My surface web experience

It's been a few week now
that I've been back on
the surface. It's been an
interesting experiment, but
I feel like a change is
needed again.

What is the surface?

I want to answer this as
one friend mentioned that
mastodon wasn't really
the surface web. To be
fair, mastodon is a really
sweet place on the surface,
but I still feel that it's
being part of the surface
web. Maybe even saying that
mastodon is on the lower
end of the surface (which
is a good thing!)

If it's on the http protocol,
publicly accessible, searchable,
I consider it surface. Not only
that, but people on mastodon
links to a lot of other surface
web medias. The door is open
to youtube, news sites and
the rest of the surface web.

What is not the surface?

Everything Gemini, gopher,
newsletter (email), pubnix,
newsgroups... You could say
the darkweb is also not
surface, but I haven't found
much of interest on there.

Why does it matter?

I'm in the process of
reclaiming my life in
all of its details. The
surface web has become
a place that sucks the
life out of me, by creating
more and more content and
algorithms with the only
purpose of keeping me online,
and keep me purchasing. 

I don't want that, I don't
need that.

What was my experience?

At first it was great. The
instance I wanted to join
is an instance that I've
been following even if I
wasn't part of it. It's
a beautiful community of
creative people, tech,
misfits, musicians and
since it's by invite
only, it creates a really
nice curated group of people.
A good party, with only the
people you wanted to see!

I got inspired to create more,
I got to re-connect with other
communities and meet really
nice people. One of the most
important shift that happen
while browsing on there,
was to create oneiricmonk.net

That came to me after creating
a short piece of music, following
a prompt from Junto music. This
was a really fun experience, which
brought back that desire to
have theme centered creative
process.

For the inspiration of creating
Oneiric Monk, I'll always be
grateful for the experience.

But a few weeks into the
process, I'm back into scrolling,
without a goal, and I assume
seeking a dopamine hit? I'm a
little bored, and have created
a mildly useless habit. I
post in the hope someone will
like or share... 

Now this is in no way a
complain about the quality
of content, or mastodon in
general. I've developed
addictive pattern online
and I know my pitfalls and
tendencies, so when I see
this is starting, I have
now a bit of a knee-jerk
reaction to run away.

Now will I quit? You
quitter!! Nha, I won't
quit mastodon at this point.
I've removed the app from
my phone though and from
my laptop. I can always
reach it from the web
anyway. I like to have
a foot on the surface when
and if I need to connect
with people around some
of the project I like
(faircamp for example!)
and the community I've
joined is really inspiring. 
But I want to come back
to gopher more.

I had found a nice rhythm
of writing on gopher, while
spending some time on Gemini,
for forums and games and that
felt good and minimal. And
when I need a hit of surface
web, I know where to go!

I actually have quite the
backlog of gopher writing,
I'll post that in the
coming days.