You actually can just leave Twitter and read a book instead.
- Social media minimalism
- Cell data minimalism
- Web minimalism
What you say is true about the 2nd section, but the comment you are replying to is referencing the 1st section which states, in part:
"I did not leave X the platform, but I did leave X the interface. Instead, I have been doing most of my tweeting through Firefly:
Firefly is a multi-client that combines together X, BlueSky as well as Farcaster and Lens (both partially-Ethereum-based decentralized social media platforms)."
When I decided to take a break from being terminally online, I didn’t turn off the phone feature but leave Wi-Fi on so I could still check my socials on the office Wi-Fi; that wouldn’t have actually done much. I forced my phone off the bulk of the internet by turning off Wi-Fi and disabling cellular data for everything but a few core apps like Messages and Maps.
having a phone with "flip to shhh" (put it face down, notifications are silenced) is really nice
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_Sigma_Phi
> Founded in Abilene Kansas, in 1931...
Wow, that sure is a thing to post online. The rest of the article is no better... Why is this person relevant?
I did not leave X the platform, but I did leave X the interface
Rant aside, beside social media minimalism I am also a big fan of compute minimalism. I don't use VScode with 100+ plugins or a zsh maxed up with so much bells and whistles that the terminal looks like Christmas and respond with the speed of microsoft powershell.
But I guess most people in SF are in the opposite camp.
That’s what I thought the article would talk about. If it were social media, I’d rather buy a cheap used phone, put the app on it, and turn it on only when I want to check something. Then it’s off. But I deleted/haven’t logged into my accounts for years now.
As for as minimal compute goes. my daily driver is an old laptop I put OpenBSD on. I also have an m1 air that I mostly use for shopping and meeting. Then an iPad for reading. But the key thing is that app and software are tools. It’s either tied to an activity (even relaxing ones) or it’s not used. No ricing or theming, just basic configuration to get the job done.
I kinda believe this. The web for collaboration, work, dumping out information and doomscrolling is a great tool, but I think is bad for any kind of socializing or 'communitizing' at a human level, where you are forced to treat humans as such instead of looking at some transduced digital representation of a real person in the form or chars or pixels prone to dehumanization.
Sounds great.
> But it's just using social media less, not using the Internet on your phone and using the CLI more
Never used social media, my phone only gets internet via a cable connection and I only use GUI where the CLI isn't capable enough, like a web browser.
Not sure what I was expecting. It's great advice, but kinda preaching to the choir.
Particularly if you comment.
Its definitely not a super toxic site though, but its social media. Same as discord and other chatrooms. Something like IRC we would have called by another name in the past but I think nowadays we could say it's a form of social media.
I agree it needs a definition and its no easy limes to draw, but id put it around algorithmic infinite feed recommender systems.
HN has no recommender system so I dont count it in. For me, its a forum. Plain, sometimes boring and often deep & rich.
HN front page is digitally curated. HN has an opaque post ranking algorithm.
Interesting... are you using a particularly old blackberry or PDA? Or is this something you've got your modern phone to use.
The thing that I’d been looking for on this minimal setup was a way to prevent access to the browser or installing apps at will. It was easy enough when I was on iOS. I just used Apple Configurator [1] to block Safari and the App Store, but on GrapheneOS, there was no great option.
Recently I made a device owner app [2] which allows hiding any UI app and locking itself. It ended up being quite an elegant solution as it allows full access to app stores for updates (new apps you install are hidden until you unlock and approve them). The only way around it is with the lock code or a factory reset.
This makes my phone a quite private device whose functionality I intentionally set ahead of time. It can only do what the apps I’ve chosen can do. I prefer browsing and similar on a computer.
[1] Apple’s Mac MDM app anyone can use. You need a Mac and to factory reset your phone first.
It is really interesting to see a third-party client for Twitter still operational. How is this still possible? This seems like an unauthorized third-party hack that would likely get shut down with too much attention?
I think that's telling. If you're reducing digital human interaction on social media (which yes, has its share of problems) but replacing it with "social" interaction with AI, that's not minimalism. You're replacing one vice with an even worse one and coping about it.
People are using LLMs to fill friendship, romantic, and mental health voids. Instead of turning to friends, lovers, and therapists/priests/mentors.
Obviously depends what you're doing, and not suitable for everyone, but it's an unhelpful generalisation to say AI in its current form is purely a paid product subscription.
The main problem is that talking to AI is like talking to a human without any of the thorny parts. It's only going to be nice and helpful and always available to you. Chatting with AI is to social interaction like candy is to a balanced diet. Sure it's more instantly gratifying but long-term it's really bad for you. You need the thorny parts to build important social skills like tactfulness and navigating conflict.
You could always try "You are a thorny internet troll" as your system prompt instead. Works wonders.
> social skills like tactfulness and navigating conflict.
We're not still talking about social media, are we?
(I agree that substituting AI for human interaction is bonkers, btw. But I'm not sure social media helps, or doesn't also involve mostly AI interactions these days.)
But that’s better than social media, which substitutes human interaction with chronically online weirdos. At least AI is smart and respectful.
If you are using it as an assistant, coach, or deep researcher to chat about interesting things with, then no.
Sherry Turkle breaks it down more here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMiR-GxTrtM
And using Twitter/X even with a different client... it's not really minimalism is it?
I can agree to some extent about the gripes with social media. It's why I prefer using Substack over Twitter, Reddit, etc. It is much more limited, but certainly not as toxic. BlueSky has also been decent in my experience.
We made all of this work before phones even existed. Getting your attention siphoned away by your phone isn't a convenience, it's an unhealthy dependence.
This is what reinforces the problem.
When we choose conveniences, we reinforce them. This makes it harder to get away from the things that brings us that convenience.
Conveniences to be able to get a hold of anyone in seconds rather than waiting. Believe it or not, there was a time when we were just, not available. It was OK.
Did that mean that things were a little more challenging? Of course, road trips or going anywhere new meant more upfront planning. Not knowing where your children were brought anxiety which meant rules. However, it was all manageable. By ALWAYS choosing conveniences, we shut the door on alternative options which in turn make it harder to deal with inconveniences.
I’m struggling to see how having anxiety about losing your children is better. I’m struggling to understand how knowing where they are would lead to having fewer rules.
I struggle to figure out how my friends being more available to text is a negative. What was character-building about calling them on a landline or losing contact with them entirely as an alternative?
I got chicken pox as a kid, that doesn’t mean my kids should get it.
I’ve had arguments like this with my parents about urbanism. When they grew up, the city was dirty, crime-ridden, etc. They also grew up during a time when the automobile was like the tech industry of their day. It was an innovation that changed their lives for the better in their opinion and lived experience. Their house got bigger, their car got bettter and lasted longer and their neighborhood got cleaner and safer, in their eyes.
My parents feel like trying to use the car less and switching to public transit or cycling more is like denying progress. What was the point of all that innovation and progress if we are “going backwards” in their eyes?
The end result of these discussions isn’t that I don’t believe in urbanism anymore, but I’m now more accepting of their point of view on the subject. I see their viewpoint as more valid than I used to. There’s nothing horribly wrong about their way of life even though I don’t necessarily want to adopt many aspects of it.
I am not saying that those things have no value. The opposite is definitely true. However, you are accepting a lot of baggage by reinforcing the systems that bring those conveniences. Now, you MUST have a cellphone or you are a Luddite. You MUST have a cellphone or you can't read a menu at a restaurant, unlock the door to your hotel room or access your bank funds.
You now have lost digital sovereignty to large corporations because you need to be able to get a hold of your kids within seconds.
All conveniences come with costs that you and society must bare.
Teach independence/self-defence/street smarts, encourage weight lifting for older kids, therapy/meditation for yourself (some anxiety is natural of course!), move to a safer city, have more children (easier to pair them up on adventures, plus less subconscious physiological fear of losing your one and only child), distract yourself and stay busy, go with them to places the first few times to assure yourself then take off your training wheels. Or just say no to certain things.
It doesn't seem to me a special case of anxiety that can only be addressed by spy apps and knowing you might be able to instantly contact them.
“Move to a safer city” is a lot more expensive than a phone plan. A lot of people don’t have that luxury.
I agree that all the things you talk about are life positives but the way I see it, giving a kid who is old and mature enough to use one a cell phone is like a $15/month cost proposition for an outsized benefit of being able to contact them.
Similarly, I think for people who are stuck in prison in Burkina Faso, I think much of this things also don't apply, as they don't have the freedom to chose if they want cellular service or not, if we're going through scenarios where all of those things might not apply :)
It's a shared personal experience, it is what it is? I don't think author is advocating that everyone in every circumstance should try to emulate all of those things. You read it, build your opinion, then learn from what you found useful and ignore the rest. If something would be impossible because of your personal circumstance, then you can just not think about that.
What a "fantastic" era we're entering into. I think eventually these people will have a minimalistic life, with malware stealing everything
- Not using social media at all
- Not using your phone at all
- Not using AI at all
Digital minimalism is less time on devices/platforms.
This article is more about digital curation, which has value in it's own right.
I have reduced my social media to two sites: Here and Mastodon (with a very limited follow circle). I don't follow tons of ad-ridden websites. I have a self-hosted RSS reader, following 10 feeds. Instead of following junk tech news, I read LWN.
Next step might be enabling antiproc on HN to reduce my time here, since I added time limits on applications on my phone and love that artificial limit.
I have limited energy and I want to focus it instead of spreading it around. Otherwise progressing beyond a certain point becomes impossible.
Having some kind of notification system would be helpful as well, since most platforms are actively trying to minimize the accounts you follow and replace them with their algorithmic suggestions.
My Instagram app (besides showing no ads) shows just the stories and feeds of people I follow, chronologically. Just a couple days this way will make you realize how little content there is, my friend's Korea trip has been the top one for like a couple weeks already.
Then you can get the DMs to avoid FOMO and realize how antisocial the whole thing is.
No idea if it works for x, I left that long ago and everytime I've checked out of curiosity I've been shocked at the absolute cesspit it is.
There are 4G mainboards you can buy and projects like https://www.nokia3310lteproject.com that aim to bring them into the modern world but for me these don't go far enough as they try to preserve the original UI. For me, the ideal device would be a 4G/GPS/Wi-Fi/Bluetooth-capable Nokia brick with modern interpretations of apps for maps, music, messaging etc. with optimized user interfaces for the limited screen space their tiny LCDs offer.
I have tried this very same thing on https://grimoire.bio. Large corpus of biological knowledge with detailed visualizations that are shown immediately upon searching, but adding LLM answer when missing/needed.
> I propose a philosophy of technology use called digital minimalism in which you radically reduce the time you spend staring at screens, focusing on a small number of digital activities that strongly support things you deeply value, and then happily ignoring the rest.
I have never seen a Hitler post but if I saw one I would immediately block that user and the algorithm knows that. It doesn't show me people arguing it shows me debates and tech. Because that's what I taught it to do. It is not even hard it just requires a little discipline.
When a friend sends a link I refuse to click on it unless my VPN is on and I'm using Mullvad Browser. I don't want their taste (which is quite often look at this outrageous thing) ruining my feed.
That's precisely why something like signed distributions packages are way more secure than curl bash'ing.
But many simply don't understand that. We had plenty of forged Web certificates likely. And even without that, with curl bash'ing anything sensitive you have to cross fingers that the server ain't serving one in 10 000 request with a backdoored version.
With curl bash'ing everybody is trusting every single time that the server ain't compromised or intentionally malicious.
At this point I've lost any hope: people simply don't understand security.
And as long as we'll have people saying that curl bash'ing is just as safe as signed distros packages, we'll have daily posts about major security incidents.
Security is a mindset and most people simply don't have it.
You know, it really is entirely optional to hang out at the Nazi bar.
> A phone connected to cell is an always-on tracking device
A phone connected to wifi is also an always-on tracking device. You can't really escape this without removing the "phone" part of the equation
Phones are not inherently bad for privacy. The cell connection, telemetry, and default apps are the main problems. The first can be solved with airplane mode, and the latter two with a custom OS (or an iPhone to an extent), just as you’d install Linux for those advantages over Windows. Due to their security model (app sandboxing, permissions, exploit protections), they’re a much better place to start for making a private OS that protects user data. GrapheneOS with airplane mode is more private than most desktop setups.
For most people, the phone records and relays network SSIDs it sees as well, even if not connecting to them.
That is this next Tuesday, four days from now.
example: https://www.sos.wa.gov/elections/voters/helpful-information/...
For example just yesterday there was a tweet by Richard Sutton.
Even Zuckerberg tweets.
Having worked for the man some time ago, I'm pretty sure a bowl of oatmeal has more insightful things to say
But misses the point. The guy owns his own Twitter competitor, yet has to go there if he wishes to have any influence.
It's where influential folks post. Whether you like it or not.
> Click on the tweet and look around its quotes and responses, the same way that someone would morbidly stare at a car accident.
Twitter gets money from ads. They can sell more ads for more money when they can demonstrate eyeballs and eyeball time. Therefore, they're incentivized to keep your eyeballs on the app for as long as possible. If that means putting car accidents in front of you, that's what it'll do!
I strongly believe that social media is basically a lost cause for this and a few other reasons. I tried out Mastodon and Bluesky, but people there don't seem to actually be interested in conversation, and there's physical limitations that prevent meaningful conversation anyway in the form of character limits. ~200 characters is simply not enough space for anything meaningful to be conveyed, so the platform selects for snippy clapbacks and pithy virtue signalling.
I'm also unconvinced there's anything of value to be had from these platforms, maybe including HN. I seem to be hearing about the new hotness in the AI space for example by just regularly attending coworking events. I guess if everyone stopped using Twitter, that would stop being the case. Or maybe we'd go back to RSS...
There are parts of the community where it's a lot better (atmosphere and open source devs, some digital artists who are not vocally pro/anti AI) but most people will see the front page that's almost exclusively US politics and get turned off.
I don't know how to fix this. Maybe create a new site that starts out focused on a specific large, politically mixed group like gaming or football fans and then expands to a general audience. Or use a personalized algorithm by default and initialize it randomly so new users see more diverse content.
I finally unsubscribed from the RSS feed of a web comic creator who has for over a year now (I think) not posted a single comic that is not about AI.
I mean there is not a single plot point beside "AI is bad" in those dozens of newer strips. I‘m not exaggerating as a rhetorical device, I mean this literally.
I‘m actually sympathetic to his view, but I came for the wonderful world and drawings. I‘m sad about the effect AI had on this artist, because yes, he‘s objectively endangered and right to protest it, but it has already taken away his oeuvre in a way.
(imo)
1. Small social like Discord, WhatsApp / facebook groups, Bandcamp (I was recently invited to a topical group there).
I have some designs for something like ATProto by fully permissioned and focused on small social modalities. I'm not interested in platforms with globalness, reposts/quotes, or blocking (fence sitting this one tbh)
2. Spending more time offline, with people in real life, then taking those social dynamics and interaction patterns back to online ones. We are currently doing the opposite as a society.
What's really notable is how the tone of a small subreddit post changes completely if a post gets boosted to everyone's front page. There's a small cycling sub I read with good posts about routes, tips, and advice. When something reaches the front page, it becomes a shitshow of car v bike culture war bullshit.
Substantial discussion of some hobbies has moved from Reddit to invite-only WhatsApp groups, precisely because Reddit went downhill. (This is true for long-haul bicycle travel, for example.) Unfortunately, on WA, too, everyone is on their phone, so messages are on average too short for comfort, and also there is no FAQ culture so people just ask the same questions again and again.
Getting this experience is simple: don’t click or garbage, occasionally block content you don’t like.