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

The AirPods Effect

theescapenewsletter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

631–640 of 824 posts

Re: The AirPods Effect

#631

Post by Zambyte »

Enginerrrd wrote: post #473
stasomatic wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is using headphones on a bike with music on or not somehow different from driving in a Lexus with music on or not?

Yeah, it’s definitely higher risk. When riding a motorcycle, you’ll encounter people that don’t see you almost every trip. The same is not true in a car. Riding a bike is just a 100% engagement thing with higher risks and lower margins for error, for all kinds of reasons. And it’s not just traffic, minor pavement imperfections become relevant, the necessary skill floor is also higher. It just demands more attention,…

Driving a car is a higher net risk than riding a motorcycle. The problem is that drivers externalize much more of the risk. People die riding motorcycles all the time - way more than people driving cars. But you know what people driving cars do? Blow holes into buildings. Smash cars. Kill pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists, and other drivers.

A motorcycle demands your attention because the risk is mostly on the rider. Drivers are pacified by how externalized their very existent risk is.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#632

Post by pclmulqdq »

eur0pa wrote: post #546
oceanplexian wrote: post #539

Yeah, great article. But it should get to the point. The reason you need to physically remove yourself is because of the insane lunatics that blast trash music and do a dance while aggressively panhandling or screaming at you for trying to commute quitely on the train to work. A hallmark of daily life when I worked in SF and in NYC. A great way to fix the fake problem would be to aggressively enforce the existing law…

Oh lord not the laws and especially not the tickets

This is why they cane people in Singapore for nuisance crime. Incarceration is expensive and fines don’t have the right effect.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#633

Post by antisthenes »

goodmythical wrote: post #374
cassepipe wrote: post #348

To be fair when you live in a big city and you have to take the subway all the time, it just feels physically nice to remove the background noise whether it's the noise of the train itself or the musicians or the people asking loudly for money. I don't even have airpods, I have good old earplugs because I often too lazy to choose the soundtrack of my own life. It's not that don't want to talk to unknown people, it's…

That's kind of the point the article is making though, isn't it? You're making a choice to insulate yourself from your surroundings. That choice has effects on both you and your environment. You see it as a simple salve, but the poor souls you're choosing to ignore see it as a just another bourgeoisie wall. I used to live in a prison. Headphones were a huge fighting issue. People who couldn't afford them would borrow…

> I can sleep, eat, shower, and meditate just as well in the middle of a deadly riot

Good for you. I can't. Some people need quiet conditions to focus or sleep and if they don't it feels like active torture.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#634

Post by bscphil »

goodmythical wrote: post #626
bscphil wrote: post #554

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surely the solution to this social problem, however, can't be "everyone should simply convert to my religion / achieve a higher state of mind where they're not bothered by any form of inconvenience, irritation, or interruption." If it comes to that, most people will continue to wear their AirPods. It's a non-answer.

I think you'll find that I never made any such claim. I only ever spoke of my own experience with the topic at hand. I've done so in good faith that others may find it a useful comparison to the original technique suggested.

Well, I suppose that's true strictly speaking. What I'm reacting to is your claim that this is a simple "choice" that everyone else is making:

> Embracing or shunning the society you live in is a choice.

When the reality is that it's more complicated. You're able to make this "choice" because you've spent years cultivating a quasi-religious attitude of equanimity toward things that are, from the perspective of most, annoying, troubling, or frightening. So what you're asking of most people is more than a choice (taking their AirPods out), it's more a matter of converting to a different way of life entirely.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#635

Post by nonethewiser »

cglan wrote: post #549
oceanplexian wrote: post #539

Yeah, great article. But it should get to the point. The reason you need to physically remove yourself is because of the insane lunatics that blast trash music and do a dance while aggressively panhandling or screaming at you for trying to commute quitely on the train to work. A hallmark of daily life when I worked in SF and in NYC. A great way to fix the fake problem would be to aggressively enforce the existing law…

Coming back to the states after traveling abroad is always astonishing. For all our wealth, it genuinely feels worse than somewhere like Brazil in many of our big cities

It has nothing to do with wealth. It’s just policy.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#636

Post by nonethewiser »

oceanplexian wrote: post #539

Yeah, great article. But it should get to the point. The reason you need to physically remove yourself is because of the insane lunatics that blast trash music and do a dance while aggressively panhandling or screaming at you for trying to commute quitely on the train to work. A hallmark of daily life when I worked in SF and in NYC. A great way to fix the fake problem would be to aggressively enforce the existing law…

It’s a mixture of naivety and foreign influence campaigns.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#637

Post by 9dev »

multjoy wrote: post #548
9dev wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Noise cancellation headphones that will block out loud things or ambulances approaching you, sitting exposed on a motor strapped to two wheels at a high speed? Yes. That is different from driving in a Lexus.

The ambulance with the bright flashing lights? ANC doesn't dim your eyes. This is absolute nonsense.

Sure, if you keep the eyes in the back of your head peeled, you’ll be fine

Re: The AirPods Effect

#638

Post by nonethewiser »

tverbeure wrote: post #585
oceanplexian wrote: post #539

Yeah, great article. But it should get to the point. The reason you need to physically remove yourself is because of the insane lunatics that blast trash music and do a dance while aggressively panhandling or screaming at you for trying to commute quitely on the train to work. A hallmark of daily life when I worked in SF and in NYC. A great way to fix the fake problem would be to aggressively enforce the existing law…

> if that doesn't work, incarceration. Sure, let’s “solve” a minor problem in the grand scheme of things with a much larger evil.

Wont someone please think of the unstable homeless person threatening people on the street.

Incarceration is more humane for everyone than letting sick people live on the street.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#639

Post by plutokras »

andrepd wrote: post #561
oceanplexian wrote: post #539

Yeah, great article. But it should get to the point. The reason you need to physically remove yourself is because of the insane lunatics that blast trash music and do a dance while aggressively panhandling or screaming at you for trying to commute quitely on the train to work. A hallmark of daily life when I worked in SF and in NYC. A great way to fix the fake problem would be to aggressively enforce the existing law…

Eh I don't think so. Commutes are as clean and peaceful as they can be in the Netherlands or Switzerland and people are no less buried in their phones with noise-cancelling earbuds on.

Can confirm. Traveling via public transport in Switzerland is remarkably uneventful. It's a stark contrast to my Eastern European home country, where it is a gamble due to a certain demographic's anti-social behavior.

Re: The AirPods Effect

#640

Post by nonethewiser »

kranke155 wrote: post #589
oceanplexian wrote: post #539

Yeah, great article. But it should get to the point. The reason you need to physically remove yourself is because of the insane lunatics that blast trash music and do a dance while aggressively panhandling or screaming at you for trying to commute quitely on the train to work. A hallmark of daily life when I worked in SF and in NYC. A great way to fix the fake problem would be to aggressively enforce the existing law…

Incarceration would be nuts.

For what exactly? And unstable homeless person threatening people on the street?

Harassing people and living on the street is already crime. Camping in public, public nuisance, loitering, obstructing sidewalk, etc.

Post reply on HN