

Fast Food for the Mind: Why I Don't Have a Facebook or Twitter Account - daktanis
http://www.forbes.com/sites/sungardas/2014/04/08/fast-food-for-the-mind-why-i-dont-have-a-facebook-or-twitter-account/

======
geebee
Wow. This was almost the exact analogy that prompted me to quit facebook about
a year ago.

I was watching a show about the addictive nature of junk food, and how it
works. Many food items, especially zero calorie ones like diet soda, trick
your mind into believing it has received something it needs. However, by
tricking your mind but denying your body, you come back again for it later
(and again, and again). Unfortunately, this applies to high calorie foods that
are largely nutritionally empty. You sense a need, you go to the food for that
need, and it provides a mental signal that you have received it without
actually filling the need.

The recommendation was - every time you find yourself reaching for a salty bag
of chips or a diet soda, ask yourself, what is my body actually telling me it
wants? While it may seem more expensive, try to fulfill that need as low on
the "processed" chain as you can. This way, you'll fulfill the signal _and_
the need.

That was kind of long winded, but I realized, at that moment, how I was using
social media. I'm in a state of life, for better and worse, where I have very,
very little time (kids, mortgages, work, and so forth). Many relationships are
starting to fade, or rot.

My mind was sending me signals that I needed more social interaction, and I
was fulfilling these signals with social media rather than real human contact.
To me, this is the aspartane of social interactions. You have a need, you use
something that satisfies the signal but not the need itself, and so you keep
coming back.

Very specifically, I was replacing something that used to be a big part of my
life - playing music at jams and with friends, with youtube clips and other
videos.

Now, this is a little complicated, in that videos have actually been a good
thing in some ways. For instance, because of youtube, I've been able to learn
a lot of bluegrass songs well prior to going to a jam, which has certainly
enhanced my experience at those jam sessions. And if all I have is 30 minutes
after the kids go to bed to learn a new song, well, at least I got to learn a
new song.

So I'm not sure total abstinence is a good idea here. There's an interesting
continuum of these addictive things. You can quit cigarettes completely, just
walk away. You can (and probably should[1]) quit junk food completely, but you
can't quit food. And lastly, I'd say you probably shouldn't quit social media
completely. But this does make it much more complicated, and you need to be
careful about it - and of course, keep in mind that a corporation that seeks
to maximize ad revenue from you is something you need to be particularly
cautious about.

Personally, I am glad I quit facebook, for all kind of reasons, not just the
one above. Occasional fast food is pretty much harmless. I'd also guess that
the risks of a once in a blue moon cigar are vanishingly low. The difference
here is that you can tolerate some of a bad thing, whereas I'm not sure all
social media should be considered a bad thing. But I'd put it in the category
of food, there is definitely junk social media that you would want to avoid.

~~~
incision
_> 'You have a need, you use something that satisfies the signal but not the
need itself, and so you keep coming back.'_

Exactly.

I'm not sure who coined it, but I've taken to the term 'infosugar' to describe
the knowledge analog of this.

I don't want to take the analogy too far, but I expect there's a whole range
of behavior we easily slip into that evidence this same sort of pattern - bad
behaviors as the result of an unfulfilled subconscious desire.

For example, I wonder how much the assorted aggressive nastiness you find
online is basically a burst valve from sedentary people who really just need
to go hit a ball or run hard for an hour?

~~~
Dewie
> For example, I wonder how much the assorted aggressive nastiness you find
> online is basically a burst valve from sedentary people who really just need
> to go hit a ball or run hard for an hour?

Physical venting/channelling seems like a very temporary outlet for general
misanthropy.

~~~
incision
I don't follow.

It seems to me that anything short of death would be a temporary outlet for
'general misanthropy'.

~~~
Dewie
I'm saying that people who are really hateful online have issues that are
deeper than simply having pent-up aggression/restlessness that can be
channelled through some physical activity or sport.

------
was_hellbanned
I eat at McDonald's once a week, and I log onto Facebook a couple of times per
month. This sounds like a recovering alcoholic ranting about how alcohol is
evil and nobody should drink it.

~~~
benihana
I got a similar vibe. It talks about how facebook _can_ be bad for some
people, but then basically calls out everyone for being unhealthy. I react to
this the same way I react to someone who sees a small part of my life (like me
grabbing a shitty McDonald's burger) and extrapolates my entire physical and
mental health based on that small point. And that reaction is usually "piss
off, you're being really presumptuous."

~~~
mitchty
While you're both correct, I really do think things like twitter do fit
somewhat into if not fast food, maybe candy category of social/interaction.

It feels empty. I vastly prefer chilling out in person, even if there isn't a
ton of conversation, its preferable to texting on my phone or whatever.

------
blutoot
I can't quit - my active Facebook-ing GF and my own profile have a
relationship status pointing to each other. If I quit her relationship status
would suddenly look weird (I think) and that would raise silly questions. But
I'm practically inactive on Facebook. I do request my friends from time to
time to not tag me on photos after social gatherings and events. Facebook
Message is the only useful thing for me - glad Facebook recognized that
there's a market that covers people like me and decided to separate the
Message app from the main one.

~~~
coldtea
> _I can 't quit - my active Facebook-ing GF and my own profile have a
> relationship status pointing to each other. If I quit her relationship
> status would suddenly look weird (I think) and that would raise silly
> questions._

That's a valid reason not to quit Facebook if you're both 14 year olds.

------
Fuzzwah
... much like fast food, there are decent options out there for moderate
consumption.

------
jccalhoun
People who say they don't have a facebook or twitter account are the new
people who say they don't own a tv...

~~~
cruise02
How do you know when someone doesn't have a Facebook account? They'll tell
you. But at least you won't have to friend them.

------
rebelidealist
The usefulness and power of FB and Twitter is for your professional network.

It is immensely valuable that relevant people that you know get update on your
what you are building and any insightful information that you have. Rarely do
people keep up with their LinkedIn.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
This is why I hate social networks for professional work: a nauseating level
of self-promotion. "Wow, my repo has twenty stars!" Great, why did you tell us
all that? I'm more interested in discussion or insight. Twitter's character
limits make that nearly impossible; relegating it to snark, cheap puns, and
humblebrags.

We're blind to it here at HN; we worship success and accept that contributing
to the noise of it all is a necessary evil so we can build our brand.
Meanwhile, everyone's doing the same, hawking
e-books/courses/OSS/products/consultancies. It's not communication, it's
typing at each other. Now that we're supposed to maintain an online identity,
it's utterly exhausting at times.

Disclaimer: I'm an old soul. I much preferred the non-social web because we
didn't all seem to be pushing something.

------
shearnie
I have been having intriguing discussions on Facebook with my friends. I think
it's a matter of what friends you have or are paying attention to. One could
say visiting mediocre people who gossip about other people is junk food for
the brain also.

------
Rudism
This smells a lot like arguments people would have made against TV when it
first showed up. Comic books, non-classical music, yadda yadda yadda. It seems
like every generation thinks that the way they grew up was relatively
wholesome and meaningful when compared to newer generations... I don't buy it.
People change, habits change, ways of communicating and experiencing the world
change, but I think it's silly to compare any of that to actually doing things
that are physically unhealthy or harmful to your body.

All that being said, I don't use Facebook or Twitter either, but mostly
because I find them tedious.

~~~
pavelrub
The problem with your comment is that it can be said about any criticism of
anything new, regardless of whether it is objectively good or bad.

Not every way of communicating and experiencing the world is psychologically
equivalent. If my choice of "experiencing the world" is lying in bed and
watching pictures on reddit for 50 years (let's say I'm rich), without going
outside even once, and my idea of "having a relationship" is FB chat - It's
likely that this is going to make me a very miserable person. There are limits
to the amount of behavioural changes you can make without causing
psychological damage.

That's why there are actual studies on the matter: does Facebook make us feel
good? Is it psychologically healthy? Some of those studies are mentioned in
the article. A much better line of criticism would be to address those studies
directly, rather than making very general comments that can be used to justify
anything.

------
daktanis
I've been thinking about quitting Facebook but I haven't convinced myself of
it yet. Over the last year I've been trying to eat better, trying to be more
productive with my time....is it time to quit?

~~~
wutbrodo
You could just try treating it like an inbox (which is basically what I do). I
feel like people always talk as if the trade-off is between wasting hours of
time on the newsfeed or being harder to reach, but this is a false dilemma. I
log onto FB in an incognito window once every two or three days to check my
messages (I've turned off email notifications). I spent all of 1 minute there,
and I haven't looked at the newsfeed in at least a year or two. If I were to
close my account and lose its function as an inbox, there's a lot of messages
I simply wouldn't get. For example, it's happened more than once that extended
family visiting my city from overseas want to grab lunch in < a week; this has
happened more than once and I would hate to miss a message like that.
Sometimes these people won't go to the effort to hunt down the chain of phone
numbers across a few continents to get to my phone number, and that's totally
understandable when Facebook is a convenient alternative in terms of
messaging.

~~~
mercer
I treat Facebook in much the same way. However, I don't completely agree with
your statement that:

> I feel like people always talk as if the trade-off is between wasting hours
> of time on the newsfeed or being harder to reach, but this is a false
> dilemma.

I've often argued the same when friends of mine closed their facebook account
and became harder to reach. Then I realized that this choice of 'moderation'
can be very difficult for many people, in the same way that for some people it
can be _really_ difficult to stop drinking once they start, and in the same
way that for _me_ it's _really_ difficult to start watching a new show without
binging on it.

That said, ideally I'd propose your solution. On mobile this is easier if you
just install the messenger app without the facebook app (assuming that's
possible).

~~~
wutbrodo
Oh yea I totally agree. Some people definitely can't control themselves and in
their case closing down the account is definitely best. I had a friend who
broke his civ4 cd so he'd stop playing so much... He just ended up pirating it
a month later haha. I should have specified in my comment "if possible".

I've considered the messaging app but given the immaturity of app permissions
and Facebook's abysmal record, I figured I'd stick with the incognito login
thing.

------
vezzy-fnord
I never understood the appeal behind Twitter myself. I don't have an account
(nor one on Facebook) and I only use it infrequently to search various trends
when my curiosity is piqued. Twitter is an indispensable tool to perform
sentimental analysis and analyze/predict societal tendencies and trends in
general.

But as a social media tool? People always keep saying that there's plenty of
interesting information to be obtained from following technical individuals. I
just don't see that. What can I get that I won't obtain from blogs attached to
my RSS reader, or even just by going to high-profile communities and message
boards like /r/netsec, HN and Slashdot/SoylentNews/AltSlashdot to use as
digests?

Finally, even if you do find golden nuggets, they're buried between layers of
inanity and mundane content. Who would've thought a communication medium
limited to 140 characters would suffer from that?

I guess the only real benefit is that I can directly speak to tech figures,
although in a highly constrained format. I don't think I'd want to, though,
especially considering plenty of those people would likely see you as a
Luddite for still using email and IRC. Twitter's very webdev-centric, I find.

I waste enough time on the web as is. Adding Twitter to the mix would offer no
benefit. Though I'm assuming employers insist on it?

~~~
atmosx
Okay for social media. What about reading online articles?

~~~
vezzy-fnord
What about it?

