It's a bug, not a feature! Tech distractions & digital 'good practices' for creativity

Fibbit, Fibbit... let's start with a new comic before we talk about tech and sprucing up our newsfeeds

It's not a bug, it's a feature…

One I came across recently while so bored I was scrolling through the screens on said Fibbit, and finding such entertainment gems as Water Lock, Settings, DND Mode (which sounds exciting, but actually means do not disturb) and this gem of a suggestion, despite the fact that the fibbit does not come with any sort of clip. My literal brain was left to assume that I am expected to find the nearest clipable object, and attach it directly to body as the screen suggests.

I am a fibbit user.

I say user rather than owner, because we legally own very little of the tech we pay for these days.

Even though I possess such a device and possession is nine-tenths of the law, I'm sure that buried somewhere deep in the scroll of the Terms of Service of any current electronic is a self-destruct clause or a page about how drones will collect it if I refuse an update. I can picture them now, arriving in V’s like flocks of homing pigeons, to carry our palm-sized consumer electronics back to the mists of Silly Cone Valley from whence they came.

I am half joking; tech companies wouldn’t do that.

It would cost them money.

But they do include such TOS clauses as, if you’ve got a problem with us, you can’t take us to local court, and have to fly to and stay on Mars, where we get to pick the person who decides if we were doing anything wrong.

Am I overstating?

How many of us could just hop up and go to the venue (in another state or country) chosen by a company to have them choose an arbitrator and decide a case? For the average user, California or Delaware might as well be Mars: both are completely beyond the reach of many user’s travel access to settle a complaint. Nevermind that much has been argued about how the arbitration system is inherently biased pro-business, since it is businesses that pay them and perpetuate the existence of their services.

Today's terms of service are like the Godfather, with a one-sided offer you can't refuse… unless you’re in the position to go to a rival mob that's offering the same thing or you have access to an open source equivalent. But the more complex the dependencies within a system, the more likely the only available option is privately owned.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how terms of service agreements can constitute a form of coercion.

In university, people don’t want to use Lockdown or Respondus to sit an in-class exam. Should students have to find out on the day they show up to a required course that their choices are a) don’t graduate or b) install a software that can see everything on your personal device and watch you through your webcam?

That’s not consent, that’s coercion.

Remember: if you’re required to use a particular technology as part of your education or employment, you're as bound by the TOS as anyone who freely chose to use the technology.

I love technology and gadgets, but our current technological landscape has become a growth at all costs garbage dump.

If you're interested in educating yourself on how this technological wasteland affects us, real, breathing humans, dygres is worth subscribing to. Another good option is Ed Zitron’s Where's Your Ed At, which unpacks the current big players and big problems in tech in an extremely well-researched newsletter.

I get most of my news through newsletters these days. It feels a little old timey compared to the 24/7 stream of news noise, like I’m getting the newspaper delivered via the magic of email at periodic intervals.

For my sanity, I have blocked news from showing up on my browsers, and have blocked feeds on most social platforms, including Youtube. I recommend the newsfeed eradicator if you’re using Chrome. There are other alternatives for other browsers.

But I promise you, it feels better to be able to search things you’re interested in than be treated to an algorithmic drip-feed.

It gives ideas space to flow, rather than feeling constantly exhausted in the barrage of narratives designed to make us feel strong emotions so that we react and engage.

Blocking out news while trying to cultivate a “balanced” feed to stay informed takes effort, but it is one of the best things I have done for my creativity and mental health.

It’s hard to write or create when you’re in a headspace that everything is awful and nothing-I-could-do-could-possibly-change-anything-so-what’s-the-point-and-I’m-going-to-numb-with-doom-scrolling.

We empower ourselves to think and create by blocking, deleting, and hiding infotainment exhausts us.

It’s a matter of asking a simple question over and over again.

What does this do to my battery?
Does it drain or recharge it?

If it makes me feel a little bit drained, a little bit tired, it’s done. It gets no more of my time. I block and delete to create power and energy for myself.

This has had some entertaining results. My Substack feed is now full of medieval history, cartography, and boring rocks for nerds. It makes me happy. But it does take conscious effort to maintain; and it requires thoughtful maintenance to prevent draining media from slinking into the feed.

So good news, we can get out of the destructively distractive feed cycle. And I say that as someone who has diagnosed neurodivergence and oftentimes, the attention span of a gnat.

HINT: You may need to do a few weeks of total news detox and blocking to let your nervous system calm down enough so that you can effectively cultivate a feed.

It takes effort to find newsletters with voices you want to support and hear from.

THE NEWSLETTERS I FOLLOW

I have found a few. Disclaimer: none of them pay me (I WISH!). These are just the things I read because I care about being aware of them, and don’t want to be fed whatever Goofle decides I’m supposed to have an opinion on. They are all have free newsletters (though some articles in the sites themselves may be paywalled.

For Science: I subscribe to Nautilus. The highlight reel is free and there’s a free long article every week.

For global and US news that attempts to remove biased language (it is written in the US): I follow 1440. It’s refreshing to read something that avoids incendiary and inflationary language, and attempts to strip information down to factual events.

For politically focused “non-partisan” US news that attempts to explain what sources on the left and right are saying about the issue and provide its own middle ground take: I follow Tangle . US politics is presently affecting Canadians like me, and many of us feel the need to stay on top of it. Tangle helps me not to be completely drawn into the political torment nexus.

For local news: I subscribe to the Van City Lookout, since Vancouver’s politics affects me.

For Canadian financial news: Wealthsimple’s TLDR is the only markets news that manages to inform and entertain.

A quick note on any source that claims to be “unbiased,” as two of the above do.

Keep your brains on while reading,

because unbiased media of any kind is impossible, regardless of whether articles are human written or AI generated. Unbiased news typically means they’re using a centerist approach, which is actually its own position. More on that another time.

My preference is for independent, well-researched journalism.

In Canada, most of our major media outlets are now owned by the same companies. They regurgitate similar takes that reflect the political leanings of their funders across their publications. I believe it’s good to hear from different voices so we don’t forget that there is a whole world beyond our own little algorithmic bubble.

If you know of other news or newsletters that are worth sharing, please add them in the comments.

BACK TO FIBBIT

See how distracting technology can be? Anyway, I use fibbit because they don't put those clicky little pedometers in cereal boxes anymore. Gone are the days when corporate marketing let me run with Tony the Tiger and Toucan Sam.

You could shake Tony vigorously to massively inflate your step count. And he wasn’t great for swimming… or any contact with a drop of water… so my fibbit will have to do.

But I digress. There are two thoughts I’d like to leave you with.

One, if we actually did everything our technological overlords suggested to use their products, our lives would be objectively worse for it.

And two, when I leave myself space to follow the intrusive thoughts through to their natural “ooh but what would happen if…” conclusion, I skip along to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, where I am rewarded with a Scrooge McDuck vault of ever replenishing ideas.

That is, as long as I can cultivate my digital existence effectively enough to avoid distraction and finish a thou-

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