This is the experience of someone who has worked in digital media for more than a decade now, so your mileage will vary.
If you spend a significant portion of your day online like I do, you’re exhausted. Exhausted from the constant firehouse of news that bombards you whether or not you’re prepared. This may have come in the form of an article from a website you actively clicked on. Or you might have encountered it from a social media post where a person you follow has added a doomer reaction to an already bad thing. We all need some sort of refined media diet, one that doesn’t make us feel defeated every time we check on whatever screen is closest to us.
My journey to a better online experience is always evolving, but I started using an ad blocker on my desktop to block any elements that contribute to the online brain rot. Depending on what ad blocker and browser you have, you can block the element that you find most demoralizing. You can still keep the ads on the site visible if you want too, especially because companies need that revenue to keep the lights on.
A lot of online misery I encounter are in comments sections of news sites. Most websites have them turned on by default, which is great if you are actively (but almost naively) looking for a general discussion on the topic you were reading. But most of the time, I personally scrolled to the bottom and browsed until I found the worst comment until I was … satisfied?
I’m still trying to process what I was searching for when I do that. Is it validation that whoever wrote the comment has bad taste or is a bad person, therefore making me look good comparatively? Is it just that I think the internet is inherently a pretty lousy place and those comments those reinforce that? It’s unhelpful and the end result is me feeling worse because the addictive tendencies of being perpetually online had me searching for something bad.
It’s a tough habit to break, endlessly scrolling. There have been instances where I caught myself in the middle of a search for negativity, but I hardly ever had the wherewithal to prevent it . It’s unhealthy to have a media diet like that! Friends have told me similar stories about waiting to find a bad comment or a set of bad comments that devolves into an online argument between strangers.
To find joy in conflict is obviously counterintuitive, and yet I still scrolled. I used uBlock Origin to block my distractions. After blocking some of the comments sections of my most visited sites, I … still scrolled! But I found nothing. All that was left between my eyes and the screen was an empty space and my own thoughts, giving me the time to reflect on what I was trying to accomplish. The focus on my intent was heightened and my own thoughts occupied the dead air that random comments would have filled. It felt like someone slowly closed the valve connected to the firehose.
There are good comments sections out there, especially ones that have dedicated and niche fanbases. Reddit is a helpful place for comments because community and comments are the features. But if you’re visiting a site primarily for information and not community, consider blocking the comments element and prioritize the online communities that you truly value.
Blocking home buttons on social media sites has been something I never thought I would do, but it’s incredibly helpful. I can visit an Instagram or BlueSky as I normally do, but then I can’t go back after I’ve responded to DMs or checked notifications. This prevents the endless scrolling that has taken away so much of my time and peace of mind. I get (usually) one chance to througouhly read my timeline, so I try to make it matter.
I can’t count how many times I’ve scrolled until I realized I was on a never-ending search for nothing. I frequently found myself stopping when I’ve hit my quota of bad news. If you’re reading this you’re probably coming from my BlueSky account, so you know how bad the barrage of quote posts with “this is bad” and “it’s only getting worse” can negatively affect you. But if I’m ready and have the time to browse for fun, I can easily go back by entering the url on my browser to revisit my social timelines.
All this isn’t to say that I won’t read the posts comments at all. But having an opt-in setup like this makes things clearer, and the one additional step requires me to sit with the decision to read whatever good (or bad) things are on the other side.
I owe a lot to online communities and social media. And as someone who makes a living from it, I understand the nuances of the internet being a place that fosters creativity while also being built to keep you on whatever app or platform you prefer. It can be a vice and personal moderation could make someone happier.
Endless timelines and every voice front and center might make you think your phone or laptop is as overstimulating as walking the Las Vegas Strip. And if every physical storefront was as chaotic as that, we would yearn for the mom and pop place with no music or frills just to hear yourself think and do what you were there to do. And when you want to go back and party, we party. An ad blocker helps take me there online.
You might read this specific formula and think this is overkill, and that’s perfectly fine. We all have different thresholds depending on our upbringing with the internet and how much we rely on it for fun of for work. But I hope you can glean something from this to make your online experience just a little bit happier. Happiness and clarity is the goal, not just for your online experience but offline as well. I hope you can use that happiness to reenergize yourself and help your people.
A recommendation: This post was partially inspired the Turned Out a Punk podcast episode featuring Kate Nash. The conversation starts with music but then Kate goes on a very good rant about the online attention economy. It got me thinking into the ways I already preserve my sanity for an always-online job.
Thank you: I haven’t written anything in a while, so I appreciate you spending the five minutes or so of your time with me. I’m going to try to do this regularly to brush up on my blogging. If it’s good enough, maybe it’s a newsletter in the future. But we’re taking baby steps over here.
Hector Diaz 