
Neal Stephenson: Why I Am a Sociomediapath (2015) - sasvari
http://www.nealstephenson.com/social-media.html
======
marktangotango
Comments so far seem to be focusing on the social media aspect of this piece,
what struck me was the acknowledgement that he has a limited number of
productive years left, and the Longfellow quote. In my mid 40's, I also have
come to feel the weight of years passed, without achieving professional goals
(ie starting a succesful software based company).

This feeling of unfinished business really set in after the birth of our
second child. I had always claimed to be one of the best developers around,
yet, I could not master myself to be truly productive when working of personal
projects. Overcoming my self imposed limits is where I'm at now. Has anyone
else experienced this?

~~~
snowwrestler
I just turned 40, parent of a young child, and I know what you mean. I think
the below article, a cover story in _The Atlantic_ , is really insightful and
I found it helped adjust my thinking.

There are going to be things that I wanted to do, that I won't do in my life.
Some may never have happened no matter what, like winning the Super Bowl or
becoming an astronaut. But some of them will be things that I could very
plausibly have actually done--but instead I did other things. The challenge of
happiness is acknowledging that I made those choices for reasons that seemed
good at the time, and anyway I can't go back and change the past. To be happy,
I have to accept that it's possible to be happy, even knowing that I gave some
things up for other things.

Essentially I'm working on believing that goals and happiness are separate
things, each of which can be achieved independently of the other.

The link:

[http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/12/the-
real...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/12/the-real-roots-
of-midlife-crisis/382235/)

A quote:

> Long ago, when I was 30 and he was 66, the late Donald Richie, the greatest
> writer I have known, told me: “Midlife crisis begins sometime in your 40s,
> when you look at your life and think, Is this all? And it ends about 10
> years later, when you look at your life again and think, Actually, this is
> pretty good.” In my 50s, thinking back, his words strike me as exactly
> right. To no one’s surprise as much as my own, I have begun to feel again
> the sense of adventure that I recall from my 20s and 30s. I wake up thinking
> about the day ahead rather than the five decades past. Gratitude has
> returned.

~~~
mikegerwitz
I'm experiencing those same emotions in foresight.

I'm young---I'm 26, and I have a wife and two young children (2 and 4). I'm at
that age where I could have gotten involved in so much, personally and
professionally---and still could. And I know that this will be a bit setback
for things I'd like to do in the future. But time with my family is more
important, and we also bought a house that needs a lot of work.

And I fully expect to be feeling exactly as you are describing. And I'm trying
to come to terms with that today, while I'm still young: focus on what I can
be happy for today, recognize how my decisions affect my future, how I might
adjust my plans, and recognize that the decisions I made (or didn't) have
desirable consequences that I wouldn't change if I had the option to go back
and do it again.

Thanks for sharing your experiences.

~~~
zkhalique
Mike, I'm going to say that you can continuously improve and upgrade your
career, you can't say the same about your wife and kids. So, it's more
important to date and look for a wife early, while with your professional
career you have all the time you need.

From your name, I'm going to guess you're Jewish, so you would have had even
harder of a search, if you wanted to marry someone Jewish, than if you did not
have this additional filter. So, don't worry... you've succeeded in choosing
your wife, starting a family, and now you have plenty of time to keep
improving in your career. Consider the opportunity cost of doing the reverse -
career first, then kids.

~~~
mikegerwitz
I do agree---I'd rather have the family.

I'm not Jewish, but your comments stand all the same. Thanks for the kind
words.

------
jasode
This essay might be deeper than it first suggests.

My first interpretation: knee-jerk reaction after reading it that it's a very
typical lament about social media getting in the way of doing more important
things in life. There are thousands of blog posts repeating this message and
this variation of it happens to be on HN because it's from N.S.

My second interpretation: I lingered on his chosen word " _sociomediapath_ ".
Since it's a riff on "sociopath", I think what he's saying here is that he's
going to _give the impression_ that he's a social media hound but behind the
scenes, he's doesn't care. Likewise, a sociopath like Ted Bundy on the surface
can shake your hand and charm you with his smiles but underneath it all, he'll
kill you.

N.S. has to be a "sociopath" in media because he's a published author. He _can
't_ go full Howard Hughes detached-from-society-mode and therefore, has to at
least fake out the public with a social media presence.

Maybe that means there's a need for a web service that generates random and
periodic posts on behalf of users to give the appearance of "Facebook
normality". E.g. the website service posts random inspirational quotes from
dead people or TIL from random wikipedia pages. You never have to log into
Facebook and yet it seems like you're "with it".

I believe other celebrities accomplish this with "public relations" staff. The
PR firm makes the celebrity look "connected" to the fans via Reddit AMAs and
Twitter updates but in reality, he/she really isn't.

~~~
digi_owl
Makes me think of a recent talk at ccc.de about libusb, and how there was a
"hostile takeover" in part fueled by the maintainer failing to push out new
releases even though there was activity on the tracker (he wanted to make sure
the new stuff worked before releasing, others saw it as the project
stagnating).

~~~
nly
Do you know which talk that was?

~~~
digi_owl
[https://media.ccc.de/v/32c3-7547-libusb_maintainer_fail](https://media.ccc.de/v/32c3-7547-libusb_maintainer_fail)

------
HSO
Abstaining from "social media" is for _amateurs_!!! ;-)

Many years ago, I threw my TV out and it was one of the best decisions I've
ever made.

Internet is the new TV.

I see the irony of writing this on HN but I really try to find the internet
analogue for throwing out the TV.

The problem is that you need services like maps, online banking and tickets,
mobile payments, etc.

What I want to get rid of though, completely, is news and noise. I tried and
tried but self-regulation is too hard; I still waste so much time and poison
my brain with all this crap; I think the time has come to try self- _binding_.

My current setup is to not have internet at home (where I work) except for a
mobile connection, and to pull the SIM card out by default. I only put it back
in when I need to do something specific (or when I am on the go, for maps).

Obviously, this is not a perfect solution yet (as I somehow found my way back
to HN, grrr…) but I'm working on it.

I should probably get a dumbphone for emergencies, and I also want to
habituate myself to a weekly rhythm where I bunch all the stuff (like emails,
software updates, articles to be downloaded, references to be checked, etc) to
one day a week (say Sat) and do all my "internet errands" in one go.

The rest of the time, I rely on my books and articles and downloaded
documentations and offline Wikipedia. If I want to watch something, I can make
a note and download the movie or entire season along with the other "internet
groceries". To keep in touch with current events, I can read weekly news
magazines. That also dials down the noise. Something like that. Interestingly,
since I got a big tablet, I read news magazines like The Economist or Die Zeit
in PDF format and it seems to also affect me somehow. There is no outside
clicking and endless linkbait anymore, and I feel less monitored and stressed
(even though I already have all these adblockers and Little Snitch and
whatnot). It also gives me back a feeling of a natural end to my reading
session when I reach the final pages of the PDF. On the web or online, the
next article or curiosity is always right behind.

~~~
riskable
> What I want to get rid of though, completely, is news and noise.

Why? I'm being serious.

Everyone assumes that our lot in life is to be productive. For Americans it
seems we need to be _as productive as possible_. It's untenable.

The most productive person is the one who dies at 40 because they didn't get
enough sleep because they drank too much caffeine and augmented themselves
with other drugs to maximize wakeful productivity. Is that worthwhile?

I can definitely see a problem with spending considerable amounts of time
keeping up with social media because ultimately the thoughts, pictures, and
videos posted by your "friends" aren't important. You, them, and everyone else
will have long since forgotten what was posted in _a week_ and nothing of
value will be lost.

On the other hand, "keeping up with the news"\--especially news in your
industry--is important. There's a lot of things going on _all the time_ that
could make a huge difference in our lives and careers. Things we need to stay
on top of not just because we care but because _they have impact_.

I don't know about you but at my job it is a common occurrence for me to solve
problems with tools and techniques I've learned about through sites like HN.
Keeping up with these sorts of things also gives you insight on how to
schedule things. For example, if you just read that the next release of
ProductX will include a feature that you need you probably won't bother to
spend time writing your own implementation since it will be obsoleted soon.

Then there's the entertainment aspect: What's wrong with "wasting" time if
you're enjoying yourself? I enjoy reading the news and the occasional
entertaining Reddit post. When I laugh at a meme was my time truly "wasted"?
Or perhaps the time I spent trying to discover "something good" was wasted?

"Getting things done" in spite is the opposite of happiness.

~~~
rouxz
>Then there's the entertainment aspect: What's wrong with "wasting" time if
you're enjoying yourself?

About the entertainment aspect. I think the point here is following: modern
web media/pics/etc is too attractive and people can't focus on things what
really matter. Every website with "funny cats" tries very hard to retain you
as user and your attention -> entertain you more. I think many people (myself
included) fall in risk group and can't actually measure/control time spent on
procrastination while browsing infinite number of subreddits or something for
interesting stuff. Even when i really need things to be done - there is
something that can immediately capture my attention. And I have to say I am
not alone.

The root cause here is inability to focus on important things and finally quit
procrastination.

------
myhf
In Seveneves, Stephenson discusses "Amistics, the study of the choices made by
different cultures as to which technologies they would embrace or spurn."

"Anyone who bothered to learn the history of the developed world in the years
just before Zero understood perfectly well that Tavistock Prowse had been
squarely in the middle of the normal range, as far as his social media habits
and attention span had been concerned. But nevertheless, they called it Tav's
Mistake. They didn't want to make it again. Any efforts made by modern
manufacturers to produce the kinds of devices and apps that had disordered the
brain of Tav were met with the same instinctive pushback as Victorian clergy
might have directed against the inventor of a masturbation machine."

You see those kinds of choices being made at a cultural level all over the
world. Developed countries where nobody uses leafblowers, or in-sink food
waste disposals, or what have you. People understand how those things work,
they just don't want the effects.

~~~
theoh
About leaf blowers and waste disposals, I think it's not about the "effects"
so much as the item itself. These devices do perform a function but their
original reason for existing is arguably to profitably sell motors (or small
engines in the case of the leaf blower). Having lived mostly in countries
where they aren't used, I'd say it's a skepticism about the real utility of
the device that makes them unsuccessful there, not a reasoned assessment of
the effects of widespread use.

~~~
arbitrage
Leaf blowers are very overrated, unless you buy the industrial grade backpack
type. And that's only a niche application.

I use a rake, which works faster for my consumer-level yard than a mid to
high-range blower, to get the leaves all in once place. Then, I use the blower
in reverse to chop the leaves for compost. Not the intended purpose at all,
but it works for me.

~~~
yock
Exactly how I use mine, and how my father taught me when I was a kid. I
thought this was normal.

~~~
tombrossman
You can also drop the leaves into a large trash can and use a string trimmer
lowered into the can to chop them as finely as you like. Works just like a
giant immersion blender, plus it's cool to take a huge pile and reduce it down
to almost nothing.

~~~
zentiggr
And I have one of those "Why didn't I think of that" moments.... Thanks!

------
SwellJoe
I took a week off of facebook two weeks ago. No interaction with facebook, at
all, except one messenger session with a design contractor who is doing our UI
overhaul. I haven't been so productive in years. And, it mostly broke my
facebook addiction...I check it once a day now, often just on my phone while
standing in line at the grocery or during some other downtime. I'm able to
ignore it most of the time (notifications have been turned off for years,
because I hate anything dinging at me and interrupting my thought process; I
leave the ringer on my phone off for the same reason, I can check my voicemail
in Google Voice a couple times a day to deal with important stuff).

I'm considering doing the same "fast and then reduced consumption" for my
other social media habits: reddit, HN, twitter. When I traveled full-time, in
the past, I would often find myself with little or no Internet connectivity
for a week at a time, and that imposed periodic social media fasting, and it
was sufficient to keep the addictions in check. After living in a fixed house,
with very fast Internet, for a little over a year, the urge to check my
phone/tablet first thing in the morning and last thing at night has become
notable and annoying.

In short: He's right, and I notice my own inability to do things of substance
has been significantly impaired by the time and attention I give to social
media, and it's only reasonable to abstain in the interest of spending more
time doing the things I truly value. It can be hard to make that choice,
however...one more shot of dopamine (or whatever chemicals the constant
affirmation of social media provides) seems harmless.

(I note the irony of this being an HN comment.)

~~~
riebschlager
I hear ya. I started out 2016 by deactivating my Facebook account, culling my
Twitter following to 12 and my Feedly subscriptions to 10. I also added Disqus
to my hosts file to make news sites less enraging.

I've taken other measures in the past. Someone else in this thread mentioned
unfollowing everyone on Facebook, that helped quite a bit. But there's a lot
to be said for declaring social media bankruptcy and being freed from that
involuntary compulsion to open up a new Chrome tab and waste time.

~~~
morganvachon
> _Someone else in this thread mentioned unfollowing everyone on Facebook,
> that helped quite a bit. But there 's a lot to be said for declaring social
> media bankruptcy and being freed from that involuntary compulsion to open up
> a new Chrome tab and waste time._

I did this recently (unfollowing (almost) everyone on my FB friend list), and
it has resulted in me spending less than 10 minutes a week on the site. I
didn't do it so I would use FB less, I did it because my feed was full of
nothing but hatred and negativity, and to see that from friends and family is
extremely depressing. If I didn't use FB to promote a couple of projects I'm
running, I'd drop it altogether and rely on my wife to keep me updated on
family and mutual friends who choose to only have contact with the outside
world via the FB window.

~~~
kerryfalk
I also unfollowed nearly everyone for similar reasons. The unintended side-
effect is that it's much less interesting now and as a result I spend less
time on Facebook. Success!

------
jacobmoe
I'm torn. On the one hand, I agree. On the other hand, I wouldn't have found
this Neal Stephenson post if it wasn't for social media.

~~~
sasvari
I came across a reference to it while reading the first chapter of _Deep Work_
by _Cal Newport_ [0]. For anybody interested in _distraction free work_ , it
seems to be quite a good book (can't give a thorough review, I'm still at the
beginning). I enjoyed reading his blog so far.

[0] [http://calnewport.com/blog/2016/01/05/the-book-facebook-
does...](http://calnewport.com/blog/2016/01/05/the-book-facebook-doesnt-want-
you-to-read/)

~~~
3stripe
I'm making this book my Bible for getting stuff done in 2016. Social media =
crack.

~~~
pklausler
Ironically, for me, re-reading Neal Stephenson's novels is one of my biggest
crack-like time-wasters.

------
irremediable
It's interesting. I thought I didn't lose much time to social media because I
only used them in "dead" time, e.g. waiting for a train. But I've come to
believe this was a mistake in two respects. Firstly, no time is truly "dead",
and there's almost always something better I could be doing. Secondly, almost
any use of social media trains me to crave more -- it genuinely is addictive,
and the unreliability of the novelty ("refreshing in the hope of seeing
something new") makes this all the worse.

~~~
harryf
> Secondly, almost any use of social media trains me to crave more -- it
> genuinely is addictive, and the unreliability of the novelty ("refreshing in
> the hope of seeing something new") makes this all the worse.

That's pretty much what it's designed to do. Really recommend reading "Hooked:
How to Build Habit-Forming Products"
[http://www.nirandfar.com/hooked](http://www.nirandfar.com/hooked) or watch
some of the authors videos like
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVDN2mjJpb8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVDN2mjJpb8)
or his talk at The Next Web
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z29RvrHPp1s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z29RvrHPp1s)

~~~
irremediable
No disagreement here -- I know it's intentional. Thanks for the resources
though.

------
osullivj
Perfectly captures the way I feel. I spend very little time on FB & twitter
these days. I fear I'm still spending too much time on HN though...

~~~
randycupertino
I loved how the whole point of the essay is not to waste your time reading the
comments and not to get bogged down in minutia, yet here we all are, reading
the comments!

------
josefresco
I was able to fully quit Facebook - with the help of my wife. Not that she
needed to help me actually close my account, but rather she keeps me posted
(via her Facebook) page on the comings, and goings of my/our family.

Without her I'd probably feel pressure to at least have FB for close family,
however I'm not sure it would be enough to lure me back in, given the use of
group texts etc.

------
amelius
I just unfollow everybody by default on FB, and I can highly recommend this.
(Basically I just use FB to find interesting events, and see where everybody
is going).

~~~
yitchelle
Wouldn't FB be a ghost site like myspace or G+ if everyone is unfriended?

~~~
isaacdl
There's a difference (on FB at least) between being "friends" and "following"
someone. If you unfollow a friend, you'll still be connected, can communicate,
see events, etc, you just won't see their posts in your news feed.

~~~
mistermann
Well I certainly didn't know that.

Is there a way to make it so it screens out all the content that comes from
content factories ("You won't believe....!"), but still see things such as
pure text or user-created photo posts?

~~~
philh
You can unfollow individual sites. There's a down arrow in the top-right of a
post, you click it and select 'hide all from clickhole'.

I unfollowed a bunch, and now I rarely see that kind of thing.

~~~
greggman
You can also use "fb purity", an extension that can hide posts based on string
matches. For example "liked a post", "commented on", and other annoying things
fb fills the feed with

------
tmaly
I am almost 38 and I look at the founder of the company I work at in my day
job. He started the company in his early 40s and now he is worth in excess of
8 billion. 40 is not too late to start something.

------
mark_l_watson
Social media is a tool, useful for business and self promotion. Also handy for
checking up on what friends and relatives are doing.

That said, I agree with Stephenson (I really enjoyed his latest book
Seveneves) that it's use can get in the way of doing more creative and
productive things.

I am a big fan of "self monitoring" to keep track of types of food eaten, time
spent on social media, TV, etc. Personally, if I spend more than 15 minutes a
day on social media that is a warning sign that I need to do better time
management.

~~~
tomkinstinch
Automated monitoring of computer time can be very revealing. I use
RescueTime[1] as a check of my productivity, and have found it helpful for
ensuring I remain on-track.

1\. [https://www.rescuetime.com](https://www.rescuetime.com)

~~~
mark_l_watson
I also used rescue time for several months after one of my consulting
customers recommended it. It is a good product, but after understanding my
time use profile I stopped using it.

------
huuu
Cut away branches that suck energy but don't bear fruit.

------
cmiles74
This strikes me as a pretty serious failure on the part of Facebook, Twitter
and their ilk. I'm not sure what the solution might be, but I would prefer to
read the posts of the actual author or personality, rather than a stream of PR
posts. Neal Stephenson is not the first and surely won't be the last person
who's account will now be ghostwritten (by publishers, agents, trusted people,
etc.)

I understand why he's managing it this way and I might do the same if I were
in his position. My hope is that Facebook, etc. start to realize that their
current approach isn't the best fit for everyone.

------
daemonk
I think learning to do things in moderation is really the key here.

I liked that the article is not vehemently chastising social media as the bane
of modern civilization nor praising it as the second coming. There are pros
and cons to adopting most new technologies.

It's better to develop a discipline to use them in moderation rather than to
cut it off completely or depend on them excessively.

------
skybrian
But why does Neal Stephenson of all people feel he needs to write as many more
novels as possible? Sure, it's good for us that he feels that way, but strange
that he thinks he still has something to prove.

------
cableshaft
This is a bit offtopic, but his latest book is 'Seveneves', huh? I worked on a
puzzle game for the DS and Wii called 'Neves', which was named that way
because there was a 'puzzle in the name', being seven backwards, and there was
seven pieces in each puzzle.

I feel like I should probably read Seveneves now, even though I know it's just
a coincidence they're named similarly.

~~~
acheron
_I feel like I should probably read Seveneves now_

Do you like orbital mechanics?

------
Johnny_Brahms
HN is the only social media I use. Quitting social media is really the best
thing I have ever done. I used to check facebook and twitter every 2 minuter
when I had nothing else to do. The result was to never have a dull moment. It
just stressed me out.

After quitting I realized how much I need all those small breaks. I am less
stressed and much more productive. Jobs kept coming by word of mouth.

------
DubiousPusher
Basically, he's just coming out and saying that he's doing what almost every
other highly visible, busy person is doing.

------
walod
Well, I relate to both this and the older 'bad correspondent' article
immensely. I have struggled with this for at least 2-3 years now. The only
times I can be truly productive (in music, programming or visual stuff) is
when I feel like I have a cocoon where there will be no interruptions with
100% certainty.

For me personally the cell phone is a bigger problem than the internet, since
people get annoyed when I don't pick up the phone, but I also notice I need to
stop clicking endlessly all night on web sites to calm my mind down to get to
that mental space for creativity.

Basically the best periods I've had were when others were on vacation or I
was, and there was some natural unbroken few days where there was no anxiety
at all about being interrupted. The question is how to make it happen. I
basically just turn off my phone, close the browser, go for a walk, try to get
the nerves calmed down, and hopefully something comes out of it that night.

It's really quite annoying though, because 7 years ago it wasn't like this. I
don't want to be a recluse, I just want to balance the two things and have
that be okay.

------
MCRed
"With that said, here are the links to my social media:" <crickets>

I think a rendering issue in Safari hid them, or something, but I thought it
was humorous to have that article, followed by no way to follow him on social
media! (presumably unintended.)

~~~
mayoff
An ad blocker that blocks social media sharing buttons will hide the link
buttons at the bottom of that page.

------
atmosx
> I completed SEVENEVES recently and have three other novel projects in the
> works. Somewhat perversely, however, using social media has now become part
> of a novelist's job.

I find amazing the fact that he manages to write 3 or 4 novels at the same
time.

~~~
sbierwagen
We can only hope that the other novels will be better than Seveneves.

~~~
trusche
They can hardly get worse. I used to be a huge fan of NS, but Seveneves was
the last book of his I bought without reading review first. He seems to have
decided that character development is for other people, not to mention the
gaping plot holes. Sloppy and superficial.

~~~
programmarchy
Huh, I thought the book was pretty good. (Warning: spoilers ahead.) I couldn't
put it down for the first 500 pages. Things got a little slow in the second
part of the book, but I thought the character development in terms of the
races of Eves was a really interesting twist. You still "knew" the characters
based on their ancestors. I do wish he had fleshed out the history of the
Diggers and Pingers, but that could be an entire book in itself.

------
david_mitchell
I think this is a good time to repost a link to pg's "disconnecting
distraction":
[http://paulgraham.com/distraction.html](http://paulgraham.com/distraction.html)

------
nickysielicki
Not related to the content, but yeesh, this color scheme is awful. The yellow
gradient... Blegh.

I couldn't make it through the article because my eyes kept getting lost
between the lines.

~~~
jordanlev
What got me was the fact that the background image is a 3.4 MB (!!) file.
Yowzas, talk about page boat.

~~~
Buge
Wow. And looking at it, it appears blurry and slightly pixelated, as if it has
been upscaled. It also looks like it might have jpeg artifacts from a previous
compression. Although it cannot simply be made a jpeg as-is because it is
largely transparent. I used [https://tinypng.com/](https://tinypng.com/) lossy
png to get it down to 770kB with virtually no loss of quality (since the
quality was so bad to begin with). But it could be shrunk more by either using
a smaller image and upscaling it in the browser (instead of upsaling it prior
to saving), or merging the background gradient with the image and saving it as
jpeg.

------
kenamarit
If anyone else is interested, here's a link to someone's repost of "Why I'm a
Bad Correspondent"

[http://www.carlkingdom.com/neal-stephenson-why-i-am-a-bad-
co...](http://www.carlkingdom.com/neal-stephenson-why-i-am-a-bad-
correspondent)

------
sjclemmy
Nothing to do with the function, but the form...

I really struggle with white on black text. Most of the internet is black on
white, so, when switching back to a light screen I see black line after
images. I really dislike it.

------
SFjulie1
If Charles Stross, Georges RR Martin could do the same, maybe we could stop
having shitty milfan boy creepy SiFi and have good SiFi again with bits of
humor.

If Neal read this and meet Charles please tell him to stop post photo of his
cats on twitter and go back to work.

The quality of his writing is going down, and the only thing that make me stay
away from social medias are good books.

I get it. I am a Sociomediapath because of him in fact. I blame him 100%!

PS neal makes good funny books, but he has difficulty making ends that don't
involve deus ex machina. (REAMDE ending is a tad disappointing after quite a
good development. Still it is a good essay on virtual currencies).

------
MikeNomad
"Cultivate an identity as a Luddite." This coming from someone who writes
their first draft using pen and paper.

~~~
hobs
I dont understand this comment, should he be using quill pen, or starting an
oral history to be more of a luddite?

~~~
adrusi
The point is that the parent thinks he's already established himself as a
luddite by using so antiquated technology as dead trees.

