In 2014 consumer expert and Silicon Valley startup founder Nir Eyal wrote Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products. But five years later, the New York Times reports he’s offering consumers a new book about how to resist those habits — even while arguing that “addiction” is the wrong way to describe technology’s hold on people:
There was a problem, yes, but the thinking was all wrong, he decided. Using the language of addiction gave tech users a pass. It was too easy. The issue was not screens but people’s own minds, and to solve the problem they had to look within. “If I call technology something that people get addicted to, there needs to be a pusher, a dealer doing it to you,” Mr. Eyal said. “But if I say technology is something that people overuse, then it’s, ‘Oh, crap, now I need to do something about it myself….'” The solution he proposes in Indistractable is slow. It involves self-reflection. He argues that many times we look at phones because we are anxious and bad at being alone — and that’s not the phone’s fault…
Mr. Eyal has written a guide to free people from an addiction he argues they never had in the first place. It was all just sloughing off personal responsibility, he figures. So the solution is to reclaim responsibility in myriad small ways. For instance: Have your phone on silent so there will be fewer external triggers. Email less and faster. Don’t hang out on Slack. Have only one laptop out during meetings. Introduce social pressure like sitting next to someone who can see your screen. Set “price pacts” with people so you pay them if you get distracted — though be sure to “learn self-compassion before making a price pact…..”
“I got myself a feature phone that had no apps. I got on eBay a word processor, and all it does is let you type. I made my phone grayscale, which only ruined my pictures,” he said. “I tried a digital detox, but I missed audiobooks and GPS….”
He also argues that getting hooked on social media isn’t necessarily a bad thing. “For many people, social media is a very good thing and gaming is a very good thing. It’s how you use it….” But he’s also predicting a “post-digital” movement will emerge in 2020.
“We will start to realize that being chained to your mobile phone is a low-status behavior, similar to smoking.”
of this story at Slashdot.
Source:: Slashdot