#83

Yeah but different addictions clearly carry different levels of harm.

3 Likes
#87

It is, but the response is the same. Turn it off.

#89

That isn’t how addiction works.

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#90

What?

#94

Yeah but addiction isn’t an independent thing. You can’t say ‘Oh that guy is addicted’ without some sort of reference to what they are addicted to.

You are addicted to something because of the effect (physical and mental/emotional) that it has on you. So addictions to different things are different.

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#96

I’m absolutely being as anecdotal as you are, but I don’t see how you can argue that addiction is addiction completely independently of what you are addicted to. It doesn’t make any sense.

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#100

Yeah, but wouldn’t you agree that an addiction to smoking is more harmful than an addiction to chewing gum?

#101

Fully aware of that but there’s a distinction here between say, I don’t know, the gambling and tobacco industries and the technology industries in their harnessing of addiction. Gambling and tobacco for instance, their business models and profits seem significantly more actively built on people becoming addicted to their products. Technology less so.

There is also a distinction between addiction and impulsive behaviour that has a negative consequence. In my experiences many who cite, no matter how flippantly, an ‘addiction’ to technology etc. have made little attempt to redress it in spite of the fact there are many mechanisms at their disposal to do so. Of course it goes without saying that anyone suffering from an addiction to smartphones etc. needs additional help with this.

1 Like
#102

Thread became boring.

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#103

I think it’s people that either didn’t grow up with it (ie old people on facebook) or people who have completely grown up with it (12 year olds on snapchat) that struggle with the internet and it’s social-emotional effects.
People who started going on the internet half way through our lives are probably the most well-adjusted as we have a frame of reference for reality, grew up when the internet wasn’t taken so seriously and do kind of see it as a form of entertainment rather than actual real life.

1 Like
#105

Don’t agree with this at all, and I think this attitude is one of the reasons why abuse online is so prevalent.

#106

nobody’s saying the internet is evil, guys

#107

I’m gonna leave it there, I don’t have any numbers to give you but I think we just fundamentally disagree and that is fine.

1 Like
#109

@marckee: Old Person on Facebook

#110

Really not sure about that. Facebook has thousands of engineers whose job is to keep people on Facebook for as long as possible. I think maybe it’s just more hidden. I went to a really interesting talk by a design ethicist at Google about this stuff, and how so many elements of design on a smartphone, app or platform that we use are geared specifically towards manipulation and addiction. For example, is almost completely funded by advertising, so of course it is in their interests to design around people becoming addicted to Facebook.

I really don’t think it’s as easy as saying ‘turn it off’.

#111

It’s funny - the only place that seems to really take the addictive qualities and potential negative consequences of constant connectivity seriously is in Silicon Valley, among the people who designed this stuff in the first place. I find it funny that the guy who invented the like button is terrified of the effect social media apps are having on people and DiS is all, “meh, it’s no different than a newspaper.”

2 Likes
#112

Makes everyone think theyre a topic expert because they read about it on the internet rather than studying/working in/experiencing it irl.

#113

Yeah but every company wants its customers to engage with their products as deeply as possible. I agree that there’s something different/mind-altering about it when it comes to something like facebook and that there’s almost a kind of hypnosis that is trying to be attained. But I don’t think it’s inherently unhealthy, especially when compared to other industries whose products are. If customers with addictions to alcohol, tobacco and gambling were all cured tomorrow those industries would collapse overnight. facebook wouldn’t.

You’re right in that it’s not as easy as saying ‘turn it off’. You’re right. But at the risk of sounding Full Tory on this - smartphones and their ability to leave you constantly connected are powerful things. They really are. And in the main, it is down to the individual to protect themselves from this and there are plenty of opportunities to opt-out. Of course individuals who have addiction problems won’t be able to do that and it is important to draw this distinction.

#115

Totally agree with your second point - I guess I found your ‘turn it off’ comment pretty glib, in the sense that it is clearly an addiction and you wouldn’t really say to a heroin addict ‘Just stop taking heroin!’. I think smartphone/internet addiction needs to be taken seriously. I am not sure I agree that it’s not ‘inherently unhealthy’ - especially to mental health, with the FOMO, need for social validation and the associated problems with that, especially in young people. I am being pretty anecdotal but I have a pretty strong feeling that is is inherently unhealthy
just maybe on a different level to alcohol/cigarettes/gambling.

#116

This question seems to come up a lot in conversations with my neighbours many of whom are a little older than a lot of my other friend groups and as such are perhaps a little more skeptical about social media.

I think I’m sort of just on the cusp of this or otherwise perhaps a little too introverted to really be properly affected by social media. What’s probably more pressing for me is the saturation of content which means focusing one specific thing tends to make me feel almost guilty, particularly if it’s something unproductive, given the number of options there are at one time.