I’ve been making an effort to change my web habits. I had too much of a small number of websites, and was limiting my “writing” (should you want to call it that) to comments. In other words, my use of the web was a complete waste of time.
Change #1 is spending less time on the web. Not much needs to be said about the benefits of that. As it relates to this topic, I am trying to read more books and papers (the ones printed on paper) and taking notes. The joy of deep learning - something you can not and will not get from social media scrolling. When you say yes to one activity (scrolling and wasteful interaction) you are saying no to another activity (learning, in my case).
Change #2 is to stop posting comments on other people’s sites. Few people will read them, and even if they do, they’re only shallow levels of written communication. Nobody benefits from those comments beyond links to related material, factual corrections with sources, and that sort of thing. Social media does not facilitate discussion, thinking, or the exchange of complicated ideas. And there’s nothing wrong with that if your goal is to kill time, but that’s not my goal now, nor has it ever been.
Change #3 is to greatly increase the range of sites I’m visiting. https://bubbles.town/ provides access to content that would never take off on social media or one of the big sites. It has been particularly helpful to check the most recent posts on Bear Blog. And I even threw together a page with my own web directory. Here is an example of the kind of post I wasn’t seeing. I don’t agree with everything in that post, and that’s the point. It has the depth that I can learn something, think about it, and come away with a better understanding of the world. Articles like that provide the reader with much more than consumption.
Change #4 is to increase the amount I write on this blog, on my website, and on my other blog. I’ve learned that writing on the internet is not something you do for other people, it’s something you do for your own benefit. That’s not to say it won’t be useful to others, but that usefulness to others is irrelevant. Writing up your thoughts formally, getting them to the point that you’re willing to share them with the world, is a sign that you’ve actually thought things through. It goes without saying that writing something you intend to share publicly is not the only way to think at a deep level. It is one way to accomplish that, and in many cases the easiest. “Writing is thinking” is a phrase that’s thrown around all the time. It’s true. Social media commenting, in most cases, does not qualify as writing. It is written communication lacking the comprehensive thinking process that makes it an act of writing.