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I read The Attention Merchants after reading the excellent essay "You Are the Product" by John Lanchester, published in the London Review of Books. I've read that essay several times and I highly recommend taking 30 minutes to immerse yourself in it. If you are at a point where you are questioning why you spend time using social media sites that end up making you feel worse than if you hadn't logged in at all, you are contemplating a "digital sabath", or are drawn to practicing meditation, the essay will probably add more fuel to your mental fire.
I majored in visual communications, and so I took many classes on the history of graphic design and advertising. The two are inseparable. Much of this book was a review of what I studied in college, so much so that I could even mentally recall specific images or ads mentioned. I didn't learn many new things, but if you are wanting to become a more literate consumer this book will point you in the right direction to begin thinking more critically about ads and how they affect your thoughts and feelings. Honestly, I would skip the book and just read the essay. It is that good.
A key takeaway is that social media sites use free labor to make money. When you post on Instagram, you are creating content that draws more people to use the site. As Instagram makes money by showing ads to its users, that means it is making money by using your time and your creativity. As a graphic designer, I don't work for free. Why are we so willing to work for free for Instagram, Facebook, etc? You may say that the benefits (being inspired, keeping up with friends) are worth the payment. But realize that with cookies and data trafficking, you are giving up much more than your snapshots. Add the psychological burden that many feel by using social media (there are studies that show that even seeing positive things on social media causes a net negative effect on our psyche), and you have to wonder what the cost is. If "our lives are the sum of what we paid attention to", is it really worth the trade?
I am going to delete my instagram account pretty soon, I use Twitter because it is the best news source on the planet, I keep facebook because I don't have all the emails of those contacts and it's the best way to get in touch with someone you haven't talked to in years, LinkedIn really is useful for job hunting, and Goodreads provides an outstanding service to me. But after logging on to Instagram only once in the past month, I have noticed that I am much more mentally healthy, more satisfied with my life and current possessions, and yeah, I like seeing my friends photos but I think that it stalls natural conversation. I don't ask, "What did you do this weekend?" if I already saw everything on Instagram. So I prefer to be in the dark and send a message or ask friends for status updates IRL.
These changes, added with some adopting some monastic spiritual practices, have made me more considerate and deliberate in my daily life, and have created the mental silence that I need even though I live in the center of one of the world's largest metropolises.
I majored in visual communications, and so I took many classes on the history of graphic design and advertising. The two are inseparable. Much of this book was a review of what I studied in college, so much so that I could even mentally recall specific images or ads mentioned. I didn't learn many new things, but if you are wanting to become a more literate consumer this book will point you in the right direction to begin thinking more critically about ads and how they affect your thoughts and feelings. Honestly, I would skip the book and just read the essay. It is that good.
A key takeaway is that social media sites use free labor to make money. When you post on Instagram, you are creating content that draws more people to use the site. As Instagram makes money by showing ads to its users, that means it is making money by using your time and your creativity. As a graphic designer, I don't work for free. Why are we so willing to work for free for Instagram, Facebook, etc? You may say that the benefits (being inspired, keeping up with friends) are worth the payment. But realize that with cookies and data trafficking, you are giving up much more than your snapshots. Add the psychological burden that many feel by using social media (there are studies that show that even seeing positive things on social media causes a net negative effect on our psyche), and you have to wonder what the cost is. If "our lives are the sum of what we paid attention to", is it really worth the trade?
I am going to delete my instagram account pretty soon, I use Twitter because it is the best news source on the planet, I keep facebook because I don't have all the emails of those contacts and it's the best way to get in touch with someone you haven't talked to in years, LinkedIn really is useful for job hunting, and Goodreads provides an outstanding service to me. But after logging on to Instagram only once in the past month, I have noticed that I am much more mentally healthy, more satisfied with my life and current possessions, and yeah, I like seeing my friends photos but I think that it stalls natural conversation. I don't ask, "What did you do this weekend?" if I already saw everything on Instagram. So I prefer to be in the dark and send a message or ask friends for status updates IRL.
These changes, added with some adopting some monastic spiritual practices, have made me more considerate and deliberate in my daily life, and have created the mental silence that I need even though I live in the center of one of the world's largest metropolises.