
Many teenagers report that they’ve never been so bored - ytNumbers
https://www.thedailybeast.com/generation-z-is-already-bored-by-the-internet?ref=home
======
soylentcola
They touch on something later in the article that sounds perfectly familiar to
me from my teen years: eventually that unavoidable and universal boredom can
lead to creativity.

Just as people my age saw TV go from 13 channels to 150+ channels and wondered
how you could ever run out of things to entertain yourself, today's teens run
into the same limited ability of "consumption" to keep their minds stimulated.

Eventually there's nothing on that you feel like watching, your mobile media
feed runs out of new posts, and you get tired of playing the same video games.
That period of boredom can be just what you need for ideas to start
percolating in your head and occasionally lead you to make something or do
something different.

Boredom is what got me screwing around with simple programming on my old
Commodore computer or figuring out how to use a mix of cables, adapters, and
stereo inputs on my boombox to experiment with rudimentary multi-track
recording.

To this day I love having a good supply of parts, bits, pieces, craft
supplies, and yes--boredom available on occasion because that's when I try out
new ideas. When the alternative is just sitting around doing the same old
things, the barriers to trying new ones tend to drop.

~~~
jbob2000
Boredom is a double-edged sword; it can lead to creativity, but it can also
lead to drug and alcohol abuse. Small towns and counties are rife with
substance abuse and everyone will tell you it's because "there's nothing
better to do".

If boredom can be reasonably structured, then I think it's a good thing, but
unfettered boredom is a bit risky in my opinion.

~~~
liberte82
Idle hands are the devil's workshop.

~~~
jbob2000
Love that saying. I use a different version, "The devil makes work for idle
hands".

------
Mononokay
As someone who falls into 'Generation Z' (at least technically. The line
between generations is a special kind of confusing), I'd say on average that's
the exact opposite of true - there's so much to do I'm almost never bored, but
the result of that's been absolutely disappointing - it's made it infinitely
harder to dedicate myself to learning new things, or reading books. There's
simply so much to do that it feels almost neglectful not to try and get
everything done.

Then again, I suppose that might just be a chronic lack of an attention span,
which I've had years before I had internet access, so my experience is more
than likely less common than average. There's simply too much to do and not
enough hours in a day.

EDIT: I will say, though, that the internet's been incredibly beneficial to
most, if not all, of those who've grown up with it - the world's never had a
better comprehension of the English language.

~~~
smoyer
The lines between generations are definitely blurry - if you stretch the
unofficial start and end dates apart, my father and I are both parts of the
same generation (how does that work)!

~~~
Mononokay
I'm in the same situation, actually! With the dates I've seen for Millennials,
at least.

~~~
smoyer
Youngin' ... my father and I could both be baby boomers.

------
danschumann
I'm 32. I only see people on a few days of the week, some days I don't leave
my house. I'm not axious, but I seem to think, "Why leave? My stuff is here, I
can do all my work and socialize from the internet."

Part of the problem is I'm starting a company, and am on low finances until it
launches. So, I'm car-less, in a city not really meant to be walked, and it's
a small town, so not much happens anyway.

Part of me wants to take a cheap job washing dishes, so at least I see people
regularly, but I know it would be a waste of my talent, and I would hate it
and quit after a day ( seeing how futile it was ), but seriously.. yea, I get
what they mean.

Sorry I'm not being extremely articulate, I'm trying to wrap my head around
the utility and role of the internet in my life moving forward.

~~~
bufferoverflow
I find most people IRL are very boring. Out of all the people surround me
there's one guy who I can talk to about life extension, robots, AI, etc.
Everyone else is busy with meaningless everyday news and/or sports and/or
generic entertainment shows, almost nobody has cool hobbies or even interests.

~~~
hobbylobber
There are other interests besides what you might find on HN. Talk to someone
about law or music or philosophy or art. Not everyone particularly cares about
life extension, robots, or AI (I certainly don’t). Maybe it’s not that
everyone is boring, but rather that they simply don’t share your interests.

------
kuon
I'm the most creative when I am bored. Being bored is important.

~~~
soylentcola
Yep! I've tried explaining this to my gf. I told her that I just _need_ days
where I have the freedom to sit around and do nothing for a few hours because
without feeling rested and bored, I don't have as much mental motivation to
try new things or finally tackle projects that have been kicking around in my
head for months.

When I'm never bored I feel like I'm too busy. Then when I get some small bit
of downtime, I don't want to do anything because I never know when I'll get
the next small bit.

~~~
wizardforhire
I have a mentor who loves to define this any chance he gets. Recreation: re-
creation. It’s not what we do for fun, it’s what we do to recreate ourselves.
Arguably one of the most important activities we may be so fortunate to
partake in. In my freelance circles we have an idiom “getting your _no_.” It
applies to when one learns to say no to things and has the courage to use it.
As in “I finally got my _no_.” Those two lessons have been invaluable for my
wellbeing.

~~~
athenot
Wow, I never realized that. [Quick lookup]... indeed, the etymology is from
Old English via Old French going back to Latin "recreare" and seems to have
had that meaning all along.

This comes at the perfect time for me as I've been reflecting on my hobbies
and how to make the most of them for my life.

------
ashelmire
We're all getting bored because microconsumption is inherently unsatisfying.
You're waiting for others to produce a tiny bit of content for you to consume.
Perhaps we will see a renaissance of long form consumption, dedication to work
and study, and doing things for their own benefit rather than for social gain.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
> We're all getting bored because microconsumption is inherently unsatisfying.

Well said.

> Perhaps we will see a renaissance of long form consumption...

The problem can perhaps be considered one of opportunity cost. In the time it
takes to read that long form article, I could read a whole lot of "tiny bits
of content". And in many ways, I have spent the last N years tuning myself for
those tiny bits. So the long form article has to pay me back for the time I
spend reading it, not just at the end of the article, but at least at the rate
that the tiny bits of content do. Otherwise, I'll feel like the article is
wasting my time, and I'll quit part way through, looking for something more
stimulating.

Of course, the flip side is that all those tiny bits of content have their
opportunity cost, too. The problem is that, for each one, it's just a tiny
opportunity cost. But add them all together through a day (or worse, a year),
and I lose a _huge_ amount of time and mental energy on tiny little searches
for stimulation.

------
dingaling
> "Sometimes I feel like I’ve seen everything there is to see on the internet"

That's very sad, and a direct result in my opinion of the gamification of
digital attention. If it's not on ${social_network} and doesn't earn you Likes
then it might as well not exist.

Even just pressing Random Article in Wikipedia would be a step up out of that
abyss.

But first teenagers have to relearn the ability to self-discover, like
previous generations did in libraries, instead of sitting staring at a feed
waiting for something to be pushed to them.

And the second lesson might be that not everything has an immediate feeback. I
still reach back to things that I learned about by chance on the Web and
Usenet back in the 90s.

~~~
freehunter
Eh... I'm not Gen Z and I get this quite often too. Sure there are a few dozen
new articles on the front page of HN, but not all of them are interesting to
me. Sure there are thousands of subreddits but good ones are hard to find and
eventually you'll run out of interesting content there, too. Random Wiki pages
are fun, but for every good one there's a hundred boring ones. I used to use
StumbleUpon but again, the signal to noise ratio is just silly.

I don't think your assumption that these teens just don't know how to discover
content is correct. The problem is that content isn't interesting. There's
only so many times you can hit random on Wiki and stare at "List of famous
dogs from Bollywood movies" before you want something more engaging.

Your comment, to my ears, sounds like "these kids need to put down their
Nintendos and go play a nice game of kick-the-can!"

~~~
AnimalMuppet
> Sure there are a few dozen new articles on the front page of HN, but not all
> of them are interesting to me.

I think the problem is deeper than that. The problem is that even many of the
interesting articles are only interesting in a certain way. I'm looking for
something, and _what I 'm looking for isn't really here_. And after a few
years on HN (or Facebook, or Reddit, or Twitter, or whatever), I start to
realize that the next article isn't going to really supply what I'm looking
for, just like the last thousand didn't. So I'm bored even while I'm looking
at the next HN article, hoping it will do the trick, and at the same time
knowing that it really won't.

------
artichokeheart
It's not just the kids. I've never been so bored with the internet.

~~~
chrisvalleybay
It's the "commoditization" of the Internet.

The other day I started thinking about how amazing toilets are – how much time
they save every day. Bare with me. I went on thinking about the history of
toilets, musing back to an ancient one I visited in Ephesus, Turkey. There
were no toilet stalls. Between 6-10 holes in a bench, with flowing water
underneath. According to our guide, this is one of the first toilets of its
kind (citation needed). It must've been so amazing when they got this toilet.
They probably talked about it all the time, and wanted to go there to hang
out. It was a place of communion. Today toilets are utilities. They aren't
exciting at all. You barely stop to wonder about the marvel you sit on. How
much time it has saved you, or how the mechanics actually work.

The Internet will sort of become like that one day too. Just a utility.

------
JustAnotherPat
>"Sarah, a 14-year-old in New York, describes it this way: “I’ll go on Insta
and it’s just people all talking about the same things. I’m like, I already
heard that or I already saw that. It’s like, when you’ve seen everything there
is to see in your Insta feed or on the internet. We see the same lip gloss,
the same eyebrow style, the same meme like 14 times. It all gets old and then
you get bored.”"

Incredibly sad that this is what the internet has been reduced to. It's not
the internet that's boring; it's your vapid social circle!

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Maybe the medium is partly at fault. How can you sustain any sensible
discussion in the noisy mess of Insta etc? You can try but it reduces to
catchphrases and catty remarks so easily. Even here on HN its a constant fight
to keep folks on topic and contributing usefully. How much harder in the wild,
wild internet!

~~~
srtjstjsj
YouTube is full of fascinating stuff for all hobbies. But it's hard to find
because there's no quality filter, only popularity filters that promote
clickbait.

~~~
ytNumbers
There's plenty of great content on YouTube. If you spend a day or two watching
quality videos, YouTube will then start recommending other quality videos with
a similar worldview. How do you find that first day or two worth of quality
YouTube channels?

[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/7xn6yv/what_yout...](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/7xn6yv/what_youtube_channel_is_great_to_binge/)

------
smoyer
"Sometimes I feel like I’ve reached the end of the internet"

Sometimes I've jokingly asked my family members if they've finished reading it
(the Internet) yet. It's so sad that these limits are imposed - sometimes by
ourselves but also often by the invisible walls of the corporate, private
gardens. I guarantee there are enough educational (history/technology) and
maker videos on youtube alone that I'd never get bored.

But if you're specifically looking for more to do where your friends are,
you're going to be limited in the same way you would be in real life. When I
started traveling extensively for business in the mid '90s, I made a point of
being friendly to people in airports, restaurants, stores, etc. (Well ...
those that wanted a conversation anyway). Expanding the pool of people that
you talk to will inevitably lead to information pools that you weren't aware
of.

As an analogy, it always amazes me to watch someone else using software - take
git or even bash for example. I'll say "I didn't know you could do that" and
when they ask how I accomplish a task, they generally learn something new too.
I have (by far) more sites bookmarked that I've learned about here on HN than
from any other source. I guess it's because we don't just repeat lip-gloss and
fingernail polish styles here?

------
_bxg1
I think part of it is that mainstream technology has become so homogenized and
consolidated. Both hardware and software. Phones these days, for most people,
are no longer empowering pocket-computers, but same-y glass rectangles that
all hook you into the same handful of content streams. That's incredibly
boring.

In 2018 you have to go out of your way to remember how novel and diverse both
the internet and personal computing can be.

------
ponderatul
It's great that our bodies have this mechanism to reject this artificial
progress, the kind that is so fast we can't even get accustomed to it.

There is so much, SO MUCH, to do, to see outside our black mirrors, that we
don't even realise. But it's much harder now than ever. Because our phones
have made everything seem so easy, it cheapened many experiences (e.g. social
interactions). Now that we have to go back we have to realise that the pace is
much slower in real life.

reminds me of:
[http://www.paulgraham.com/addiction.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/addiction.html)

------
ender89
I'm a definitive millennial, I have access to multiple video streaming
libraries, 3 game consoles, literally 100s of video games, all of the
internet, and any book I could want. I still find myself looking at my copious
amounts of entertainment and think "I don't want to do any of this right now."
I may have a netflix queue in the hundreds and entire series I want to watch,
but I experience the boredom that only comes when you have so many options you
can't pick one. I don't think this is unique to teens.

~~~
moistoreos
I think it comes with changes in personality. I used to get into a new game
every 3 months or so (and I still buy steam games on sale like that) but I
find my way back into two games for months. I think it has to do with side
work and hobbies. I definitely don't binge netflix or gaming like I used to.

------
slfnflctd
That was... a lot of fluff.

A 15 year old kid who has "seen everything there is to see on the internet"? I
mean, really.

This is the exact same 'restlessly disengaged' phenomenon humans have been
experiencing since the dawn of the species. It's part of having a complex
brain. Other animals probably even have it.

There is no end of stuff to do and see! Sometimes you just don't feel like
doing anything. And that's okay. It might be better in my mind to consciously
redirect, or to take a nap instead of zoning out on a screen, but to each
their own.

~~~
slothtrop
>A 15 year old kid who has "seen everything there is to see on the internet"?
I mean, really.

This isn't necessarily a literal statement. There's just so much noise and
nonsense to wade through as to be demoralizing. Or the excess stimulus is
enough to just turn you off everything, in part why I try to minimize aimless
surfing. It may take a conscious effort to stumble upon something of interest.

------
jodooshi
>boredom is actually a crucial tool for making our lives happier, more
productive, and more creative. -Gretchen Rubin

It reminds me of a book I read last year: Bored and Brilliant[1].

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Bored-Brilliant-Spacing-Productive-
Cr...](https://www.amazon.com/Bored-Brilliant-Spacing-Productive-
Creative/dp/1250124956)

------
return0
I am shocked by the amount of people browsing the internet on mobile/tablets.
If you are not going to make the effort to get yourself on a seating position
so you can actually create stuff efficiently, you 're definitely going to be
bored because feeds are just other people's ideas and you can only have so
many before you lose yourself.they should try a desktop machine

~~~
yoz-y
Well, you could also say that on a desktop machine one will just open 20 tabs
with long-form articles to "read later" and then end up scrolling down a bite
sized feed anyways. I know it happens to me.

~~~
return0
the point is not to read more, but to try things real-time.

~~~
yoz-y
Having a desktop computer may be useful if what you are making/trying has to
be done on a computer. However, most of the things you read about on the
internet can be done without it no? For example you could be looking up music
sheets, or some tutorials on how to craft something.

I get your remark that the massive passive consumption leads to boredom, but I
do not think that the format is the real culprit here.

------
rabboRubble
Question.... is boredom felt differently by people in different eras?

I was terribly bored as a teenager. I didn't have the luxury of blaming the
internet at the time. _I_ was boring.

------
turc1656
The teens are bored because 1) they are misusing the technology/resource that
is the internet and 2) they never learned how to entertain themselves,
probably because of the internet.

I'm a Millennial and had several friends complain regularly in high school and
college that they were bored. They couldn't stand to be alone because they
didn't know what to do with themselves. I never understood this. I was fine in
groups and could be social and I was perfectly fine being alone for extended
periods of time. I genuinely can't think of a time when I was bored when I was
left alone. Sure, I've been bored in my life - but it has been when I was
forced to do something or be somewhere I didn't want to be. Alone and in
charge of my own time, though, there was always something I wanted to do,
learn, etc. I think people like some of my friends and apparently Gen Z never
learned to be alone or how to get lost in their own mind, whether that be
through creativity or curiosity.

I've also noticed another troubling trend with Gen Z. Many of them have no
passion, drive, or ambition. They don't really care about much of anything and
simply want to be entertained all the time. I think that's the other side of
this. I have younger siblings as part of this generation and nieces and
nephews and they all seem to be aimless in life. Granted, they are still young
and may not know for sure what they want to do, but for all but one of them
they seem to have no interests or hobbies!

This wording might make me sound old and cranky but...when I was their age I
was not like that. This isn't some romanticized hindsight bias from my
childhood. I remember clearly. I had several interests that I was really,
really into - science/math, computers/programming, tennis, and science
fiction. I was fortunate enough to have parents who could afford to send me to
places like tennis camp in the summer as well as computer camp (yes, that
actually existed back in the 90's, believe it or not) so that I could further
these areas of interest. My pure entertainment was through movies, music, and
yes, gaming. But gaming wasn't done out of boredom. It was done for one of two
reasons. First was the social aspect of multiplayer games like Counter-Strike
and Goldeneye (which at the time had to have everyone in the same place). The
second was for the fantasy aspect of gaming so that I could allow myself to
get wrapped up into a well-told first person story with games like Myst, Half-
Life, and System Shock.

Lastly, what truly astounds me is Gen Z's lack of curiosity. When Google and
Wikipedia came around, I entered a whole new level of learning online. I could
find and learn anything I wanted to, without having to hike to the library and
try to figure out where to find the information I wanted (which I never did,
because I hated going to the library). The internet became a massive
educational resource to me. But Gen Z doesn't even use it for this purpose, as
far as I can tell.

I don't think, as the article suggests, that the cause is that we have
adapted. Instead, I think society has changed in a few other ways where
instead of trying to curate children's curiosity and imagination, we have
instead decided to follow stricter structures and schedules in a one-size-
fits-all attempt at schooling, while decreasing funding for the arts and
entirely getting rid of things like shop class. Combined with these structural
changes, children have tablets from shortly after birth and they learn that
entertainment (a.k.a. the eradication of boredom) is just a click away...until
it suddenly isn't. And then when that hits, they don't know what to do,
because they have never been in that situation ever before. Their mind
literally can't function in the same way because it was never taught how to
handle that scenario. So they click around through apps like zombies,
accomplishing nothing, learning nothing, and remaining unfulfilled.

~~~
magduf
>I've also noticed another troubling trend with Gen Z. Many of them have no
passion, drive, or ambition. They don't really care about much of anything ...
they all seem to be aimless in life.

I think this is a symptom of a much bigger problem in society. I think there
was a similar phenomenon during the collapse of the Roman Empire: people
simply lost interest in maintaining the society and doing what was necessary
to keep it going (such as specialization of labor), and it fell apart. People
abandoned the cities to instead work for feudal lords, and the cities were
sacked by invaders.

~~~
turc1656
I agree with that general concept. The larger society becomes and the more
densely populated an area is, combined with expanding government in nearly all
areas of life, people seem to have this attitude that everything is someone
else's problem to fix. Problem with poverty? Don't worry, government is on the
case. Healthcare is too expensive? Government has a solution for that. Police
are abusing their authority? Don't worry, the ACLU and other rights advocates
are suing on your behalf. The list goes on. All of this takes away from the
concept of being an involved, responsible citizen that knows what's going on
in your community. It also absolves people of the moral obligation to do
anything since the issue of the day is a clearly defined problem that someone
else is supposed to tackle.

And of this, I have to admit, I am not guiltless. I don't feel connected to
society in the same way I used to and I admit to having fallen into this
mindset. I have actively tried a few times to offer something back (other than
money) and no one seems to want it, despite their claims to the contrary. Case
in point - I went on several forums offering completely free advice and
support in helping people to lose weight as I have studied this topic
extensively and made significant changes to my body through changing my eating
habits. Only one single person even responded and then they didn't even follow
through with a single communication. None of this was unsolicited, either.
People directly asked for help and then wouldn't take it (despite being free).
Others chastised me on the boards for what they thought was a scam ("it's not
free, he'll hock products at you", despite my promise to not do so). I even
put up fliers at my local grocery store and bus stops advertising the same.
Not a single response. I tried to put up a flyer at my community center but
they put up so many roadblocks just to let me put up a piece of paper
advertising a free service, I couldn't get approval. So even when I try to pay
it forward, so to speak, I can't even do that, so I just gave up and stopped
trying entirely.

So now I'm more, "Fuck 'em, every man for himself. They're someone else's
responsibility and they probably have a family anyway who should be helping.
Not wasting my time." And that's really messed up and unfortunate.

~~~
btrask
Thanks for trying. There are still a few areas where good samaritans are
valued, but they are drying up (mostly due to companies and scammers).

------
tomcooks
It's easy for me to think "first world problems", but that's the aim off such
clickbait-ish articles after all.

Hopefully this boredom will lead to the end of the society of the spectacle
and commodity fetishism (bringing with them consumerism i hope).

Maybe this will result in a new approach towards entertainment, how to
socialize between peers, art; it would be amazing if boredom would lead to a
renaissance driven by science and helping others - let's see

------
oblio
Teenagers being bored? Is this a news report from the 50's? :)

------
neonate
The Onion article almost writes itself.

------
forgottenpass
So, 57 channels and nothing on?

------
hashkb
Do they still even know how to entertain themselves IRL? Can we get Calvin and
Hobbes in front of these kids?

~~~
Balero
Yes they do.

Whilst I also like a bit of C&H, it's a cultural artifact from another
generation. "(T)hese kids" don't need our C&H, they have their own, or will
make it themselves.

------
Agathos
I'm bored by roads.

------
krasicki
_Never_

