Is Facebook killing freedom and liberty?

[Brian Peacock]

Breaking up (with my smartphone) is hard to do

There is something wrong with my phone, and it is not just that the predictive text feature thinks I’m obsessed with ducks. The real problem is that my phone is the first thing I look at in the morning, and the last thing I look at at night. I come running when it makes a “ding” noise. I think in tweets and look at meals and people and imagine them cropped into squares on Instagram. There is something mentally totalitarian about it.

Smartphones are designed to addict us – nagging us with notifications, disrupting us with noise, making themselves indispensable. Social media apps harness neuroscience to the same end, triggering dopamine hits that lock us into them for hours. A terrifying new book, How to Break Up With Your Phone, says we are rewiring our brains so they are less organised for deep thought; killing our attention span, destroying our memory, sleep and happiness. Phones have changed the world, too; advertisers use them to hoover up our attention. We are no longer just consumers, but product. As Ramsay Brown, co-founder of app-designers Dopamine Labs, has said: “You get to use [Facebook] for free, because your eyeballs are what’s being sold there.”...

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... _clipboard

[JimC]

Precisely why I don't have one...

And the fact that the money involved would eat into my gin budget...

[Sean Hayden]

Embrace the crutch. Fight the lie that before the crutch they were smarter. Where's the evidence for that!

[Rum]

Precisely why I don't have one...

And the fact that the money involved would eat into my gin budget...

Nah - it's a bit like gin. Taken in moderation and it is fine. Oh wait.

[JimC]

I have a non-smart phone, pre-paid, that I use once in a blue moon.

[Svartalf]

I don't have a mobile phone at all, think regularly of getting myself a non smart one, to be able to call people and coordinate when I'm out of home, but I make a splendid job of procrastinating about that...

[Rum]

I have decent smartphone. They don't have to rule your life. In fact the only time I look at Facebook on it is if I am say waiting at a cafe for someone to arrive and I've got a few minutes to kill - and then I'm juts as likely to look at the BBC. I use it for that sort of thing a couple of times a week at most. An ageing memory is much assisted by the diary and I also use the weather forecast and such quite a lot. I also stay in toch with my daughter a couple of cousins and Mrs Rum via text. All in all I find it a positive tool and not something I'm slavishly tied to. I NEVER look at the thing walking down the street!

[Scot Dutchy]

I dont do social media but I have decent smart phone like you Rum I use to kill time. I read the news and my e-mails. I never got my phone properly set up. I can only receive and not send emails. I use my phone for walking. The app 'my routes' I find very handy in keeping track of the route and statistics involved. I used to use a step counter (paid a lot them) but with GPS it is great. I also have the Kobo app which allows it to be an eReader which is good for train journeys.

[Hermit]

There is something wrong with my phone

Is it really?

The real problem is that my phone is the first thing I look at in the morning, and the last thing I look at at night.

That's manifestly not a smartphone problem then, is it?

I come running when it makes a “ding” noise. I think in tweets and look at meals and people and imagine them cropped into squares on Instagram.

As I said...


About a year and a half ago I bought my first smartphone, a second-hand Samsung Galaxy 6, for $240, and I pay $10 a month to keep it connected. That cost includes national landline and mobile calls I make. I am not a slave to the smartphone. Its just a handy tool and convenience to me.

The kind of people who get addicted to its charms are the same as those who got addicted to other charms in the past.

[Scot Dutchy]

With my second last contract I got a Samsung S5 free and with the last contract my contribution was brought down to €8 because I use it so little. Well I never down load outside my house.

[pErvinalia]

About a year and a half ago I bought my first smartphone, a second-hand Samsung Galaxy 6, for $240, and I pay $10 a month to keep it connected. That cost includes national landline and mobile calls I make. I am not a slave to the smartphone. Its just a handy tool and convenience to me.

The kind of people who get addicted to its charms are the same as those who got addicted to other charms in the past.

Yep. I basically ignore my phone when it makes noises. I love how it infuriates others that I don't answer my phone when it rings. They just can't understand it.

[Hermit]

About a year and a half ago I bought my first smartphone, a second-hand Samsung Galaxy 6, for $240, and I pay $10 a month to keep it connected. That cost includes national landline and mobile calls I make. I am not a slave to the smartphone. Its just a handy tool and convenience to me.

The kind of people who get addicted to its charms are the same as those who got addicted to other charms in the past.

Yep. I basically ignore my phone when it makes noises. I love how it infuriates others that I don't answer my phone when it rings. They just can't understand it.

I configured my phone with different ring tones. Family and good friends sound the first eleven bars of one of Gabrieli's canzons - glorious 16th century brass. Depending on circumstance they get my attention sooner rather than later. Everybody else causes my phone to emit one of the bog standard Samsung ring tones. Emails and SMSs are on the same priority level as "everybody else". "Backburner" comes to mind. And I am very good at turning the phone completely off before entering any concert hall. Get my drift?

[pErvinalia]

Phone calls from family members are more likely to get my attention later rather than sooner...

[Hermit]

Phone calls from family members are more likely to get my attention later rather than sooner...

Yeah, I know. You told us often enough how much you hate your kids and how embarrassed you are about the way you treated your wife and therefore can't handle it when she rings.

[pErvinalia]

I love my kids. Doesn't mean I want to talk to them.. :p

In any case, it's the other family members I avoid. Although I should make more effort to keep in contact with my rich(ish) aunt.