41
prostoalex wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An alcohol manufacturer rarely has an army of designers, data scientists and engineers working non-stop to make their product more addictive and measuring their success on engagement growth.

Some do

I would be utterly shocked if most of the big ones didn't, and I'd be even more shocked if they (along with tobacco companies) had helped to develop techniques now taken for granted in the digital world.

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#46

Post by dplgk »

A less extreme idea embedded in here, that I'd like to try, is writing things down that you'd like research instead of impulsively Googling stuff. I think this wil have at least two benefits. 1. This will prevent you from impulsively interrupting what you're doing (like work or eating dinner) 2. Will filter out things you don't actually care about. When you sit down to go through your research list, you might discover you don't actually care about half of them thus saving you time and effort.

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#47

Post by jghefner »

mastazi wrote: post #40
jghefner wrote: post #38

> I need the Internet for ...workwork... > You probably don’t, and maybe it’s time to look in the mirror and be honest with yourself. That's where I stopped reading as obviously this article is not directed at me. Unless there is a way to troubleshoot and fix remote servers in the middle of the night without internet.

Yes I agree with you and I think, for people with our type of needs, a more sensible approach would be to switch from smart to dumb phone, in fact I have been thinking about that for a while now.

That would probably be a better way to improve productivity since I rarely use my phone for phone calls but it is still always by my side.

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#48

Post by osdiab »

thr0waway1239 wrote: post #35
vcool07 wrote: post #12

I don't think this is the correct solution. It's like chopping off your nose to avoid cold. Rather, try more self restraint or self control. - Install a nanny software to block time-sink sites at specific time (chrome nanny was an awesome tool) - Schedule appointments in advance with your friends/relatives to keep the relationships active - Enroll in social events to be around with people and work for a cause you car…

A famous author once made the following observation - When faced with the option of either doing more exercise or less eating for losing weight, take the option which requires you to a) spend less time and b) not add anything new to your life (i.e. the cognitive overhead). Apparently, people who tried to eat less were also more successful in losing weight. Cutting off home internet is the option of less eating. Seems…

To be fair, the amount of exercise you need to overcome even small amounts of excessive eating can be disproportionately difficult and time consuming—but while the example may have some logistic holes, I still generally agree with your idea :)

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#49

Post by osdiab »

daylightyotei wrote: post #5

I did something similar when I was in college to fix my bad grades - I didn't have a laptop or a computer at home, and didn't own a smartphone. I did all my school related work at labs in college, and this made me much more productive at home - instead of mindlessly surfing the internet, I actually did the school work. As a result, my grades shot up to summa cum laude levels and there is a distinct step function betw…

If your girlfriend is at all receptive to it, maybe you can try to move things in that direction—sounds like you appreciated a bunch of aspects of that lifestyle!

Re: Removing Home Internet Is the Most Productive Thing I've Done

#50

Post by reacharavindh »

I think I should do something similar to my addiction to HN. I find myself glancing HN feed several times in the day with insatiable need to know the shiny new things. I'm going to try to restrict myself to one time a day visit to HN. Lets see if that can get my lazy ass to finally make more contributions in GitHub and do something more productive.
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