I’ve never been particularly fond of Las Vegas and I actively despise gambling. This is likely due to the fact that I do not have any sort of fascination with flashing squares of light and also tend to have a pretty solid grasp of probability theory.
Nevertheless, I found myself spending a disproportionately large amount of time there during my tenure as a corporate executive, primarily for business meetings. Why? Because anyone in the world, anywhere in the world can get to Las Vegas conveniently and inexpensively, relatively speaking. And that is of zero coincidence, it’s exclusively by design. Very intelligent people have invested zillions of dollars in making this so. As such, we had a lot of meetings in Vegas, thereby falling right into the trap.
SLOTS OF FUN!
My routine was to eschew the late night post-meeting shenanigans and retire early. I’d then awake with the sun and go outside to take a walk and get a bit of exercise. During one of these trips (it was probably many to be honest), I distinctly remember negotiating the labyrinth of the casino in a desperate attempt to find my way out (also by design) and seeing a sight that will vividly and indelibly live forever in my mind’s eye.
A man was sitting in front of a preposterously large slot machine, completely passed out with his head on the screen snoring loudly while drool dripped and oozed down as the machine continuously screamed, “Wheel of Fortune! Wheel of Fortune!”
It was perhaps a few years before I retired when I was on a plane headed home. I recall it being mid-day and as I put down my book to take the water offered to me by the flight attendant, I looked to the gentleman next to me who was…
Completely passed out with his head on the seat in front of him while also snoring and drooling with his phone still lit up like a slot machine resting in his limp hand.
It was simultaneously harrowing and revolting. My thought then was precisely the same years earlier upon witnessing the pitiful scene in Las Vegas, “There’s one pathetic addict who got “got” by people and corporations infinitely smarter than him who have consumed his time, energy and attention and who willingly and delightfully paid them for doing so.
I could feel his mind decaying, only inches away from me.
Gary Numan
For the record, in the context of addiction, I specifically mean dopamine addiction and apply the following well-accepted definition: “A brain disorder characterized by compulsive engagement in rewarding stimuli despite adverse consequences.”
And, as most reasonably intelligent and cognitively aware people know, this type of compulsive, addictive behavior is exactly what device and application designers strive to do. In 2016, Tristan Harris, a former Google design ethicist stated that all applications being designed use the same underlying psychology as slot machines and cultivate obsessive behavior to steal your attention and maximize revenue.
As Harris says, “When we pull our phone out of our pocket, we’re playing a slot machine to see what notifications we got. When we pull to refresh our email or text, we’re playing a slot machine. When we swipe down on our Instagram feed, we’re playing a slot machine to see what photo comes next.“ You get the gist.
Like slot machines, much of app design is based on intermittent variable rewards to stoke this behavior. More eerily, integrating this type of behavioral psychology into the software design makes people get “problematically involved” three to four times faster compared to other types of gambling.
A NATION OF JUNKIES
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Mr. Fate. Everyone already knows this, but it’s cool because I got my shit totally under control. I’m way too savvy to get “got” by (statistically likely) some young white male with a PhD in software engineering living in Silicon Valley.
Yeah? Dunno. Maybe.
Probably not.
On January 2022, CNET and the BBC published an article with the headline “Americans Spent A Third of Waking Hours on Mobile Devices in 2021.” Citing recent research from the analytics firm App Annie, the data within this report is nothing short of shocking. Moreover, it’s clear that Americans, in particular, have got “got” big-time.
According to the report, in 2021, time spent on mobile devices was 4.8 hours per day, an increase of 30% from 2019! Of that, 7 out of every 10 minutes on a mobile device was spent on a social media or photo/video app. All in, Americans logged a record 3.8 trillion hours on their mobile devices and downloaded more than 230 billion apps, spending $170 billion in total, also up 20% from the prior year.”
There’s plenty more interestingly depressing factoids in the report, but the above is more than enough not to suggest, but to legitimately confirm, we’re a nation of junkies.
Sadly, the barrier to us acknowledging this is that the behavior is so pervasive and inculcated that it’s simply perceived as normal. It’s tantamount to the dude huffing free-base cocaine in a crack-house every day saying, “What do you mean this is a problem? Just look around here, everybody is doing it.”
POINTING MY FINGER AT ME
Anyway, after reading Matt Haig’s wonderful and insightful, “Notes on a Nervous Planet,” it really made me think far more critically of my own technology use and, perhaps abuse. I started my process by reading Cal Newport’s “Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World” and Catherine Price’s “How to Break Up with Your Phone: The 30-Day Plan to Take Back Your Life.”
Even before starting, I knew I was likely in a better position than most as I’ve attempted to be somewhat aware of and deliberate about my relationship to technology, specifically my smartphone. I don’t sleep with it in my room, I don’t take it with me when I do things like shopping or hiking and I leave it turned off for many hours at a time. Moreover, I am not on social media (except Twitter for Fates) and have only downloaded about 15 apps on my phone. Last, I already track my streaming, news, film, and video usage and report that on Twitter monthly. So, I figured I was a bit ahead of the curve.
Not surprisingly, just like we FI folks do with potential aspirants, both authors advised readers to download a monitoring app to their phone that, just like Mint or Personal Capital in the money space, meticulously tracks handling, app usage, time spent, etc. Like we all know, you can’t manage it if you don’t measure it. I used an application called SPACE.
The next steps from both Newport and Price were about the same, which were to delete all social media apps from your phone and then turn off all notifications of absolutely everything. This is very sage advice as app notifications are a foundational underpinning of the previously mentioned intermittent variable award psychology and, of course with 70% of all usage being social media and related, it’s a rapid way to free up some time. A powerful way to get at the root of your addiction.
I deleted Twitter from my phone and iPad, no big whoop. I’ve always disabled my notifications with the exception of text messaging, so I did disable that as well.
More from Newport & Price in managing the physical nature of the actual devices by keeping them out of bedrooms entirely and having charging stations in less used parts of the home. Already doing that.
So, after a couple of weeks, I was able to get a much better handle on my mobile devise usage. Like every single person who’s done a comprehensive review of their Mint or Personal Capital data after the 1st month, I was a bit surprised. While my usage was not excessive or close to a third of my waking life, it was more than I expected and fell into distinct patterns such as heavy usage in the mornings when I attempt to get all of my “electronic administration” knocked out and the evenings to see what came in throughout the day.
ME, I DISCONNECT FROM YOU
The most significant benefit I realized was from deactivating text message notifications. Texting, sadly, is my primary form of human communication and I like to be responsive. However, what I learned very quickly after turning them off, is that those text notifications (vibrations, banners, and badges) were unconsciously driving me crazy. I didn’t understand how much so until they went away. I found they would pull me away from whatever I was doing and had a Pavlovian desire to respond immediately once I heard one come in.
Since then, I’ve stayed the course and my life is incrementally better for it. Moreover, I now “batch-text” in the mornings and evenings as opposed to continuously throughout the day.
A couple of readers did reach out last week when I did not publish an article (which was very kind). However, it was a deliberate 7-day break from laptop usage and my own arbitrary “rule” for never varying from my own schedule. It felt great. I also gave the “Twitter Machine” a 7-day break and, while I lost out on a couple of craft beers from my pal Freddy Smidlap, it felt good. FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) causes anxiety. JOMO (Joy of Missing Out) is wildly underrated Just sayin’
Overall, this journey has certainly proven that even someone who is hyper-aware of their relationship to technology and is a relatively very light user of mobile devices is still quite prone to get “got” by something like text notifications. However, as it stands, I’m pleased with where I am. My goal is not to abandon technology altogether, but to be in a position where I don’t just feel, but actually know that I’m running the device and it ain’t, mostly, the device running me.
HOW ABOUT YOU?
Have you ever tracked your technology usage? Why or why not? Do you have “problematic behavior” with your smartphone? If so, what? As always, I’d love to hear from you.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
I openly acknowledge my own hypocrisy in that as a shareholder of Apple, Google, & Facebook/Instagram, I am a direct financial beneficiary of the “problematic behavior” of my so-called “Nation of Junkies.” The same for Eli Lilly & Co. and Pfizer, manufacturers of Prozac & Zoloft and other meds widely used to treat depression and ancillary psychological damage caused by social media & tech addiction. And let’s not overlook the obvious fact that I have used mobile devices and applications to compose, publish and distribute this article.
Addictions are symptoms of coping mechanisms gone awry. We are indeed a nation of junkies, and social media/smart phones are relatively mild and less destructive forms of soothing mechanisms, in the same echelon as food/exercise/work, and just below drugs/sex/adrenaline. I would submit we are instead, or perhaps in addition, a nation in a healing crisis. In order to heal, we must be willing to pay attention to the parts of us that are broken or wounded, sit with the discomfort and ultimately transform the pain into wisdom. That’s way harder work than a trip to the strip mall, and yet in our deepest wound lies our greatest gift.
Hi BB and thanks for the comment. I agree with you and it’s somewhat horrifying that companies have intentionally and knowingly created a entire nation (and world) of dopamine addicts. They have created a pervasive problem where none existed even 15 years ago. I also agree with our position on the foundation of healing being based on acknowledging that we’re broken and wounded, however, as I state in the article, pretty much one a) recognizes that they have a problem and b) how severe it is. Sadly, I’m not optimistic at all about the adverse impact on humanity. Although, I’m quite bullish on my tech stocks continuing to rise.
I have a good relationship with tech overall. I spend most of my ‘tech time’ on my full desktop and it’s generally when I’m working on my graphic arts business. Only then do i ever look at or use any social media and that’s only to promote my designs or sometimes my blog. My graphic arts business is growing and my blog is dying, so I spend most effort on the former.
I rarely use my phone, some days I never even touch it. I have no social media apps on my phone and won’t allow them. I do like navigation for driving, but I rarely drive. I see the behavior you mention and it saddens me, so many folks living their life while looking at either a smartphone screen or a TV, or both at the same time.
Thanks for the comment Dave and nice to see there are others out there who refuse to be addicted to a smartphone. Yeah, the image of someone staringing simultaneously at a phone and the TV is pretty harrowing.
I have my notifications disabled as well, except for text messages and calls. But yeah, I have the same problem with texts. Over the years I’ve noticed the swing from calls to texts on my phone, especially at work. I’m really considering ignoring work texts and letting people know they should call if they need something. Maybe my last few months before FIRE, I’ll make some radical changes that might beg a layoff check haha.
Yeah, I find myself subconsciously distracted by my phone too, especially during idle time. I jokingly blame the decline of newspapers and magazines for forcing me to read from my phone. My last “classics” read was Anna Karenina, and I remember being a bit envious of how socialization takes place in the 19th century, that goes with all the classics. People went out of their way to socialize back then (at least in the books). Seems that might have been the height or golden age of real human socialization. Good read Mr Fate.
Hey Noel and thanks for the comment. Yeah man, those text notifications are just insidious and it’s funny I had no idea how much so until shutting them off altogether. I much prefer the phone over text, but I hear you on the work-side of things. It was the same way for me and just drove me insane. Like you point out, it’s quite pitiful how human socialization has declined in the 20th and 21st centuries. As much as I wish it would change, I think it’ll only continue to get incrementally worse.
when they write my epitaph the one think i want on the plaque is “freddy never owned a smartphone.” while i’ll freely admit to many vices that ain’t one. i am also grateful mrs. smidlap is not “on call” with her phone and the thing stays in the kitchen at night many rooms away from where we sleep.
i swear i would barely use social media if i had to do it on my own time. i have many little increments of down time at my thankless J.O.B. and it’s barely a good time killer for those. i barely respond to create much content on weekends or at night, choosing to waste my life on other things. oh, i’m still wasting it, just not on the trendy.
good for you tracking and catching yourself on the little addiction. i really hate seeing folks glued to this junk that really adds no value and probably is poisoning them. i appreciate the mention, mr. fate.
You’re my hero, sir! Not even owning a smartphone. That is punk AF! Nuff said!