I appreciate your consistently thoughtful and interesting articles, rodrigo. Thanks for taking the time to write them and share them with us. I do this thing, usually before bed, where I just sort...
I appreciate your consistently thoughtful and interesting articles, rodrigo. Thanks for taking the time to write them and share them with us.
I do this thing, usually before bed, where I just sort of cycle through opening different apps on my phone for no reason. Like, Email > Three Cheers > Alarm > Fitness > Email again > etc.
It’s not that I’m looking for anything in particular, and each app is usually only open for seconds, if that. It really does feel like some sort of compulsion.
I’ve also noticed it’s worse when I’m stressed. The benign explanation I give myself is that it’s basically just a digital fidget, in the same way I might play with the wire on my headphones or click a pen while at my desk.
There’s another part of me that thinks it’s a holdover from when I was active on social media, and I couldn’t get myself out of checking the same apps over and over again. You know, closing reddit only to reopen reddit? The scary part is that, if this is true, the compulsion has persisted across YEARS. I haven’t used social media outside of Tildes in a LONG time.
Been there too, sometimes I notice this behavior with email and RSS feeds apps. Two things is helping me to avoid screens before bed: Move selected articles that I want to read to Kindle. No...
Been there too, sometimes I notice this behavior with email and RSS feeds apps.
Two things is helping me to avoid screens before bed:
Move selected articles that I want to read to Kindle. No distractions, no “screen” (I mean, there's no light). I shared my method here.
Yesterday, my partner and me started an attempt to cut screen time at night. At 20 PM, we left our phones in a table far from the living room and the bedroom. The goal is to not reach to them until next morning. The first night was easy. Now we need to repeat forever.
I've increasingly had this thought too. It's just so difficult when I work from home and rely on notifications from my phone. I haven't quite figured that part out yet. I have noticed sometimes...
I've increasingly had this thought too. It's just so difficult when I work from home and rely on notifications from my phone. I haven't quite figured that part out yet.
I have noticed sometimes I'll just get sucked in. I'll check for something small like text notifications and end up looking at YouTube or Reddit.
I recently installed this app called Screen Time. It adds a permanent notification so how much time I've used my phone is always visible.
I used to have this issue as well. What helped me: uninstall all social media (plus YouTube) apps from phone, and keep them logged out on the computer. When I want to browse YouTube or other...
I used to have this issue as well. What helped me: uninstall all social media (plus YouTube) apps from phone, and keep them logged out on the computer.
When I want to browse YouTube or other dumpster fire, I mean, social media platform, I open a different profile (properly named “Dumpster”) to do so.
(Also, if you're familiar with Docker, lurker is a godsend for browsing Reddit.)
I've had the thought recently I really shouldn't modify these websites to be more compatible with what I find acceptable. It feels like it's solving the wrong problem and I end up making it more...
I've had the thought recently I really shouldn't modify these websites to be more compatible with what I find acceptable. It feels like it's solving the wrong problem and I end up making it more addicting for myself. I've done it with pretty much with everything since I've been using the Internet. I use Revanced for YouTube, extensions for Twitter or Reddit.
The other thing I've noticed is I will replace one website for another. I had a pretty bad habit of checking Twitter when I was even slightly bored. I blocked it on my devices and end up just watching more YouTube instead. I feel like soon I'm going to be more serious about getting a grip on it. When I use my phone & computer for 10hrs+ a day, it really drains me.
Edit: I wanted to include - it seems like the solution is moderation, not entirely removing it. I really do find value in YouTube for learning about topics I never would've known about.
I believe in this, too. And I also believe that modifying the tools is helpful, since their official front-ends are a minefield to capture our attention. YouTube is one of the worse offenders. Not...
it seems like the solution is moderation, not entirely removing it. I really do find value in YouTube for learning about topics I never would've known about.
I believe in this, too. And I also believe that modifying the tools is helpful, since their official front-ends are a minefield to capture our attention.
YouTube is one of the worse offenders. Not only I access it in a different browser profile (on the main one, it's logged out), but I also avoid watching videos using the official website or apps. Instead, I download the ones I'm interested in, most of them I know about via RSS feeds that I follow, and watch them on the TV, via Jellyfin, installed in a small home server, streamed via a simple Roku Express. No comments, no related videos, no autoplay. It's overall way better.
Pretty much blogs and publications you enjoy. I tend to follow indie blogs, which are specially good to be followed via RSS (as in: don't post too many). In that regard, btw, I don't recommend...
Pretty much blogs and publications you enjoy. I tend to follow indie blogs, which are specially good to be followed via RSS (as in: don't post too many). In that regard, btw, I don't recommend subscribing to high volume sources, such as newspapers' sites and things like The Verge or Engadget.
Recently, I've been checking Bubbles a lot. It's a kind of Hacker News, but for personal blogs.
Not who you asked, but I can talk about what I've done in the past year and some change of "getting into" RSS. Look for feeds for your hobbies. I'm into a whole bunch of different things that I've...
I tried to get into RSS feeds not too long ago, but didn't know what to look for. Do you have any recommended feeds, or ways to find decent feeds?
Not who you asked, but I can talk about what I've done in the past year and some change of "getting into" RSS.
Look for feeds for your hobbies. I'm into a whole bunch of different things that I've essentially just googled feeds for. FIA Rally results, PhillyMesh group updates, a WHOLE BUNCH of webcomics, github releases for projects I'm interested in, popular bloggers often offer RSS feeds, some newsletters are converted to RSS, a whole bunch of sites related to indieweb/slowweb/rss information and discussion, following specific hashtags on Mastodon, look for rss feeds for local newspapers to keep an eye on what's going on around you, meetup.com has (hidden) rss feeds for groups hosted on there, I even have a "read it later" flow similar-ish to how Pocket (rip) works integrated with RSS.
If you're looking to have "more content" to use with your reader (more on this later), then there are several aggregators that you can use to look at random rss feed posts. The only one I use right now is indieblog, but there are plenty more. This one has several settings you can select from. I follow the 5 new random posts per day feed to keep it relatively manageable.
In the spirit of this thread, I would actually recommend against using RSS to have "more content" to consume. Find a few things you like, follow them, and if you find that you enjoy reading the things that wind up in your inbox, then start expanding some more! I'm getting to the point where I'll probably start cutting back on the feeds that I have to really focus on the high quality or interesting ones. It sucks the fun out of reading these things to feel like you're obligated to read everything that's served to you.
That's the short and sweet of it. If you (or anyone else reading this) have any more questions, I'm happy to answer if I can!
I appreciate your consistently thoughtful and interesting articles, rodrigo. Thanks for taking the time to write them and share them with us.
I do this thing, usually before bed, where I just sort of cycle through opening different apps on my phone for no reason. Like, Email > Three Cheers > Alarm > Fitness > Email again > etc.
It’s not that I’m looking for anything in particular, and each app is usually only open for seconds, if that. It really does feel like some sort of compulsion.
I’ve also noticed it’s worse when I’m stressed. The benign explanation I give myself is that it’s basically just a digital fidget, in the same way I might play with the wire on my headphones or click a pen while at my desk.
There’s another part of me that thinks it’s a holdover from when I was active on social media, and I couldn’t get myself out of checking the same apps over and over again. You know, closing reddit only to reopen reddit? The scary part is that, if this is true, the compulsion has persisted across YEARS. I haven’t used social media outside of Tildes in a LONG time.
Been there too, sometimes I notice this behavior with email and RSS feeds apps.
Two things is helping me to avoid screens before bed:
Recently I realized that I may be addicted to screens. If acknowledging the problem is the first step toward trying to fix it, here it's.
I've increasingly had this thought too. It's just so difficult when I work from home and rely on notifications from my phone. I haven't quite figured that part out yet.
I have noticed sometimes I'll just get sucked in. I'll check for something small like text notifications and end up looking at YouTube or Reddit.
I recently installed this app called Screen Time. It adds a permanent notification so how much time I've used my phone is always visible.
I used to have this issue as well. What helped me: uninstall all social media (plus YouTube) apps from phone, and keep them logged out on the computer.
When I want to browse YouTube or other dumpster fire, I mean, social media platform, I open a different profile (properly named “Dumpster”) to do so.
(Also, if you're familiar with Docker, lurker is a godsend for browsing Reddit.)
I've had the thought recently I really shouldn't modify these websites to be more compatible with what I find acceptable. It feels like it's solving the wrong problem and I end up making it more addicting for myself. I've done it with pretty much with everything since I've been using the Internet. I use Revanced for YouTube, extensions for Twitter or Reddit.
The other thing I've noticed is I will replace one website for another. I had a pretty bad habit of checking Twitter when I was even slightly bored. I blocked it on my devices and end up just watching more YouTube instead. I feel like soon I'm going to be more serious about getting a grip on it. When I use my phone & computer for 10hrs+ a day, it really drains me.
Edit: I wanted to include - it seems like the solution is moderation, not entirely removing it. I really do find value in YouTube for learning about topics I never would've known about.
I believe in this, too. And I also believe that modifying the tools is helpful, since their official front-ends are a minefield to capture our attention.
YouTube is one of the worse offenders. Not only I access it in a different browser profile (on the main one, it's logged out), but I also avoid watching videos using the official website or apps. Instead, I download the ones I'm interested in, most of them I know about via RSS feeds that I follow, and watch them on the TV, via Jellyfin, installed in a small home server, streamed via a simple Roku Express. No comments, no related videos, no autoplay. It's overall way better.
I tried to get into RSS feeds not too long ago, but didn't know what to look for. Do you have any recommended feeds, or ways to find decent feeds?
Pretty much blogs and publications you enjoy. I tend to follow indie blogs, which are specially good to be followed via RSS (as in: don't post too many). In that regard, btw, I don't recommend subscribing to high volume sources, such as newspapers' sites and things like The Verge or Engadget.
Recently, I've been checking Bubbles a lot. It's a kind of Hacker News, but for personal blogs.
Also, follow mine :) Feed URL is https://manualdousuario.net/en/feed
Not who you asked, but I can talk about what I've done in the past year and some change of "getting into" RSS.
Look for feeds for your hobbies. I'm into a whole bunch of different things that I've essentially just googled feeds for. FIA Rally results, PhillyMesh group updates, a WHOLE BUNCH of webcomics, github releases for projects I'm interested in, popular bloggers often offer RSS feeds, some newsletters are converted to RSS, a whole bunch of sites related to indieweb/slowweb/rss information and discussion, following specific hashtags on Mastodon, look for rss feeds for local newspapers to keep an eye on what's going on around you, meetup.com has (hidden) rss feeds for groups hosted on there, I even have a "read it later" flow similar-ish to how Pocket (rip) works integrated with RSS.
If you're looking to have "more content" to use with your reader (more on this later), then there are several aggregators that you can use to look at random rss feed posts. The only one I use right now is indieblog, but there are plenty more. This one has several settings you can select from. I follow the 5 new random posts per day feed to keep it relatively manageable.
In the spirit of this thread, I would actually recommend against using RSS to have "more content" to consume. Find a few things you like, follow them, and if you find that you enjoy reading the things that wind up in your inbox, then start expanding some more! I'm getting to the point where I'll probably start cutting back on the feeds that I have to really focus on the high quality or interesting ones. It sucks the fun out of reading these things to feel like you're obligated to read everything that's served to you.
That's the short and sweet of it. If you (or anyone else reading this) have any more questions, I'm happy to answer if I can!