
Eager to Burst His Own Bubble, a Techie Made Apps to Randomize His Life - ZeljkoS
http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2017/06/08/531796329/eager-to-burst-his-own-bubble-a-techie-made-apps-to-randomize-his-life
======
et-al
To a certain extent, this how we used to travel back in the day.

You hung out in a hostel, _had conversations_ with other travelers (instead of
thumbing through Instagram), and let the randomness of other people and life,
not apps, dictate your itinerary. You walk down a street, "oh hey that looks
interesting", and wander down a quiet alley that leads to cute cafe, or jump
in the back of a tuk-tuk headed to a waterfall that may or may not really
exist, but who cares? You're riding the wave. One of the main reasons for
travel/holidays is to break from routine, and the single most significant one
can do, bear with me Silicon Valley, is to put away that smartphone. Try
exercising your intuition instead of apps.

Many folks nowadays have optimised their lives so much that they've needed to
create a noise-generator to bring back some humanity.

~~~
losteric
Spot on, apps have optimized our lives... to local maxima. Apps can't guide us
to peak happiness because the best is disconnected from the rest.

Even when it comes to something as "simple" as music, I've never found a
"favorite" band through something like Spotify. Good music, sure, but the "bar
raisers" alway comes from randomness - radio, odd bar show, personal
recommendation, cabbie's CD player, etc.

~~~
toomanybeersies
I've found a lot of great new artists through Spotify's discover weekly.

~~~
WalterSear
We call it Spotify week. First week, suggestions are amazing. Second week they
are great. From then on, they are terrible.

~~~
endless1234
That's just not true IMO. The weekly playlist's "quality" varies, sure, but it
doesn't get worse over time for me.

------
reustle
I actually met Max while we both happened to be in Thailand in 2015. We spent
the day on bicycles following the directions his script told him, without
hesitation. Regardless of where it was in the city, that's where we went next
(a laundry mat, daycare, cafes, and the zoo iirc). Nothing was skipped,
because it was what the software told us to do.

Here are some pictures from that day
[https://goo.gl/photos/gyCNRz2rs7zLJrt79](https://goo.gl/photos/gyCNRz2rs7zLJrt79)

~~~
notdang
Just stay alert, in some parts of the world it can end tragically:
[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/07/british-
woman-...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/07/british-woman-shot-
after-family-stray-into-brazil-favela)

~~~
jpatokal
What does accidentally making a wrong turn into the bad part of town and
getting carjacked have to do with the original article?

~~~
coldtea
Obviously the concern of the grandparent is that if you do like the article
says and you blindly follow some randomized scripts to where they tell you to
go, you can easily end up "into the bad part of town".

~~~
Kiro
Well, you obviously don't jump into a volcano just because the app tells you
to. Unless you're going full Dice Man with it.

~~~
coldtea
No, but you obviously also don't necessarily know if some streets it asks you
to go to are in bad areas, unless you know about the city/country it has you
visit in a lot of detail.

------
maxhawkins
If you want to try this out check out my Facebook group, The Third Party:

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/the3rdparty/](https://www.facebook.com/groups/the3rdparty/)

You can send us a message to receive a randomly selected event near you.
People from all over are attending the events and posting about their
experiences in the group.

~~~
a3_nm
Looks like a great idea! Pity that it is not possible to see anything on this
page without a Facebook account. :-/

------
simmons
This is great. I think that the illusion of time speeding up as we get older
is due to getting into a routine where we do the same thing every day, and the
brain begins compressing memories as our everyday experiences become less
novel. Using a "randomizer lite" program to shake things up might be a good
start to breaking the routine.

~~~
taheca
protip: do this before having children, as it will be virtually impossible
after.

~~~
joezydeco
Speaking as a parent: children are _excellent_ life-randomizers by default.

~~~
bonniemuffin
This is one of the top reasons I'm interested in having kids. I think I need
my life randomized a bit more, but "the app that sends me to random facebook
events" won't come see me for Christmas when I'm old.

~~~
chris_wot
You may live to regret that. Most of the random things my kids do are cute and
funny. There are also times when they are decidedly not cute and funny, and
you spend hours scrubbing the walls getting rid of Mr Bee stamps and removing
those your 7 year old stamped to the ceiling (how the heck did he reach the
ceiling?!?)

~~~
joezydeco
Yeah, forgot to mention to the part where the kid-randomness is not all happy
Instagrammable moments. There are lots of less-happy events.

------
owenversteeg
Ah, but what was his source of randomness? Perhaps he didn't have enough
entropy and now he's got to do the last few years all over again ;)

I think I naturally do a bit of that myself: whenever I have some empty time,
I fill it with something "random", only instead of choosing randomly I often
choose the cheapest option. For example, I once booked a flight to Iran
departing hours after I bought the ticket, simply because it was the cheapest
option for an interesting place to fly (under $180 round-trip.)

I think the design choices really impact the end result, though. One minor
design flaw might result in completely eliminating a whole lot of interesting
places or things, which is what I'd be scared of. For example, that cheap fare
to Iran was only on one travel search site, which didn't have an API. By
selecting one booking website as an API, and letting the algorithm decide for
me, I wouldn't have gone to Iran.

Similarly, there are a lot of things that wouldn't seem like an "option" to a
computer but are an option to me. I've wanted to see Greenland from the air,
so I've been taking a lot of flights that pass over Greenland on the way to
places I needed to go anyway. But if the algorithm decided for me, it would
probably have booked air tours over Greenland - substantially more expensive
in terms of both time and money. It wouldn't be able to say "hey, you know
that trip across the Atlantic you have in a few weeks? Why not pay $25 more to
have it fly over Greenland?"

~~~
yebyen
> I once booked a flight to Iran departing hours after I bought the ticket,
> simply because it was the cheapest option for an interesting place to fly
> (under $180 round-trip.)

...

...

I'm trying to decide which part of this sentence is the least surprising part.
It's definitely not the part where you could fly to Iran and back for a grand
total of $180? I don't think it's the part where you figured out that this was
a thing you could do, and then decided to do it with only hours notice.

There has to be a follow-up question, but I'm still too baffled by this
sentence to think of it. Bravo? I would not have the fortitude to try this, as
a white American of European descent. Even knowing some Arabic (if you know
any Farsi, that would obviously take some of the surprise out for me...)

~~~
owenversteeg
When I arrived in Iran I knew zero words of Farsi, or Arabic. (In Iran I
learned about 80 words of Farsi but have since forgotten most.) I was flying
from Amsterdam, on a budget airline with a long layover in Ukraine, so that
contributed to the low price, although that was a remarkably low fare. My only
"connection" so to speak was that a friend is Iranian, but he hasn't been back
to Iran in many years and can't go back without facing execution.

I am also a white American of European descent, although I'm a dual Dutch-
American citizen, so my Dutch passport was what I used to enter the country.

~~~
yebyen
Well, that answers one question, it would not have been $180 to fly from the
USA!

------
dogruck
Max should meet Luke Rhinehart -- The Dice Man:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dice_Man](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dice_Man)

~~~
clarebear
What is the chance that would happen? ;-)

~~~
lukerhine
Pretty good actually. Just write me at lukec@taconic.net or comment on one of
my Facebook pages.

------
Mz
This "I'm bored with my life. I shall appify it and travel to random
countries" stuff is a whole level beyond First World Problems. It is something
like First World Problems of the Jet Set. Yet, this article doesn't cast him
as a member of the Jet Set.

Modern Life has gone to some rather weird places that were simply
inconceivable until incredibly recently.

~~~
coldtea
> _Modern Life has gone to some rather weird places that were simply
> inconceivable until incredibly recently._

You'd be surprised.

Humans are not animals. They can have such worries and desires regardless of
their material status.

Even people in eras that were horribly materially constrained, had to fight
wards, work their ass off, people in anything that we can define as "First
World Problems" had similar (and even more extended) concerns.

The movement of existentialism in Europe, for example, was created and
popularized by people who had participated in major wars and struggles, and
then were left to make a living in the ruins of post war Paris and Berlin and
such (Sartre himself was drafted, caught, and spend a year as a prisoner of
war in Nazi camps).

And there have been people with wanderlust (desire to travel to "random
countries") for as long as there have been people -- including tons of people
in dire economic situation, from third world countries, and what have you,
sailing etc.

------
ZeljkoS
Max's randomized living apps:
[https://maxhawkins.me/work/randomized_living.html](https://maxhawkins.me/work/randomized_living.html)

------
throwaway2016a
This is an awesome idea.

I've spent a lot of energy making apps to automate my life and management my
schedule. Now I'm tempted to also have it throw in something random now and
again. I couldn't go to these extremes (I couldn't pick up and move to another
country for instance) but it would be cool to say do things less extreme...
like pick a random place for dinner or watch this random Netflix movie.

~~~
uncle_d
Random dinner location is certainly worth a try, for dipping a toe in the
shallow end, so to speak:
[http://www.restaurantgenerator.com](http://www.restaurantgenerator.com)

~~~
passivepinetree
Similarly, Netflix randomizer sites already exist. I've had good experiences
with [https://netflixroulette.net/](https://netflixroulette.net/), for
example.

~~~
k-mcgrady
:/ This was exactly what I was looking for but doesn't seem like it's location
aware. Every movie so far it has suggested is not on UK Netflix.

------
bartread
My immediate reaction to this was, "hey, this is awesome," and actually it
really is. I think it's an interesting and creative solution to a problem a
lot of us share - admittedly whilst recognising that for large swathes of the
world's population this would be a _great_ problem to have.

Still, there's that nagging little voice in the back of my head: part of me
can't help wondering what will happen, and how people will come to view it,
if/when his apps catch on (as I suspect they will).

~~~
jackvalentine
> Still, there's that nagging little voice in the back of my head: part of me
> can't help wondering what will happen, and how people will come to view it,
> if/when his apps catch on (as I suspect they will).

That was my thought too - once a critical mass of people are going to 'random'
events it'll be Portlandia Over.

------
driverdan
I love the idea of random surprises.

I created a simple app that picks random items from a Chinese ecommerce site
within a set budget. My long term goal was to use ML to learn what each user
liked and send them random items on a schedule, selecting from multiple sites.

I never finished it because other things took precedence but the random
selection part works.

Anyone interested in this as a service?

~~~
distances
Someone built a similar thing a couple of years ago to get random things from
Amazon:
[http://randomshopper.tumblr.com/post/35454415921/randomized-...](http://randomshopper.tumblr.com/post/35454415921/randomized-
consumerism)

------
avip
Inspiration from Borges maybe?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lottery_in_Babylon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lottery_in_Babylon)
(it's in the highly entertaining Ficciones collection)

------
zer0th
I've noticed that problem in my life as well. As a result, I decided to
consume media a bit more randomly. My harddrive has a folder called "todo".
This folder contains subfolders labeled "watch", "listen" (which includes
"music" and "podcasts"), "read" and (a fun one) "pilates". The folder "watch"
includes mostly movies and documentaries, sourced from my public service
broadcaster's VOD service (which I scan weekly for interesting stuff) or
youtube. The "music" subfolder of "listen" contains first and foremost dj
mixes I've collected from eclectic rss feeds. "read" has all kinds of PDFs and
HTML pages (mostly scientific papers, long-winded articles and e-books). The
"pilates"-folder contains videos of individual exercises (I find it more
exciting to not always do the exact same routine)

On top of that I've written a script which prompts me to choose a category
(i.e. one of the folders delineated above). It then randomly opens a file from
the respective directory. When I am done using a file the script asks me
whether I'd like to archive it, keep it (in case I am not done with it yet) or
delete it.

------
narrator
This is the plot of the indie movie called "Buggaboo":
[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0206610/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0206610/)

The main character, who is an Indian engineer living in Silicon Valley, says
to his friends : "What if you could randomize your life?". That's all I'll
say. It's a good movie. I'm not going to spoil it for you guys.

~~~
distances
> It's a good movie.

Score 5.2 in IMDb disagrees.

~~~
narrator
Well, just my personal opinion. YMMV :)

------
clamprecht
See also, Geohashing:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geohashing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geohashing)

"Geohashing is an outdoor recreational activity inspired by the webcomic xkcd,
in which participants have to reach a random location (chosen by a computer
algorithm), prove their achievement by taking a picture of a Global
Positioning System (GPS) receiver or another mobile device and then tell the
story of their trip online."

~~~
leovailati
Link to comic: [https://xkcd.com/426/](https://xkcd.com/426/)

------
rnprince
Reminds me of undergrad class registration, when everything satisfying a
general education requirement would fill up and the server would crash the
instant it started.

I didn't choose to take History and Religion of Ancient Israel, but it was the
class I got the most out of.

------
mcrad
I'm not a developer but I did once build a prototype that sent text message
inquiries throughout the day (within hours configured as "open" on my
calendar). The questions were customized around a few goal areas, as a way to
measure my progress. I never found much support for it, but the concept was
intended to give techies with the hyperactive schedul tools a chance to leave
"generic" hours on the calendar while still being accountable to being
productive during those times.

Tried a similar idea with a diet-specific set of goals. Aiming for 100%
comprehensive tracking of your calories seems a bit crazy to me.

------
lolc
Well he won't meet me. I live in the No-Facebook Bubble.

Though sometimes the parties I help organise are listed on the Facebook by
third parties. So there's that slim chance...

~~~
AndrewOMartin
How do you know when someone isn't on Facebook? ;)

~~~
twothamendment
Is there a site to sign up on so people can find you and find out that you are
not on facebook? That would be great! Maybe facebook could integrate those
results into there people search. "John Smith, Anytown, USA isn't on facebook.
Try emailing him".

~~~
lolc
Well joke's on us because they could already do this. The Facebook knows about
my existence. It knows my name, my face, and my friends. My email too. I'd
have to avoid contact with all people that use the Facebook to prevent this.
Infeasible.

They just don't publish the data because they have little to gain from it and
there's no reason to needlessly antagonize people. They sell it without
telling anybody.

------
zoom6628
Brilliant way to actually take a break, or holiday, for those with the means
to do it. I only plan my holidays down to which airport to arrive/leave and
where to stay (yes im picky about that). Everything else in between arrival
and leaving i prefer to depend on what I see/find/hear when walking around.
That is my idea of a real holiday. Each to their own - YMMV.

------
jonbaer
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flipism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flipism)

------
monksy
I've been looking to do something like this for my own side project.

Unfortunately Yelp is pretty restrictive about working with their review data.
(They only give you 3 reviews per business on the APIs, also they're hostile
against scrapers)

Hasn't anyone seen projects that do similar things with
Facebook/Foursquare/Yelp data?

------
Tade0
Great idea, but I don't need an app for that. My fiance takes on this role -
we've been living in another country for almost two years because of one idea
she had. I'm picking the next place once both of us get bored with this one.
Suggestions, as always, welcome. Has to be in the EU though.

~~~
michalskop
Czechia. It's the EU country with the newest English name hard to beat (-; And
after some 2 years you will be happy to move on(-; Just avoid Prague-this city
hates itself

~~~
Tade0
Two of my friends moved to Prague just recently. I heard it's weirdly
expensive.

------
dubin
Anyone who's interested in more ideas along these lines should look at Tyler
Cowen's list of how to be less complacent: [http://tylercowen.com/complacent-
class-quiz/](http://tylercowen.com/complacent-class-quiz/)

~~~
icebraining
It said I was a trailblazer. Doesn't sound like me at all. I guess not being
American might throw it off.

------
628C6l0
i've been doing it for almost four years now, and it's amazing to see how
wrong and how _frequently_ wrong your preconceptions and expectations can be.

you don't need an app to do that though. a spreadsheet is perfect for that
purpose (and telling Google Assistant to 'flip a coin' or 'give me a random
number between 1 and 20') and gives unlimited flexibility and less reliance on
developer to implement features you want. not a lot of people appreciate this,
but sometimes trying to accomplish a task with the general-purpose tools you
have at hand can lead you to discover solutions so good it is in fact
_superior_ to any dedicated tool.

~~~
cbcoutinho
But in your case you still have to pre-select a range of options right? How do
you avoid missing the 'unknown unknowns' that a separate service might help
provide?

~~~
628C6l0
take restaurant choice for example. yes there's a range of options, but some
of the fields instead of saying "go to restaurant A" say something like: "let
google pick a random number X between 1 and 50. google "restaurant near Penn
Station" and go to the Xth result."

multiple times this procedure led me to dine at fine-dining establishments
that i would never consider going into with the clothes i have on (the
experience almost always ended up better than i imagined). a nice thing about
randomizing is that you become psychologically dissociated from your actions.
when things go bad you don't blame yourself and take that to reflect on
yourself ("well, i was just following orders"). when things go well you just
feel thankful.

------
gehwartzen
The past eqivilent was flipping to a random page in the yellow pages, throwing
a dart at a map, or flipping a coin. It's funny that we need a app to
randomize our life at all. I suppose it is largely just how we acces
information now.

------
jpatokal
The Degree Confluence Project is an interesting version of random travel:
people visiting arbitrary lat/long intersections.

[http://confluence.org/](http://confluence.org/)

------
JunkDNA
If your life needs more randomness, I highly recommend having or adopting
children. Having three of them 7 and under, I can attest that the entropy in
my life is off the charts. I have no need for an app.

------
darioush
I don't like NPR's attitude of conflating social anxiety of meeting a random
bunch of people and whether they're going to accept you with racial issues.

This makes me like them significantly less.

------
cconstantin
Just imagine someone hacking into this algorithm

------
barsonme
some people use apps, others of us have ADHD that works just as well :-)

------
thebigspacefuck
"Peculiar travel suggestions are dancing lessons from God"

------
somberi
To quote NY Times - "Algorithms lead us to Anagrams"

------
ghosttie
So basically diceliving

------
allard
like John Cage

------
user432468
NPR so diligently points out white privilege. It couldn't be that he dresses
well, has good hygiene, is educated, well off, and speaks politely. It is
_only_ because he's white? In San Francisco of all places?

> At first, he was nervous: What if people wouldn't let him in? But, as a kind
> of unassuming white guy, he actually didn't have this problem. (And Max
> acknowledges this privilege.)

~~~
yttrium
Really? You think that this is exclusively a matter of hygiene and _style_? I
don't know what's worse, that you're so misinformed about the existence of
white privilege, or that you feel comfortable trying to bring some edgy socio-
racial nonsense into this conversation.

