[HN Gopher] Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even wh...
___________________________________________________________________
Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don't
distract you
Author : wgoto
Score : 549 points
Date : 2021-03-25 17:07 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (blog.rize.io)
(TXT) w3m dump (blog.rize.io)
| rolftheperson wrote:
| Reading this, I realize that I am in the process of second
| screening myself. Who are you second screening right now?
| blonde_ocean wrote:
| Not who, but what: work.
| ryanmarsh wrote:
| When I wake up I put my phone on Do Not Disturb.
| bootlooped wrote:
| One of my favorite features of my phone is to turn on silent
| whenever the phone is placed face down. It's a dead simple
| physical action you take, and the vision of it face down is a
| reminder of your intent.
| WhyNotHugo wrote:
| I'm constantly amazed at how the mainstream population uses
| phones.
|
| Most people tend to have phone with alarming-notifications, so
| they get informed that they have a message, or email or whatever.
| The phone interrupts them and directs their attention. They train
| themselves to be controlled by their phones.
|
| I'd go crazy trying to live like that. I have no audible
| notifications, and vibration only for actual calls. Everything
| else: I'll see it when I see it. I tend to think of it as
| receiving a letter -- I'll see it when I check if there's any
| post, I don't need to be interrupted right away. Personal space
| and all that.
|
| It just seems so mentally unhealthy. The same applies to sleeping
| with your phone in the same room.
| Loughla wrote:
| It's about identifying healthy boundaries, and apparently most
| people can't do that when it comes to smart phones.
|
| We use ours like regular phone junkies to stay connected/dick
| around/navigate life throughout the work day. But we use
| gps/time triggers to shut off notifications during our time
| most likely to be used for deep focus, and/or enable airplane
| mode at night, when at home, on dates, or with family.
|
| That way the silence is natural, and we don't have to rely on
| our own self-control to do the right thing.
| ryanmcbride wrote:
| I'm the same way. It's crazy when you see people out in public
| that are having some kind of text conversation and their phone
| makes a loud obnoxious beep with every message. I honestly
| couldn't tell you the last time my phone was off silent mode.
| ip26 wrote:
| I'm all about minimizing notifications - however, a letter is a
| terrible way for my friend to let me know they are running ten
| minutes late to meet me, or for my neighbor to ask for a quick
| task, etc. So texts still alert me.
| hnick wrote:
| I was with Android for a while but inherited my wife's iPhone.
| Since I found it so annoyingly loud I asked that she put it on
| mute like my phone and she didn't mind. Apparently it was on
| mute so long, the physical mute switch won't turn back on! It
| flips back instantly if I try.
|
| Anyway that was a mixed blessing because I found the iPhone's
| vibration to be barely noticeable compared to my old phone so I
| missed a few calls that I wanted to take. I had to use
| accessibility features to unmute the device then slowly turn
| off each notification as it annoyed me. I'm fairly happy where
| I have it now.
| root_axis wrote:
| Indeed. I have configured almost all apps on my phone to alert
| silently, leaving only a handful of applications that will
| actually vibrate my phone, that way when I feel my phone
| vibrate I know it's something I care about rather than trivial
| updates that might be of some interest, but can be viewed in
| the alerts tray whenever I get to it.
| amateurdev wrote:
| I'm with you on trying to have minimal notifications. I have
| one personal email configured only for important mails, phone
| is set to vibration only since years (TBH I don't even remember
| what my ringtone sounds like) and my phone is always face down,
| which means DND mode. That being said, I relate with what the
| article says. I find myself checking my phone every 20 minutes
| or so for notifications and the occasional Twitter/Instagram
| scrolling. It is distracting to me!
| barbazoo wrote:
| I have to admit, just yesterday I changed my phone
| notifications to audibly (sound or vibration) notify me only
| for calls of any kind. Signal still gets a silent notification
| with no details but every other app, including email, doesn't
| really deserve my immediate attention. Will that piss some
| people off? I doubt it but maybe. Will I spend less time on my
| phone, for sure!
| pdonis wrote:
| _> I have no audible notifications, and vibration only for
| actual calls_.
|
| I have no notifications at all except for calls and text
| messages from a few specific people.
| riho wrote:
| The problem is boredom. We've become accustomed to having an
| instant excitement dispenser, and are now addicted to it.
| Boredom has become even more uncomfortable than it used to be,
| because we're no longer used to being bored.
|
| No study or links to cite, just my observation.
| judge2020 wrote:
| > They train themselves to be controlled by their phones.
|
| For many people this is fine because most everything can
| already been done online - remote work is huge, friendships and
| relationships are often formed exclusively through chat apps or
| VR, and they get most, if not all, of their entertainment from
| Netflix/YT/TikTok. For them, managing time spent on different
| services will make a bigger difference to their QOL than
| deciding to not use their phone.
| 2ion wrote:
| I have my phone in do not disturb mode 24/7. The only
| exceptions are "VIP" contacts from close family...everything
| else can wait until next morning 8am when I'm checking personal
| stuff first thing or until around 8pm when I have my evening
| distraction session.
|
| So. If I _do_ get an audible notification, it 's almost always
| urgent, bad news.
| aerospace_guy wrote:
| > I have my phone in do not disturb mode 24/7
|
| Me too. I've recommended it to so many people, but I think
| many are so addicted to that dopamine hit they find it hard
| to do.
| tomjen3 wrote:
| I have found that I am involved with too many things with
| too many random people for that to work, so instead I flip
| my phone to silent mode whenever I am doing something
| interesting or with people, and then if somebody notify
| when when I am browsing hn, that is probably fine.
|
| I have DND on during the night and work day. Like gp, if
| somebody can make it sound at 4 A.M, I want to be there to
| take the call, but it is almost certainly bad news.
| mrmuagi wrote:
| > The only exceptions are "VIP" contacts from close family.
|
| Curious how you configured this? I'd be interested in this as
| well.
| y2bd wrote:
| If you have an iPhone, you can flag certain contacts as
| allowing "Emergency Bypass". This lets their calls (and
| text messages if you flip another switch) vibrate and/or
| ring your phone even if you're in do-not-disturb mode.
|
| Can't speak for Android, but I'm sure it has a similar
| feature (and due to system access it allows third-party
| apps, maybe you can do the same for third-party chat apps
| as well).
| mrunseen wrote:
| In DND settings, there's also option called "Allow Calls
| From" which user can choose from:
| >Everyone >No One >Favourites >Specific
| Group
| jonS90 wrote:
| In Android you can configure Do Not Disturb to allow
| notifications from specific apps. I'm very curious if
| iPhone can do this.
| lurker_primo wrote:
| In Android, you can have starred contacts. Only their calls
| will get through.
| GoblinSlayer wrote:
| For me vibration is very intrusive notification, if the phone
| is on the table, the table all but explodes, a melody without
| vibration is a much softer notification.
| tayo42 wrote:
| The alternative was everyone using loud ring tones. Some how
| amazingly society managed to shame that away.
| 83457 wrote:
| I hate the sound of my wife's iphone on vibrate. She has it
| on silent but then I hear this annoying sound from across the
| room. I would definitely be a fan of some nice sound instead
| of vibrate or the common ping sounds.
| SilverRed wrote:
| The default iphone notification sound is so incredibly
| loud. Especially when someone sends multiple messages its
| like its striking a bell inside my head.
| SilverRed wrote:
| I find the Apple watch to be the least intrusive notification
| method. Its just a light tap on the wrist. And it uses
| different taps for different things. Receiving a text message
| is different to a call and different to the message telling
| me to stand up for a minute.
|
| It also doesn't make any sound so its not distracting others
| in the office and it can always be felt while vibrations in
| my pocket are not always noticeable.
| deergomoo wrote:
| > And it uses different taps for different things.
| Receiving a text message is different to a call and
| different to the message telling me to stand up for a
| minute.
|
| And the "low battery" warning is heart attack inducing,
| heh.
|
| I really like the Apple Watch, they just need to fix the
| part where multiple notifications in a short period of time
| effectively DDoS you from being able to use the damn thing.
| 83457 wrote:
| I was maintaining an esports community/business on the side for
| a few years with discord and social media profiles. I
| eventually just turned off all notifications as it was too
| much. I would instead check app notifications and apps directly
| a couple times a day unless there was an event/tournament
| coming up that required a faster response. I can't imagine
| having to live with all notifications for these platforms
| enabled and responding immediately.
| lioeters wrote:
| Glad to see there are other people like me, who use a phone
| like "receiving a letter" - no interruptions, just checking it
| occasionally when I'm not busy.
| [deleted]
| glogla wrote:
| It's not the phones people are overwhelmingly interacting with.
|
| Unless you're watching someone bored in public transport
| reading the news on the phone or something, phones are just the
| mean, not the end.
|
| There are people at the other end - colleagues, friends, loved
| ones. They are talking to each other, sharing experiences,
| having fun, being in love, agreeing on what's for dinner,
| planning, coordinating, organizing, updating, ... and a lot
| more other, maybe banal things.
|
| At least for me, friend is a friend, loved one is a loved one,
| and it doesn't matter if we communicate via text, photo of a
| cool thing one of us just saw or in person, I'm going to be
| happy to hear from them.
| nijave wrote:
| I think just about anything "more interesting" reduces my ability
| to focus even when not distracting me. It just-so-happens my
| phone has convenient access to all those things Personally, in
| some cases, getting rid of a single distractor helps but usually
| only when there's nothing else conveniently available
| eevilspock wrote:
| > This cognitive capacity is critical for helping us learn,
| reason, and develop creative ideas.
|
| I agree. I'd like to make a related claim: _We spend little time
| on deep moral critical thinking. Herd thinking and going with the
| flow is so much easier and so much sweeter._
|
| The latter is sweeter because of the positive social feedback
| loop -- you're far more popular. Whereas independent critical
| thought often goes against the grain and threatens the comfort of
| _your_ herd.
|
| For example, while I support many of the "cancellations" that are
| happening, too many of both proponents and opponents don't dare
| say anything not in line with their chosen herd. There is no
| possibility of nuanced thought, or that it's not black and white.
|
| Too many of us forget that the mainstream morality of every era
| is the moral backward of the next. We wrote "All men are created
| equal" 245 years ago, and we're 155 years post Civil War, yet
| race, gender and birth class still dominate an individuals place
| and outcome. Going with the flow (and knee-jerk attack any
| counter flows) is nothing less than contributing to this societal
| inertia.
| igammarays wrote:
| I doubt the mere presence of the phone itself is distracting, but
| rather it's the fact that putting it somewhere far (or allowing
| it to be taken from you) requires a conscious intention and is
| sufficiently absurd that it triggers the novelty feeling, which
| helps your focus.
|
| I just put my phone away in the closet. Perhaps this will become
| part of my new "focus" ritual.
| brohoolio wrote:
| I find that the mere presence of the phone is distracting. It's
| subtle and I didn't notice it until I physically started
| putting it in another room. I don't mindlessly pick it up and
| opening an app.
| gfxgirl wrote:
| what part do you find distracting? Does it go off with sound
| or vibrations?
|
| I set my phone on the table/desk and completely forget about
| it. 4hrs later I see I missed 6 messages, a few I would have
| prefer to respond to when they arrived.
| wussboy wrote:
| I'd like an appliance much like some hotel rooms have where to
| turn the lights on you must slip your room key card in to the
| receptacle at the front door. I want to enter my house, pull my
| phone out of of my pocket and slip it into the slot in the
| entry way where it flips the lights on, starts charging and
| maybe connects to my Bluetooth speakers. Sure I can hear it but
| if I want to use it I need to go over there too see what's so
| important.
| airstrike wrote:
| On my busiest days I'd lock my phone in my desk drawer and put
| the key somewhere else. A bit radical, but it really worked
| Rohpakle wrote:
| You already know that your phone is a portal to distractions.
| Social media. SMS. Phone calls, You've probably heard or read
| somewhere that you should limit the amount of distraction that
| comes from your phone. All of that is true. So, I don't think
| this study says anything new.
| kfrane wrote:
| I've found a very interesting result in one of the papers[1] they
| linked in the article. The group of people with the highest phone
| dependence have the highest available cognitive capacity score
| when they leave their phone in another room (see Figure 3.
| Experiment 2).
|
| Somewhat absurdly, this would suggest that the best strategy
| would be to get hooked on notifications and then consciously
| leaving your phone in another room when you need to work/focus.
|
| [1]
| https://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/bitstream/handle/2152/64...
| nipponese wrote:
| Yet no mention of car center console UI.
| occz wrote:
| I find them particularly strange from a design perspective. If
| anyone here does design on car interfaces, please let me know
| why this is the direction you're taking, because I'm stumped.
|
| Car interfaces seem like something you would want to optimize
| for being able to be easily controlled without taking neither
| eyes nor focus off the road. This, to me, means physical
| interface elements with good built-in feedback (clicky buttons,
| notched knobs etc.). Instead, we appear to be going down a
| dangerous path of having everything be in a screen.
|
| How come?
|
| Sidenote: I'm generally not a big fan of voice-interfaces due
| to their general inferiority to 'hand-interfaces' (no muscle
| memory, large latency, high rate of error etc.), but as an
| interface in a car I think they do make some sense, given the
| obvious design constraint that you want the driver to focus on
| the road. They can't replace all functions though due to the
| aforementioned constraints, but other than that, this is a very
| fitting niche for the technology.
| judge2020 wrote:
| Touchscreens in cars were seen as luxury so once they became
| super cheap they threw them in every car with few no-screen
| options whatsoever. This was cemented in 2018 with a mandate
| for backup cameras[0] and, when you already have a screen, it
| makes little sense to only put a screen for the camera unless
| that's the market segment you're targeting (which, in itself,
| is small since most people are fine with touchscreens).
| Unless mandated, profit and sales will trump safety systems
| every day.
|
| Tesla-esque huge touchscreens are taking off because other
| infotainment systems have been the absolute worst UX of all
| mass-market software since forever. Tesla fixed this and is
| gaining market-share fast, so traditional automakers are
| trying to prevent more people from switching to Tesla by
| emulating these selling points (and some recent Mach-E
| footage shows that the infotainment isn't on the same level,
| although it is faster than SYNC 3[1]).
|
| 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backup_camera#Mandates
|
| 1: https://youtu.be/kqHmbrE11eg?t=40
| occz wrote:
| Interesting - that backup camera mandate does explain it a
| bit. I wonder if the EU has something similar.
|
| It still doesn't excuse the lack of care with regards to
| design, but I now have a bit more understanding on the
| matter. Thanks!
| aramachandran7 wrote:
| I'd imagine those are designed with keeping your focus on the
| road in mind, by doing things like limiting notifications to
| only incoming phone calls while you're driving
| swiley wrote:
| Unfortunately your imagination doesn't correspond well with
| reality.
|
| They also display texts, have tons of different entertainment
| integrations, display maps etc. All with crazy high input
| latency, zero tactile feedback, and a completely homegrown UI
| to leave you constantly guessing and reading whenever you do
| simple things like change the radio station.
| asdff wrote:
| Having to navigate menu systems to change basic climate
| controls would say otherwise
| benhurmarcel wrote:
| Then the problem is the car, not the console UI.
| StanislavPetrov wrote:
| My flip phone isn't a source of distraction.
| radicalriddler wrote:
| I bought a cheap dumb nokia on Wednesday, and have left the
| iPhone at home. I still reach for my pocket to browse reddit, but
| then remember that the site actually fails to load because it
| uses more memory than the phone has.
|
| Of course, I miss out on group messages, at least they come to me
| alone, so I have to piece together like a puzzle what people are
| saying. Ah well.
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| I've been experiencing Phantom Vibration all morning. Talk about
| distracting.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_vibration_syndrome
| occz wrote:
| I used to experience that, but it's gone away since I moved to
| never having vibrations on my phone. Highly recommended!
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| I took my phone out of my pocket for hours this morning, the
| feeling kept going. Not sure what I'm expecting.
| occz wrote:
| Give it a week or so, it will pass.
| whytaka wrote:
| I used to have an Apple Watch with LTE so I could go without my
| phone even when I left the house. Then I sold it because I
| started needing it much more for work. Now I'm considering
| getting it again just to be able to keep away from my phone at
| home.
|
| How low I've fallen.
| duggable wrote:
| I don't have the LTE version, but thinking about getting one
| for the same strategy. In the meantime, I'm just hiding my
| phone in drawers/backpack etc to keep it hidden and within
| range of my watch.
| patatino wrote:
| I never had an apple watch but precisely this is the reason I
| want one. Leave that stupid phone somewhere but still be
| reachable by my family.
| sumtechguy wrote:
| One thing that worked well for me was to uninstall the
| attention grabbing apps. Helped immensely with battery life too
| :)
|
| Pretty much all that is left on my phone is 'augmented reality'
| sort of applications. Translate, maps, 'what song is that',
| barcode scanner, etc. Anything that pops a notification for
| something I do not really need to know about right now gets
| uninstalled pretty quickly. I then use the actual websites for
| those sorts of applications as I can schedule when it happens.
| I basically made my phone a tool instead of something that is
| needy like a Tamagotchi.
| whytaka wrote:
| The problem for me is the browser. Unfortunately iOS doesn't
| let you put safari into restricted apps on screen time.
|
| I've managed to train myself to regard my computer mostly as
| a work machine but that just means my phone is my mindless
| browsing machine.
| sumtechguy wrote:
| I can not stand using the built in browsers on phones so I
| guess I am in luck :)
|
| Either the pages are designed with you having a mouse. Or
| they are infinite scroll time sinks. Ok maybe not that bad
| but sometimes I feel that way... Also my eyes have recently
| decided 'oh you want to be able to see?! that aint a good
| idea anymore'. I went from being able to read 4pt to 12 to
| 15 being readable. You can guess how well that is working
| on a phone...
| egypturnash wrote:
| I just checked and was able to set a time limit for Safari
| on both ios13.3 and 14.4.1. Type "safari" in the search box
| at the top of the list of categories that comes up when you
| go to set a new limit, pull the list down to reveal the
| search box if it doesn't show up at first.
| davzie wrote:
| Hey, you can do this. In Screentime, turn on Content &
| Privacy Restrictions and switch off Safari in "Allowed
| Apps". game changer!
| moneywoes wrote:
| Have the same issue. Like I deleted Instagram on my phone
| but I'll just use the web version. Also, I think Android's
| digital well being let's you restrict websites on the
| browser
| browningstreet wrote:
| I like my Apple Watch, but I use it almost exclusively for
| fitness (workouts, trail running, etc).
|
| I decided early on to remove all the other things -- apps,
| notifications, etc. I get Messages, but that's about it. I like
| the balance, and it allows me to keep my phone farther away in
| a bag than before.
|
| Plus with the WorkOutDoors app, I can go on runs, with maps,
| without my iPhone. Love that.
| andrewzah wrote:
| Why not use a garmin in that case? I only use my fenix when I
| work out, as I strictly wear mechanical/quartz watches the
| rest of the time.
|
| The UX is definitely not anywhere close to an apple watch,
| but it is more suited for physical activity and tracking that
| data.
| najra wrote:
| I was considering a fitbit because of this, i like my
| mechanical watches too much. Think that might work on my
| other wrist, while still wearing my regular watches.
| browningstreet wrote:
| I do low heart rate training for long distance running.
| Only iPhone apps with a chest strap or the WorkOutDoors app
| tell me when I'm above or below my specified heart rate
| zone.
| xbar wrote:
| HN reduces my ability to focus even when it doesn't distract me.
| agumonkey wrote:
| I could say the same for internet connection. Whenever my ISP
| fails, and I'm not being hyperbolic here, my brain screams
| thanks. Time then slows down and I feel free to create, wander or
| think. I really wonder, life critical needs aside, what would
| happen if people had no internet for a week.
| chrisbigelow wrote:
| In my experience, not having the opportunity/ability to access my
| phone has been the only solution that truly lets me disconnect
| and focus. I've been working on a locking wireless charger to
| keep your phone out of sight and access, I'm looking to launch
| soon on Indiegogo: https://pausbox.com/
| raghuveerdotnet wrote:
| I feel "Focus" as a function of overwhelming want or overwhelming
| need is a better proposition than as a function of tips and
| tricks. I've had times when despite all the raging distractions
| I've got the work done because I was so invested in it and there
| have been times when despite being in a perfectly isolated, no
| distraction environment, I have failed to get the work done
| because there was no real urgent need for it to be done,
| intrinsic or otherwise.
|
| I would say work on things based on constraints, that are beyond
| the artificial boundary of productivity tricks, like an
| overwhelming desire for action or an imminent deadline from an
| external enforcing agent; differentiate between want, want-to-
| want, and have-to-want; and mainly rest well, for energy
| management is key in working well.
| acd wrote:
| Can we please stop calling devices which looses our ability to
| focus with our brains "smart"?
|
| A dumb phone might be a smart phone and a smart phone might be a
| dumb phone.
| chemmail wrote:
| Also this just in, you can get wet when there is water near you.
| slk500 wrote:
| marketing article to promote their app, looks like a spam to me
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| Most links posted to this site are posted for a financial
| reason one way or another. That doesn't mean they aren't
| interesting or intellectually stimulating.
| cambalache wrote:
| That's 90% of the submissions here. Last time I said that I was
| scolded because "This was precisely the objective of this site"
| jahnu wrote:
| Have to say the pixel flip-to-shhh feature is just brilliant for
| me
| eyelidlessness wrote:
| For two years now I have kept very strict rules keeping my phone
| away from my person. They're not overly imposing and I probably
| spend more time on my phone than a lot of people here. But the
| strictness is really helpful for me:
|
| 1. I don't even look at my phone or anything it would present to
| me until my puppy is fed and walked and I have coffee in me.
|
| 2. I don't look at it while I'm in motion unless there's no other
| option (ie calling a ride or clarifying meatspace meeting
| arrangements).
|
| 3. I don't look at my phone indoors unless there's a physical
| need (ie it needs to be plugged into something else). Phone time
| is porch time.
|
| I also try not to look at it from dinner time til bedtime but
| that's less strict. It's limited mostly by spending most of that
| time engaged with said puppy.
| EGreg wrote:
| _They tested the "brain drain" hypothesis that claims the brain
| has a limited capacity of cognitive resources, and the mere
| presence of a potential distractor can occupy some of those
| resources which undercut cognitive performance._
|
| Sounds like something straight out of Conan Doyle
|
| https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/lessons-from...
|
| _" You see," he explained, "I consider that a man's brain
| originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it
| with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber
| of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which
| might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up
| with a lot of other things, so that he has difficulty laying his
| hands upon it. Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as
| to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but
| the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he
| has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is
| a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and
| can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when
| for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you
| knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to
| have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones." "But the Solar
| System!" [Dr. Watson] protested. "What of the deuce is it to me?"
| he interrupted impatiently: "you say that we go round the sun. If
| we went round the moon it would not make a pennyworth of
| difference to me or to my work."_
|
| I believe that this, rather than neuroplasticity, is the main
| explanation for why children and teens are able to acquire
| language far easier than adults. The latter have far more to
| worry about and no one spoon feeds them words all the time.
| temp0826 wrote:
| >> "you say that we go round the sun. If we went round the moon
| it would not make a pennyworth of difference to me or to my
| work."
|
| I really like this for a different reason. It's one of the
| reasons I can appreciate flat-earthers (or other discordian-ish
| reality tunnels) from a slightly more philosophical standpoint:
| it really doesn't matter
| bckr wrote:
| I upvoted you but, also, it kind of does matter. How you
| orient yourself toward science and empirical experience says
| a lot about whether you're going to fall for some BS
| misinformation campaign, fail to vaccinate yourself and your
| children, etc...
| Chris2048 wrote:
| > How you orient yourself toward science and empirical
| experience
|
| few pro-vaxxers have a detailed understanding of biology or
| science, nor empirical evidence wrt vaccination, or the
| education to interpret it.
|
| The difference is not one of understanding, but trust, and
| the capacity to believe in "conspiracy". The problem is,
| sometimes conspiracies do exist (prism) and science _is_
| becoming increasingly politicised.
|
| That said, flat-earthers are categorically different, b/c
| it has nothing to do with science: a round earth can be
| demonstrated fairly easily in laymen terms, and the scale
| of the conspiracy to confound a round-earth map is also
| disproportionate.
| wccrawford wrote:
| That quote has always bothered me. He uses incredibly small
| details to deduce incredible things, but thinks the solar
| system will never have any influence upon his casework. I can
| imagine scenarios where people thought the wrong things
| because of what the sun was doing, how far the sun was from
| the earth at the time, etc etc. It _does_ matter, just not
| often... Much like the rest of what he uses to deduce things.
|
| It's like saying he doesn't care what clerks do in their
| jobs, but then deducing that someone's a clerk by their
| hands. He's _have_ to know what they do for that, even if it
| doesn 't otherwise affect him.
|
| That said, I agree with you... Mostly. I don't really care
| what someone believes, but there are some beliefs that tell
| me people aren't critical thinkers and will just believe
| things they're told... And then stick to it no matter what. I
| definitely treat those people differently for my own
| protection.
|
| If flat-earth was the only thing that person believed that
| was weird, I'd likely just laugh and overlook it. But so far,
| I've never found that to be the case. They go in for a lot
| more.
| EGreg wrote:
| The show Sherlock shows that actually this solar system
| knowledge helps him in the end of the episode :)
| yodelshady wrote:
| Right. Even within the UK, there are observable differences
| in the day between southern and northern points. If, say,
| someone from Kent was to fabricate a story in Glasgow set
| around twilight, you'd immediately notice their timescales
| are off.
|
| You could technically remember that without knowing why,
| but for real people organising facts like that under
| "things that are true because the earth goes round the sun,
| is tilted, and is round" is _easier_. A skilled worker
| organises their knowledge.
| sunopener wrote:
| >> but there are some beliefs that tell me people aren't
| critical thinkers and will just believe things they're
| told... And then stick to it no matter what. I definitely
| treat those people differently for my own protection.
|
| What are some examples? I want to know so I may or may not
| learn to avoid your usual treatment of belief-normatives
| and instead be treated with your non-normative belief
| conditioned self-"protection" process, ultimately because I
| may or may not view your preference for
| "critical[/oppressive] thinking" as both or neither or
| simultaneously predatory and oppressive, not to mention
| self-deluding.
|
| You are obviously excusing your propensity to oppress and
| judge others through your irrational attachment to your
| beliefs that amount to nothing but false pattern
| recognition--or "apophenia". Your demonstrable beliefs make
| you weak to the clustering illusion and reveal your
| illusion of control bias. Pareidolia leads you to tap into
| your capacity to focus and directs it into protecting
| yourself from "[non-]critical[/non-oppressive] thinkers",
| wasting your focus.
|
| Yes, you can imagine, and yes you are right, but you are
| also more wrong than you may know. Your imagination is
| immaterial, your intuition however, is not. Regarding
| "small details to deduce incredible things"--don't take the
| quote so seriously... you are claim to know what the person
| quoited thinks ("but thinks the solar system will
| never...") ;) Every conscious being inherently groks
| interconnection. Your imagination is running your focus
| into a constipated mess, making you weak to FEAR where you
| feel the need to judge others based on their capacity to
| critically or oppressively think as a sort of protective
| mechanism.
|
| It's YOU, not THEM, you think its THEM, because you don't
| recognize it's YOU that are losing focus IMAGINING it is
| THEM. You are attempting to protect yourself by giving
| preferential treatment to others, when really it's your own
| run away imagination and your attachment to it combined
| with the error of attributing the lack of awareness of the
| focus sink onto the actual non objects of your imagination
| (i.e. you are mistaking the finger for the moon).
| waihtis wrote:
| This phenomenom is at times called the green lumber fallacy:
| https://fs.blog/2016/11/green-lumber-fallacy/
| jodrellblank wrote:
| Is it skillful or foolish to call to mind a quote from a story
| said by a fictional character, instead of something which helps
| you in doing your work?
|
| Reply with something from Harry Potter and the Methods of
| Rationality:
|
| " _Professor Quirrell 's expression became more serious. "Mr.
| Potter, one of the requisites for becoming a powerful wizard is
| an excellent memory. The key to a puzzle is often something you
| read twenty years ago in an old scroll, or a peculiar ring you
| saw on the finger of a man you met only once. I mention this to
| explain how I managed to remember this item, and the placard
| attached to it, after meeting you a good deal later. You see,
| Mr. Potter, over the course of my life, I have viewed a number
| of private collections held by individuals who are, perhaps,
| not quite deserving of all that they have -_"
|
| https://www.hpmor.com/chapter/26
| Chris2048 wrote:
| This says "brain", but seems to be talking about attention. Not
| everything works like that; I find the less I depend on memory,
| the worse my memory gets, the more I use my memory, the better
| my recall is in general - hence not using memory doesn't "free"
| it up at all; and this applies not just to explicit
| (intentional/conscious) recall, but spontaneous remembering
| ("Oh, I just remembered/realised something") too.
| ldbooth wrote:
| I tried a flip phone for a week but got tired of explaining to
| people why I didn't receive the picture they texted me, and I was
| carrying my no-SIM smartphone around for the audiobooks anyway.
| It does feel like taking the proverbial digital leash off, and
| rather than text replying I was calling everyone back for
| convenience. I sure have strayed socially. I shall find this
| middle ground and report back.
| freebuju wrote:
| The best part of using a flip phone is that you slowly realize
| that none of the notifications we are constantly distracted by
| are _that_ urgent. It 's a good way of cutting down the social
| media fat. Most of the digital interactions we have in our day-
| to-day are really because _you were online_ at the time, which
| could be interpreted as _you are available_ for some tete-a-
| tete.
| [deleted]
| StanislavPetrov wrote:
| I've stuck with the flip phone all along with no regrets.
| Pictures can be forwarded to your email for later viewing
| (though at a reduced resolution). There seems to be no way to
| see emojis, though, as they all appear as little squares
| (whether you perceive this as a benefit or a drawback).
| ldbooth wrote:
| You have motivated me to try it again... Switching the sim
| today. The hands free calling while driving is another
| feature to solve for. I'm going wired headset.. 2000 is back!
| =)
| bckr wrote:
| Ha, yeah we're in a really weird space right now where our tech
| is awesome and terrible. I wonder if it will get better. It
| would be cool to have like a feature phone but where the
| features are at current tech levels (and include maps), but
| there are no random notifications to manage, no social apps
| (instead of requiring you to have the discipline not to install
| them)... idk.
| duggable wrote:
| I read a blog post [1] the other day about someone who was
| using their Apple Watch as their primary "smart" device.
| Aside from pictures (and maybe a few other features?) you can
| effectively have all of the utilities of a smart phone
| without the temptation to get sucked into the device. I've
| been slowly transitioning to this and have been enjoying it
| so far.
|
| It doesn't really help with the notifications, but you can
| effectively cut out most of the noise via basic iPhone
| settings.
|
| [1] - https://www.reddit.com/r/digitalminimalism/comments/m73
| 0dz/i...
| scottndecker wrote:
| The LightPhone is working on getting there. I've been using
| it for about a year now as my primary mobile.
| fogihujy wrote:
| I went the feature phone route, bog standard Nokia with a 64 GB
| SD card in it for music/etc.
|
| I managed three months and then a customer sent me an iPhone
| because sending SMS's was too much of a hassle when everyone
| else was on Slack 24/7, and because their authentication scheme
| was changing and they required a smart phone app for 2FA.
|
| Years later, I still refuse to put Slack on my phone (now an
| Android), but I can't get away from various app requirements
| connected to my business number, and I can't be bothered to
| have two separate phones when I have two SIM slots in my phone
| anyway.
| augustk wrote:
| Researchers also found that a "Do not miss out!" popup distracted
| people from reading an article about distraction.
| fny wrote:
| General question: I have survived this by working solo for most
| of my career. Recently though, I'm faced with a barrage of emails
| and the expectation that they are read or answered within 20 min
| (!) of receipt. I much prefer answering emails within a few time
| slots each day.
|
| How do others manage these expectations?
| metters wrote:
| I've never faced that expectation, but I would most likely not
| fulfill it. If every mail is important, none is...
| t-writescode wrote:
| Speak with management and adapt (to the requirements), get
| others to adapt (different expectations), or move on (to
| another job).
|
| Edit: added clarity
| shric wrote:
| I've had this problem for years, outside of the phone factor. For
| this very reason, as others have said, I keep my phone on so not
| disturb 24/7 except if my wife calls.
|
| However, open offices drive me nuts because of the mere threat of
| a potential interrupt, even if in practice it may happen only
| once or twice a day.
| vegetablepotpie wrote:
| > Cal Newport said it best in his book Deep Work: the ability to
| perform deep work is becoming increasingly rare at exactly the
| same time it is becoming increasingly valuable in our economy. As
| a consequence, the few who cultivate this skill, and then make it
| the core of their working life, will thrive.
|
| The people who cultivate that skill, stay up late at night while
| everyone is asleep so they don't get distracted. Then they come
| in late because they need sleep like every one else. As a
| consequence, deep thought workers are seen by their immediate and
| responsive counterparts as obtuse, eccentric, or worse: lazy and
| unable to manage their time.
|
| This really comes down to the workers dilemma. Do you spend your
| time marketing your self to others and letting people know your
| accomplishments, or do you spend the time doing work that will
| benefit others? Deep thought workers will bias heavily towards
| work that will benefit others. This benefit is often non-obvious
| deep thought workers will run the risk that their peers, that are
| more connected and more reachable, will take the credit for the
| results.
| groby_b wrote:
| If you work on a team, being reachable is part of your work.
| There are (few) opportunities for solo thinking, and Cal is
| lucky to find one. I hope you find one for yourself.
|
| But as a team, the answer "I can't reach the expert because
| they secluded themselves" is not acceptable. Because as a
| senior figure on a team, you job is to become a force
| multiplier for others, not a solo force. Not to do work that
| magnanimously benefits others, but work that makes others
| better.
|
| You need occasional deep work time, sure. But the whole "I must
| disconnect from everything, always" thing does not work for any
| social endeavor - and most meaningful things are of a scope
| that requires a team.
|
| I wish I had a better answer here, because I too like thinking
| quietly for long times - but I also see that I fulfill a useful
| function when I'm reachable, and ultimately, you get paid for
| usefulness to the larger endeavor.
|
| (This points strongly towards solo/entrepreneur tracks if
| isolation is your only useful mode of work, but even then,
| you'd be well advised to find a partner who handles the people
| parts)
| BlargMcLarg wrote:
| Yet we're increasingly figuring out not all things have to be
| synchronized, and many people _can_ save themselves while
| thrown in the deep as long as there is documentation.
|
| It's not that I disagree with the premise. Rather, I believe
| as a society, we've largely taught ourselves helplessness and
| failed to document properly how things are supposed to work
| (both when requesting features and checking how existing
| things work, both functionally and in code). Add short
| tenures onto this, and it makes for a system which needs a
| lot more synchronized "are you available" time than need be.
|
| Additionally, maybe I'm biased, but many juniors don't need
| as much mentorship as the average senior dev here likes to
| claim once they're settled in. Again, it might be backfiring
| in terms of learned helplessness, where they won't try and
| solve their own problems first. Furthermore, it stimulates
| _not_ documenting processes in a way that newcomers can
| learn, where seniors become glorified encyclopedias. Most
| juniors I come across stumble here: not when the problem can
| be found online, but when the problem is a piece of domain
| knowledge / in-house framework documented extremely poorly,
| and requires an extensive amount of time to communicate.
|
| Combating this may cut down required mentoring significantly.
| Now imagine you might be able to cut down regular mentoring
| to a 1-2h window. On a regular 8 hour day, that leaves a
| whole 6-7h to plan at your own convenience. This could have
| different setups as well (two days with high accessibility,
| three days of access only in critical cases). Most of all, as
| long as we don't make the deep dive and continue our existing
| ideas, we're only setting ourselves up for a selffulfilling
| prophecy. It's only after we try, we can accurately make such
| bold claims.
| tehjoker wrote:
| I don't know who defines what work is but "being reachable"
| at all times seems like an arbitrary line in the sand. It's
| pretty annoying to be dictated what is and isn't possible.
|
| For example, what about "being reachable" four days a week,
| or 7 out of 8 hours a day, or using the toilet?
|
| Bright line rules like these are usually fake and promoted by
| people that benefit from them.
| FalconSensei wrote:
| Exactly. Of course, if you are working as an expert - and not
| an expert mentor - you will need time for deep work. But it's
| a balance of times when you can't be interrupted, and times
| when you should.
|
| Ultimately, talking to the team, scheduling 'busy' times on
| your calendar, or letting people know in the morning that you
| need a day to focus on something can really make a
| difference. Also, setting up expectations on how long can it
| take for you to reach back in matters that are not urgent.
| And urgencies that are critical for the business always have
| a preference over deep work, but if the team knows you are
| busy, they can think if they really need you to solve it or
| give instructions.
| peruvian wrote:
| This is my main issue with Newport's work. It's all great
| advice but not much of it applies to a regular office worker.
| Joeri wrote:
| As a technical team lead I've struggled more than once with
| the trade off between getting meaningful deep work done for
| myself and getting others on with their work.
|
| Over the years I've come to realize it is not as clear cut of
| a trade off. Teams can be coached to be self-reliant and to
| distribute knowledge effectively, so that they have fewer
| urgent questions. I try to proactively take myself out of the
| critical path as much as possible. Documenting thoroughly is
| one way. Another is to use channels for question-asking and
| encouraging the use of the channel instead of dm. There's a
| higher chance a person can answer who is not interrupted, and
| because everyone passively follows the channel the knowledge
| is shared more effectively.
|
| Decision-making is always the tricky part. Junior devs need
| constant handholding and it is more about a lack of lived
| experience than a lack of knowledge. You need enough senior
| devs so that the load of constant micro-decisions for the
| juniors can be spread around.
|
| The thing is that getting to the point where there is enough
| time for deep work is a process that takes time and that is
| easily undone by team churn. IMHO the only way to sidestep
| the matter entirely is to have a lieutenant who handles all
| the urgent matters, but I've only had that once and in
| retrospect it was hardly a fair situation.
| [deleted]
| at-fates-hands wrote:
| >> As a consequence, deep thought workers are seen by their
| immediate and responsive counterparts as obtuse, eccentric, or
| worse: lazy and unable to manage their time.
|
| Literally just had this on my year end review. I won't go into
| the useless stack ranking the company I work for uses, but none
| of my project work was ever late (it was actually either right
| on time or early) but because I'm a night owl and do a majority
| of my work off hours, I'm considered "unavailable" when other
| regular folks need to get a hold of me because I'm not online
| at 7am like everyone else. Yet any issues are resolved in a
| timely manner regardless.
|
| I literally got a lower rating because my manager said there
| was a "lack of effort" during business hours and that other
| team members said I was "aloof" and "not present" during long
| managerial meetings.
|
| I had to spend most of this week refuting what my manager wrote
| on my review since if I decided to move departments, other
| managers will look at it since its a typical process managers
| to do when hiring internal candidates. Pulling in copious
| amounts of documentation to refute what he was saying cost me a
| days work, but in the end, I had no other choice.
|
| I'm still bitter about the whole thing.
| unixhero wrote:
| Walk slower or quit. The efforts you have put in have not
| been apprechiated.
| freebuju wrote:
| Part of being an employee means towing the company line. Even
| when you don't feel like it. It's a sham you are collectively
| expected to endure. Is it any wonder that the most successful
| employees are the ones who succeed in reading and adjusting
| themselves to this requirement?
|
| That said. I feel and connect with your rant at a personal
| level. For reasons I won't share on this post.
|
| I know you didn't ask for any advice and yours is just a
| rant. Based on your review and what you say i.e you had to
| spend a day just to refute it. It would be wise to increase
| interviews with other prospective employers and other
| professional opportunities.
|
| Your efforts are much better spent where they are valued a
| bit more than this.
| eloisius wrote:
| I agree with this sentiment. Even if you manage to get to bed
| at an early time, it seems like the modern workplace still
| doesn't reward deep focus. It rewards frequent context
| switching, being constantly available to answer pings in slack,
| providing updates to managers just "checking in" with you,
| attending tons of meetings, and being able to juggle numerous
| things going on at once. I can adapt to all that, but the 1-2
| hours of actual work time I could squeeze out of any given day
| didn't allow for much deep focus.
| watwut wrote:
| In tech, people who were late are rewarded.
|
| And in fact, you can do deep work at morning a much as late,
| there is literally no one in tech startup at the morning.
| ysavir wrote:
| This is not a fair portrayal. This is one way to go about it,
| and a way which avoids the problem while running up other
| costs. And there are better ways.
|
| Better ways such as keeping your phone in another room.
| Building the discipline to not be checking email or other sites
| frequently throughout the day (on phone or in the browser).
| Muting notification sources. And ultimately, _taking control of
| your time_.
|
| The people that struggle with deep work are the people that
| struggle with unplugging, and/or live with a fear of missing
| out. Conquer this, and cultivating this skill becomes a much
| more manageable and achievable challenge.
| screye wrote:
| > The people who cultivate that skill, stay up late at night
| while everyone is asleep so they don't get distracted
|
| Haha, I feel so called out. I have been up for 2 days straight
| at this point, and it has been incredibly productive.
|
| Sometimes I wish I could summon my ability to do deep work
| during the day, but it is just so hard with all the meetings
| and ideations (I love them too, but can't stay up 24x7). My
| body can't take this kind of late-night abuse anymore, so I
| feel like I am running on borrowed time.
|
| Hopefully I will learn to do focus work in the day at some
| point. Has anyone here successfully made that transition ?
| danielheath wrote:
| I have; I found that when in a (physical) space where I could
| guarantee nobody would interrupt me, I can work like it's
| night.
| jariel wrote:
| Brilliantly true.
|
| I've found that it is possible to do during the day, but you
| kind of have to put your phone away, and also clamp down on
| browser.
|
| HN is unfortunately a distraction!
|
| Make yourself 'feel' like it's a Monday or Friday Holiday,
| where nobody is in the office, so they can't bother you, but
| it's not a 'weekend' either. Those days are productive.
| hintymad wrote:
| I also read Cal Newport and am pursuing the ability to perform
| deep work. In the meantime, I notice that the marginal return
| of deep work in a big enough company is questionable,
| especially for high-level ICs. A high-level IC spends most of
| the time in discussion and meetings, and people expect such
| person to make quick decisions or to assert influence within a
| single meeting. Therefore, the most influential ICs are those
| who have strong intuition and strong communication skills. Deep
| work can still pay off, but one needs to go really deep on both
| big pictures and on technical depth. I mean Wernher von Braun
| deep or Jeff Dean deep, which very few people possess. Maybe
| this is not about deep work, but about how challenging it is to
| be an IC.
| nondave wrote:
| What does IC mean here?
| augustk wrote:
| Integrated circuit?
|
| https://blog.mitchjlee.com/2020/your-writing-style-is-
| costly
| hintymad wrote:
| My bad. You're right, and thanks for the link.
| Unfortunately the window for editing is closed.
| augustk wrote:
| It's okay to use a non-standard abbreviation if you spell
| it out the first time it's used followed by the
| abbreviation in parentheses, like "individual contributor
| (IC)", and then use the abbreviation in the rest of the
| text.
| kawfey wrote:
| Individual contributor.
| adamesque wrote:
| individual contributor (aka someone judged on their own
| work output, not the output of a team like a manager or
| director)
| posed wrote:
| I first read it as Integrated chip, lol.
| pc86 wrote:
| You're making huge assumptions that a) people who cultivate
| this skill are late night folks and not morning people; b)
| people who cultivate this skill are unable to do deep work
| during the day; c) even ignoring the fallacies in A and B, that
| these folks' counterparts are blind to their accomplishments
| and assume they're lazy because they come in late; d) that
| someone cannot be capable of both completing meaningful deep
| work _and_ be lazy and unable to manage their time.
| dmingod666 wrote:
| Yes, you can do deep work late at night.
|
| The elephant in the room question is - "what are you doing
| during the time that is allocated for work?"
|
| I think deep-work is then a secondary thing. The person needs
| to solve other more important problems first.
|
| 1) are you over-commiting? 2) Should you be more assertive
| with taking up more work? 3) Are you able to set expectations
| of people that wait for your work and then also communicate
| when there are delays? 4) Do you have problems delegating
| work? 5)...
| chrisweekly wrote:
| I am living proof that it's possible to change from a night
| owl to an early riser. I used to stay up till midnight or 1am
| as often as not. By nature? and lifelong habit, for over 40
| years I was in the "stay up late, sleep in to compensate"
| camp. But a couple years ago someone I respect and admire
| challenged me to reset the pattern. I started setting a daily
| alarm and jumping into a brief ice-cold shower at 5am. It
| only took a few days to acclimate, and nearly everything
| about my days changed for the better. I need 7h of sleep so
| if I'm not lights-out by 10p, I "sleep in" to 530 or 6. I
| recommend it highly. The time I spend between 5-7a is, almost
| without exception, much better spent than 10p-12a would ever
| have been. YMMV but my point is, being a "morning person" can
| be a choice.
| balfirevic wrote:
| > I used to stay up till midnight or 1am as often as not.
|
| That's not a night-owl (midnight I mean, 1am might barely
| be).
| chrisweekly wrote:
| Fair enough. But FTR the 12-1a habit was itself a form of
| restraint against my prior tendency to stay up much later
| than that -- as a parent of school-aged kids, w/ no
| plausible option to sleep past 7a or so. Staying up till
| 3 or 4 and getting less than 4h sleep would've been a
| non-starter.
| balfirevic wrote:
| Yeah, I feel the pain. I usually go to sleep between 3-5
| and need 8-9 hours of sleep. If my work didn't allow for
| very flexible schedule I fear I'd also need to resort to
| extreme measures (cold showers - brrr).
| pc86 wrote:
| Same - part of it may have been natural shifts in circadian
| rhythms - in college I'd often be up until 3am during the
| week, not even particularly busy. Just not tired, so I
| stayed up. Any class up to and including 10am was an active
| struggle to get to. Now I am regularly up before 5am to
| work out and typically start work around 6:30.
|
| People absolutely have natural tendencies one way or the
| other, but if you want to change you can. Too many people
| approach it as if they're stuck in one or the other.
| tremon wrote:
| _b) people who cultivate this skill are unable to do deep
| work during the day;_
|
| For me, it was the other way around: inability to do deep
| work during the day (due to all the distractions already
| mentioned) forced me to cultivate a 10h-19h work schedule,
| with the accompanying sleep schedule (roughly from 01h-09h).
| michaelcampbell wrote:
| > The people who cultivate that skill, stay up late at night
| while everyone is asleep so they don't get distracted.
|
| cite? Your implication as stated above I believe has not been
| proven. Doesn't Cal go into some detail about people who have
| cultivated this skill; perform deep work, and then only do it
| for "normal" (or even more often, far less than "normal") work
| hours and thus have the rest of the working day to do whatever
| else they enjoy?
| [deleted]
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| I did exactly this early in my career: Stayed up late, got work
| done outside of business hours, suffered the consequences.
|
| Later I started being more assertive about my time.
|
| Meeting request in the middle of my core work hours? Decline as
| busy, suggest to move it to a lunch meeting or offer to call
| the person after working hours (Everyone chooses lunch meeting
| instead of after hours).
|
| People tapping me on the shoulder to ask a question while I'm
| wearing headphones? Before they can speak, I politely say that
| I'm in the middle of something I need to finish and ask if it's
| urgent. It's rarely urgent, but people quickly learn that it
| doesn't pay off to interrupt me.
|
| Constant deluge of Slack messages? I set a status that I was
| busy but would be available to chat during certain hours. When
| I'm pinged, I quickly respond that I'm in the middle of
| something but I'll get back to them later.
|
| The key was to realize that taking charge of my own time didn't
| have the negative consequences I thought it would. In my mind,
| I thought declining people's meeting invites or refusing to
| prioritize other people's demands would end my career, so I let
| people walk all over my schedule. Reality couldn't have been
| further from the truth. Nearly everyone was very understanding
| and very few people interpreted my responses as rude. Obviously
| you need to be polite and professional, no matter how
| aggravating the interruptions are.
|
| Carving out dedicated meeting and socializing time was also
| important. It's unlikely that I'm going to sit in one place for
| 8 straight hours anyway, so allocating two blocks of time each
| day for meetings and catching up was helpful. Making it
| predictable and communicating it to others made it easy for
| everyone else to understand. I even marked it on my shared
| calendar.
| at-fates-hands wrote:
| One of the first companies I worked at (a startup) had a
| strict protocol on how to ask someone for help.
|
| The chain was basically:
|
| a) ping them over IM. Do not grenade them with your problem.
| Ask first if they have time to help you:
|
| No? Try fixing your problem on your own for another 20-30
| minutes.
|
| Yes? Be short and to the point. If its a coding issue, list
| all of the solutions you've tried first and what the issue
| is.
|
| Allow the person you are asking to set the parameters of the
| help:
|
| a) how fast can this be done? Can I do this over IM?
|
| b) does this need a webex or meeting to figure out?
|
| c) how much time will the meeting require to solve problem?
| Estimate and go from there.
|
| d) do any of the previous infringe on your current work? Have
| a person set up a meeting for later in the day and then leave
| them alone.
|
| It was literally taboo to go to someone's desk and ask them
| for help. It was hammered into people that work comes first
| and any distraction costs time and money. Even when you go
| over and tap someone on the shoulder? They have to mentally
| disengage with their work to speak to you. That's precious
| time they are losing. Same thing after they've completed even
| a 5 min conversation, they have to get back to whatever they
| were doing which also takes time. There was some study that
| said just a handful of these interruptions can cause a
| company millions. When you're at a startup, every dollar
| wasted costs the bottom line.
| tremon wrote:
| _a) ping them over IM. Do not grenade them with your
| problem. Ask first if they have time to help you_
|
| This wouldn't work with me. I don't respond until I know
| what I'm saying yes to.
| meow112012 wrote:
| Me either. Getting some critical job done is impossible
| during normal working time when I get a lot of direct
| questions over slack and have to spend my time on meeting and
| communication.
|
| The hard thing is that it's not easy to explain critical job'
| result to the team. Most people simply think that's [my] job.
|
| The very annoying thing to me is that people tend to ask via
| PM. Why don't they just ask question on common group where
| there are a lot of people in the team can help? Oh... that's
| then Slack @here and @channel are problems. They are using
| that too much, and people don't care anymore lolz
| imhoguy wrote:
| I just delay any response for any new topic or I do not
| respond at all if that is just "Hi XYZ". Often I see
| "nevermind/found it/sorted it out" after a while.
|
| My rule of thumb is 15 minutes. I also never send "Hi XYZ"
| alone and then form a question. "Hi" is part of question
| message (Shift+Enter ftw!) and often while forming the
| question sentence with some guiding information I manage to
| find an answer too. No message send, win-win.
| hinkley wrote:
| > People tapping me on the shoulder to ask a question while
| I'm wearing headphones? Before they can speak, I politely say
| that I'm in the middle of something I need to finish and ask
| if it's urgent. It's rarely urgent, but people quickly learn
| that it doesn't pay off to interrupt me.
|
| You can often shorten this to, "can you come back in fifteen
| minutes?" This is less likely for them to try to pick your
| brain about whether their problem is urgent or not.
|
| Of course it depends on who is asking. If the head of IT is
| standing there, and you don't usually hear from IT, then it
| could be something bad. If your intern looks like they just
| set the building on fire, also might be important.
| corobo wrote:
| You became more assertive of your time by giving up lunch and
| off hours?
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| No, I enjoy having lunch with my coworkers. Good way to
| catch up without as much wasted time as a meeting.
|
| If you prefer to eat lunch alone, adjust accordingly. I was
| providing loose guidance, not a strict prescription.
| corobo wrote:
| I'll be honest I didn't even see it as you recommending
| any action at all. Each to their own and that I guess
| dmingod666 wrote:
| Not disagreeing with you entirely, but deep work can be done in
| office hours as well.
|
| Nice noise cancelling headphones, schedule a chunk of 1-1.5
| hours, go "do not disturb" in chat and don't check mail during
| this time. You can get decent amount of work done in one block.
| Try to get 2-3 of these blocks during the day, that would be
| pretty decent.
|
| You could use a Pomodoro timer app if you want to track the
| blocks.
|
| Manic time is also a great app, it keeps track of all the
| windows you have active, so then you can go back and tag the
| chunks of your time and do an analysis on when you went down a
| rabbit hole and for how long.
| billti wrote:
| I agree with this. As a manager I have a lot of meetings and
| few long stretches for 'deep work' in my day. Yet when I take
| on some work that truly absorbs me, I find the time for it.
| Non-essential meetings get postponed, email/Teams can survive
| an hour or two without a response, HackerNews will still be
| there at the end of the day ;-) , etc.
|
| I do feel like a lot "distractions" in work hours are
| avoidable. Some of them are just habit or a dopamine fix or
| procrastination - kind of like checking Facebook or Twitter
| on your phone when something else isn't focusing your
| attention fully.
| hazeii wrote:
| As Harry Truman said [0], "It's amazing what you can accomplish
| if you do not care who gets the credit".
|
| [0] https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/harry_s_truman_109615
| bluGill wrote:
| The problem with deep thought is you can waste a lot of time
| thinking about something that is no longer important. If your
| project is doomed to be canceled for reason outside your
| control there is no difference in output between someone who
| does nothing (ie should be fired for lack of work) and someone
| spends his days working hard.
|
| Those who do better networking tend to be onto those trends.
| They will find out about opportunities where 10 minutes of
| focused work will net a large [sale, or other win for the
| company] for the. 10 minutes of the right work can be far more
| valuable than a whole month of deep focused work. (though that
| 10 minutes probably builds on - and takes credit for - someone
| else's months of deep work)
|
| There is no clear win here. However if you like to be a deep
| focus person you should force yourself to spend some time every
| week figuring out the pulse of the company so you are at least
| doing useful work.
| 1123581321 wrote:
| There's a Richard Hamming quote, along those lines, that I
| like. I do keep in mind he was surrounded by brilliant and
| stimulating people at Bell Labs. Some closed door or deep
| work is necessary to shut out the truly unproductive aspects
| of modern office work. Doing this without seeming rude is an
| art.
|
| "I noticed the following facts about people who work with the
| door open or the door closed. I notice that if you have the
| door to your office closed, you get more work done today and
| tomorrow, and you are more productive than most. But 10 years
| later somehow you don't know quite know what problems are
| worth working on; all the hard work you do is sort of
| tangential in importance. He who works with the door open
| gets all kinds of interruptions, but he also occasionally
| gets clues as to what the world is and what might be
| important. Now I cannot prove the cause and effect sequence
| because you might say, ``The closed door is symbolic of a
| closed mind.'' I don't know. But I can say there is a pretty
| good correlation between those who work with the doors open
| and those who ultimately do important things, although people
| who work with doors closed often work harder. Somehow they
| seem to work on slightly the wrong thing - not much, but
| enough that they miss fame."
| secfirstmd wrote:
| This so explains me. Struggle to concentrate in day times but
| at night I'm laser focused. Staying up late and only getting up
| later in mornings. Which for whatever reason most organisations
| and people are awful at accommodating.
|
| At most organisations I've been part of I've adding some of, if
| not the, highest value on projects, ideas etc by far. However
| they never see that and focus on the stupid morning stuff so
| often.
| dqpb wrote:
| Just move to the east coast and work for a company on the west
| coast. Problem solved.
| iamthirsty wrote:
| From OP:
|
| > The people who cultivate that skill, stay up late at night
| while everyone is asleep so they don't get distracted.
|
| So I don't think that solves the problem if everyone in your
| office is still awake during your (later) prime working
| hours, although it does solve the waking up later issue.
| robinsonrc wrote:
| Why is getting up early not considered?
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Some do. My father did. But it's just as bad, because then
| you're seen as leaving early. Or you _don 't_ leave early,
| and are working more hours, which has a cost.
| tanseydavid wrote:
| My personal experience is that the notion "I will go in
| early today and leave at an appropriately early time,"
| fails to work out as planned 90-95% of the time.
|
| But I really can only blame myself for this.
| EvilEy3 wrote:
| Pre corona I was arriving at 7~ and leaving at 15. You
| can definitely do it.
| wsinks wrote:
| You have the discipline to use the 24 hour nomenclature
| all the time. I applaud you! I had to read this twice,
| and loved it so much I had to comment
| elwell wrote:
| It almost seems easier to pull off if you leave
| exceptionally early (3pm or earlier). E.g., if you leave
| at 4:15pm, that doesn't give any reminder that you
| _started_ early.
| sillyquiet wrote:
| Same. This was my schedule too, and maybe I got lucky in
| my workplace, but after socializing about it, nobody had
| any problem with the leaving earlier part.
|
| Was easy too, 'can we meet at 4:30' 'Hmm, I come in
| pretty early, and like to get out the door by 3:30, can
| we do it earlier?' was a typical exchange.
|
| Also, depending on your office arrangement your team-
| mates just _know_ you get in early when they always see
| you in the office when they get in. But, ymmv, I am sure
| it varies from workplace to workplace.
| matwood wrote:
| I find early better for few reasons, but primarily because
| not all work hours are the same. Waking up, working out,
| then immediately doing deep work before checking my phone,
| internet, or anything else almost feels like a super power.
| The best work hours of my day are actually spent working,
| and are almost never interrupted. Even if I do have to
| attend a late meeting or something, my brain is in the wind
| down mode and shouldn't need to wind back up. This means
| it's easier to fall asleep, and repeat the next day.
|
| I used to do the stay up late thing, and while work did get
| done, it's nowhere close to what I get done in the morning.
| MattGaiser wrote:
| I have tried this. Woke up at 1AM and went to bed at 7PM for
| one internship.
|
| The challenge was that there are very rarely obligatory early
| morning events. There are often late day events and issues.
|
| If I wake up early, I can't stay until 9PM without being
| miserable. But something requiring me until 9PM is far more
| likely than something at even 8AM.
| bluGill wrote:
| Depends, I know have to work with people in India. Me
| getting up at 7am best matches their work hours.
| SketchySeaBeast wrote:
| Why not something less extreme? I start work at 6-7 and
| that usually buys me a couple of really productive hours
| before people start popping up. It also means you can still
| do things at 9PM without compromising your sleep patterns
| too much.
| matwood wrote:
| 1AM is extreme. I wouldn't even call that waking up early,
| more like just staying up all night. When I was in high
| school I worked 10PM to 7AM, and that was terrible. But, I
| was able to, at a young age learn exactly how much sleep I
| need and what it took for me to sleep (pitch black darkness
| - eye mask).
|
| Now, I consider 5-6AM early and that's when I typically
| wake up - haven't used an alarm in years.
| elliekelly wrote:
| I can stay up working as late as I'd like - when I'm done
| with my deep focus is entirely up to me. When I get into the
| office early the end of my deep focus is entirely out of my
| control. It ends when my coworkers decide to come in and
| start bothering me.
| pitaj wrote:
| A lot (most?) people find staying up late easier than getting
| up early.
|
| Also, if your waking hours are say 0800-2300 then you can
| easily work late and move your leisure time to the morning
| without changing your sleep schedule.
| paublyrne wrote:
| > Also, if your waking hours are say 0800-2300 then you can
| easily work late and move your leisure time to the morning
| without changing your sleep schedule.
|
| Not necessarily. Early birds like me find it difficult to
| work in the evenings, despite being technically awake. I
| find it way easier to get up early than to stay up late,
| which can actually feel like torture sometimes.
|
| As for the split, I've read it's more like 10% for each
| extreme with the majority in the middle, though I can't
| find a reference, and I suspect it's very hard to actually
| know.
| ryanmarsh wrote:
| Some do, although many deep workers circadian rhythms
| naturally skew later. There's plenty of research on this you
| can find.
| MattGaiser wrote:
| > the people who cultivate that skill, stay up late at night
| while everyone is asleep so they don't get distracted.
|
| This is what I like about work from home. I can use the
| distracting and busy day to sleep and deal with admin tasks
| like email and work until 3AM instead if I really need to get
| stuff done.
| Swizec wrote:
| > Do you spend your time marketing your self to others and
| letting people know your accomplishments, or do you spend the
| time doing work that will benefit others?
|
| I like the luck surface area analogy for this.
|
| Take a rectangle. Side A is "Quality of work". Side B is "How
| many people know about it". The surface area - A*B - is your
| luck and opportunity.
|
| If you do amazing work and nobody knows about it, your luck is
| zero.
|
| If you do terrible work and everyone knows about it, your luck
| is zero.
|
| A square would be equal balance of A and B, which is okay but
| not to everyone's liking. You can get the same surface area
| with 2A and 0.5B. You can get a _huge_ surface area with 2A and
| 1B.
|
| For HN types, optimizing for big A and just enough B is
| easiest. We tend to err on the side of not enough B.
| birdyrooster wrote:
| A square is nothing more than the conjoined triangles of
| success.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| > If you do terrible work and everyone knows about it, your
| luck is zero.
|
| Well, really, it's less than zero, since now you also have a
| bad reputation you'll need to dig out of. :)
| chris11 wrote:
| > If you do amazing work and nobody knows about it, your luck
| is zero.
|
| But I don't think that implies the type of marketing social
| media apps gets you is valuable. For instance, I'd think that
| giving talks at conferences would be much more valuable than
| trying to become a LinkedIn influencer. I think you can work
| on networking and marketing in a way that limits
| distractions.
| amelius wrote:
| This is a fuzzy implementation of the boolean AND operator.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzzy_logic
| devtul wrote:
| A friend told me a new hire spent weeks drawing diagrams on
| the board and explaining to coworkers how X feature should
| work, after two months of zero commits he was let go.
|
| A perfect example of a -2 X 5, zero work done but great
| presentation, now the guy is infamous in our circle and no
| one would recommend him to be hired anywhere.
| d0mine wrote:
| > zero work done
|
| Knowing what should and should not be implemented (where to
| go) may be more important than being able to move in random
| directions.
|
| Once requirements are clear, the implementation becomes
| easier.
|
| Perhaps, the guy should be in the product team, not in
| devs.
| beckingz wrote:
| The conjoined rectangle of success.
| birdyrooster wrote:
| Damn you for beating me to this joke format. And I'm not
| deleting it.
| beckingz wrote:
| Do we expand the rectangle to have a dimension for speed?
| mszcz wrote:
| _That_ just made my day!
| wrigby wrote:
| I really like this model - thanks for sharing! A professor of
| mine drilled into us the idea that much of life is luck, but
| as he said (and I believe he was quoting someone else here)
| "the harder I work, the luckier I get."
| javajosh wrote:
| Well, this is true for any iterated game with upside and
| minor (only opportunity cost) downside: the more you play,
| the more you win.
| biren34 wrote:
| I'd add that it really matters who know about your work. If a
| lot of people know you do good work, but they all have very
| similar skills sets, you get a lot less value than if only a
| few people with very different skill sets know about you. In
| that case, you get to become "their guy for X", and that
| generates a lot of opportunities.
|
| In this case, you also get the benefit that both of you can
| get credit for the same work. Everyone will know them as "the
| guy who knows people who get things done" (i.e., good
| manager/leader) and you'll get credit as a great individual
| contributer. There's no competition for credit here.
|
| It gets even better if the few people who know you as "their
| guy for X" are social supernodes--while we're all only 6
| degrees of separation from each other, it's actually because
| a small percentage of us know tons of people, while the
| average is much less. If you become the "guy for X" for one
| of these supernodes, you're basically the "guy for X" for
| anyone who would ask them "hey, do you know a guy for X?"
|
| In my career, I've had two of those types of people know me
| and my work--and between the two of them, they have generated
| almost every opportunity I've had in the past 10 years.
|
| I could spend 50% of my time networking, and I doubt it would
| generate as much value as adding just one more social
| supernode that knows my work.
| waheoo wrote:
| Interesting, any tips on what to look out for identifying
| these people in the wild when you might not be able to work
| with them personally in the beginning?
| biren34 wrote:
| Of the two I know, one is a general manager / executive
| type that surfs and used to be in a frat.
|
| The other is a sales guy / stoner type, who always seems
| to have been to every new bar and restaurant and already
| know the owners by the time I've heard of the place.
|
| These descriptions are just the two I know--but you get
| the idea. They genuinely value people, so it's not a
| chore for them to know people, and they never really
| "network". They just like people.
|
| There's actually quite a lot of people with these kinds
| of traits. The trick, which is harder, is finding ones
| you respect and get along with, so you (the relative
| introvert) will keep up your end of the relationship.
|
| A lot times, I see skilled specialists look down on the
| more generalists/people-oriented people as being some
| form of incompetent. Compared to the specialist in their
| field, they always are. The thing that makes these 2
| special to me is that they're humble about their
| limitations in a way that makes really respect them.
| They're definitely not blowhards.
| waheoo wrote:
| Thanks I think I know what you mean.
| zild3d wrote:
| See small world networks, these supernodes are also called
| "hubs"
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small-
| world_network#Network_ro...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hub_(network_science)
| ryandrake wrote:
| I like this model, but I'd replace side B with "how much you
| self promote your work". Someone who's side A is 1 and side B
| is 20 has similar opportunity as someone whose side A is 20
| and side B is 1. A talented developer who isn't great at self
| promotion gets the same luck as someone who doesn't know what
| they are doing at all but can talk a great talk and enchant
| the execs. Surely 10x10 is better but you can linearly make
| up for a lack of A with a surplus of B and vice versa.
| [deleted]
| maroonblazer wrote:
| >I'd replace side B with "how much you self promote your
| work".
|
| I don't agree. The problem with "how much you self promote
| your work" is that if you're not good at promoting your
| work then you'll still be at, or near, 0. Whereas "How many
| people know your work" focuses on the outcome. Nearly
| everyone is promoting their work, not all of which gets
| noticed. How will you do it in a way that gets noticed?
| SkyMarshal wrote:
| This square needs to be a cube because there is a third
| important dimension - time.
|
| Amazing work requires focused effort over time, first to
| complete, and then for lots of people to discover it.
|
| And the time dimension is not linear, but has an
| acceleration. The more amazing the work, the longer it will
| take to complete, and during this time acceleration of people
| knowing about it will be near zero.
|
| But once completed and made public, the more amazing it is
| the faster the acceleration of discovery.
| sudosudo wrote:
| Honestly yes!
|
| in summary:
|
| know. Your. Audience. Let them know , but speak to them in
| their terms. Communication is not a display of hubris, it's a
| two way street
| prawn wrote:
| Completely true. It's a serious risk to be creating great
| things, impressing yourself but never making time to share
| with anyone else. In the modern world, you can't assume that
| your potential audience will see what you put out either -
| you need to repeat the news with a bit of variance, catch
| different timezones or people who don't see everything in
| their feed. Share a behind-the-scenes, share the finished
| product, a recap or case study, etc.
| t-writescode wrote:
| The way you describe the harm it causes to the employees
| sounds, to me, like a managerial problem.
|
| My company has several of those "works late, comes in late"
| employees, and none of them are seen as lazy.
|
| We have managers that recognize and re-enforce to the other
| teams the work that we do and the people we unblock and the
| wins that we're able to make.
|
| I just completed one of my own reviews where I was lauded
| loudly as a person that unblocks other people - while my own
| official tasks are relatively light because my primary task has
| become unblocking others - and a coworker was recently promoted
| due to her weird, off-hour work.
|
| Why? Management understood our strengths and re-enforces them,
| protects us from nay-sayers and rejoices openly about the work
| that we do.
|
| That way, we can keep working in the areas we're good at, in
| the way we're good at it, and we're given the recognition for
| our work through our managers.
|
| With a good manager, you shouldn't have to be constantly
| trumpeting your own skill, they should be revealing it for you.
|
| Managers, and I'm sure many of you are here on Hacker News,
| this is one of your many, many jobs.
| throwaway888abc wrote:
| Really well formulated. Love your explanation and pointers of
| worker dilemma.
| haddr wrote:
| There is somehow related posting from 3 years ago:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21906727
| 11235813213455 wrote:
| that's why I just turn it off when I don't need to call someone
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| As the years go on my relationship with my iPhone feels more and
| more negative.
|
| Actually starting to hate it and the buzz of it gives me anxiety
| it might be some more problems from work.
| whiddershins wrote:
| _may_
|
| These articles really should qualify their claims more,
| especially in the headlines. Otherwise countless people absorb
| things semi-consciously as facts, rather than hypotheses that may
| have some data to support them.
| tbwriting wrote:
| Truly curious: do you think every article based on a study
| showing strong evidence for something should have a title that
| implies "it can go either way"?
|
| Personally I would trust readers to click on the article and
| decide for themselves. Otherwise, it's a bit infantilizing, no?
| jayd16 wrote:
| >article based on a study showing strong evidence
|
| You mean a blog that loosely cites two papers of unknown
| quality and draws novel conclusions not from the papers?
|
| Yes, it absolutely should not be stated as fact.
| ben509 wrote:
| > Personally I would trust readers to click on the article...
|
| This is already contrary to all available evidence.
| whiddershins wrote:
| Note how many upvotes this article has, and how long it has
| been on the front of HN.
|
| How many people have skimmed the the headlines and had this
| assertion register semi-consciously as a fact, whether or not
| they even looked at the article or comments.
|
| Misinformation noise.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| I believe the article ought not be written at all, since
| there's barely any signal. But if you have to write it,
| communicating the level of certainty in the title would be a
| virtue. At any rate, this article is marketing, not
| communication.
| TameAntelope wrote:
| I don't think a single study showing strong anything is of
| much use beyond, "Hey that's interesting, I would love to
| know more!"
|
| Articles summarizing studies as described should use language
| accordingly. Otherwise you risk certainty-addicts swarming
| and shouting down reasonable circumspection.
| Psype wrote:
| Get a smartwatch. Not kidding.
|
| It might sound stupid, but since I have a smartwatch and only
| filter the mot important notifications on it (calls, SMS), all
| other notifications can sit on my phone & wait for hours.
| Whatever. I still can be reached in an emergency.
|
| I don't event check my phone to get the time, duh, that's a watch
| !
| neop1x wrote:
| Or a fitness band like MiBand. It works similarly and battery
| lasts almost a month.
| shaicoleman wrote:
| To enable deep work, I've started incorporating offline sessions
| (1 hour long on average) into my day ("offline pomodoros").
|
| I only go back online when I need a mental break or when I'm
| completely blocked.
|
| It seems to help with productivity and improve my well-being.
|
| I've also got a second used phone which I use for work purposes
| (e.g. 2FA, Calendar reminders and production alerts) to reduce
| distractions. I don't find the work phone's presence to be
| distracting.
| bootlooped wrote:
| I have a strategy of layered speedbumps to screwing around on my
| digital devices. Next DNS to block some time wasting sites
| wholesale, Leechblock to limit time use on certain websites or
| during certain time frames, and Digital Wellbeing to time block
| whole apps and keep track of my usage.
|
| It would take me 1 minute to turn all of that off, but the time
| to instant gratification on a stock phone is so rapid, all I find
| I need is a very minor hindrance and it helps a lot.
|
| If every time I unlocked my phone it had a screen that displayed
| for 30 seconds that just said "what are you doing right now, and
| how long do you intend to do it?" I think it would probably have
| a similar positive effect.
| tester756 wrote:
| 20 yo with flip phone and used smartphone maybe for 2 days, ama?
|
| when it sucks:
|
| * sending photos - rarely needed for me, but when I need it I
| "kinda really" need it, but you can probably work around it by
| buying better flip phone
|
| * not seeing emojis in SMS
|
| * when you need quick access to internet e.g for map, some info.
| I never needed it(I try to remember pathes/ways either via map or
| google maps or just ask people at the place), but I'm sometimes
| worried that I may need it
| potatoman22 wrote:
| Do you find it hard to connect to people without services like
| FaceTime, Snapchat, Messenger, or Whatsapp? I'm a similar age
| and so much of my socializing takes place on digital platforms
| like those, especially during COVID.
| tester756 wrote:
| > Do you find it hard to connect to people without services
| like FaceTime, Snapchat, Messenger, or Whatsapp? I'm a
| similar age and so much of my socializing takes place on
| digital platforms like those, especially during COVID.
|
| Shockingly SMS works fine, nobody ever had problem with it.
|
| >Messenger
|
| I use FB like once a week on my PC/Laptop because I'm
| studying and unfortunely it is must have
|
| >I'm a similar age and so much of my socializing takes place
| on digital platforms like those, especially during COVID.
|
| on my PC/Laptop I use a lot of VoIPs like Ts3/Discord, but in
| 90% of the cases with people from the Internet, so it's hard
| to relate.
|
| You're probably right, but I do not use them (insta, snap,
| ...) so I'm not aware of what I do lose
| mshanowitz wrote:
| Also inability to reply to specific text messages.
|
| I find this to be a very useful feature that you only get with
| "smart" messaging apps like WhatsApp.
| realradicalwash wrote:
| this constant urge to check your phone, I don't think it's much
| different from an OCD. OCDs constantly interrupt the normal flow
| of one's thought processes with obsessive, intrusive
| interjections ("you are dirty", "did I do x/y?", "maybe you are
| gay", etc).
|
| that's what apps have instilled into our minds: a constant urge
| that interrupts our thought processes, so that we check fb, WA,
| gmail, etc.
|
| I switched all notifications off and I still have this, less than
| previously, but still. I am thinking of going back to a brick
| phone because of that.
| DavideNL wrote:
| > _Will is the Cofounder & CEO of Rize, a simple, intelligent
| time tracker that improves your focus to help you become more
| productive._
|
| An app to improve focus. Yet another app.
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