FR version is available. Content is displayed in original English for accuracy.
Advertisement
Advertisement
⚡ Community Insights
Discussion Sentiment
46% Positive
Analyzed from 3873 words in the discussion.
Trending Topics
#screens#don#screen#why#https#closed#stuff#week#addiction#sunday
Discussion (90 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews
I have young kids. There is A LOT of this sort of pressure and sentiment - that using a computer/tablet/phone is somehow inherently bad and harmful. My kids love watching TV but I am fortunate that they also love imaginative play with traditional toys (teddy bears, Lego, cardboard boxes etc) more and they only watch shows maybe 1 or 2 hours a month. I think it is because we don't have a physical TV in the house - there is no looming huge black rectangle in the corner reminding them all their waking time (we adults just watch netflix/whatever on a laptop after bedtime for the kids).
I think this is part of the problem. It's not screens that are bad, it's what you do with them and how you use them.
Just turn notifications off. Just don't look at twitter/Facebook/tiktok. It's not hard to just not use the brain rot stuff. I get it you are addicted - I guess just be thankful it's not alcohol or cigarettes. Get help for your addiction.
But I do not understand why on earth you would not use these amazing, life-improving, wondrous tools? Like if you needed to hammer in a nail you refuse to use a metal hammer "because technology" and what? you just bludgeon it in with your fists instead? I do not understand this rejection of hugely beneficial tools and technology that has made our lives so much easier.
Well, I don’t get why I can’t discover his writings if I have still Saturday :) but it is his website not mine… so if he wants me to visit it on Monday to Saturday his time, I will. Or will not…
You put some spatial restrictions (no tv screen visibly standing permanently in the house). Some people put time restrictions because that works for their case. It does not mean that they do not want to use these "wondrous technologies", they just want to spend some amount of their time doing something else. Saying "this works for me, everybody should do that" is absurd, something that works for you could work for some, but there is no reason to think it may work for everybody. And you just overlook how certain stuff are built to be addictive/attention grabbing, through A/B testing and research and tons of high-end specialised human capital in order to increase profit from advertising.
That part is precisely the problem. "Just get help for your addiction" is not how anything works.
It's incredibly hard for an addict to stop using the brain rot stuff. A lot of very smart people make a lot of money making it as hard as possible.
That's why you need help.
But you don't need to eliminate all forms of fermentation or combustion from your life to get over an alcohol or cigarette addiction. You don't need to eliminate all screens from your life to get over your tiktok addiction.
> There is A LOT of this sort of pressure and sentiment.
There’s absolutely no pressure that can’t be ignored. Just because you feel the pressure there’s no need to call everyone else’s way of dealing with overuse nonsensical.
> It's not screens that are bad, it's what you do with them and how you use them.
“Medium is the message” is a highly recommended reading.
My point was it's how you decide to use them. Do you have a TV/screen as a constant visible physical presence in your life spewing content design to attract and hold attention, or do you have a screen as a damn-useful tool that you choose and decide to use to your own benefit?
People who choose not to use screens one day a week are “deciding” not to use them for one day a week, for many reasons including some you mentioned yourself. But then you say “do you avoid electricity?”
You avoid putting a tv in your kids’ room tuned permanently to the news. Why? It would be damn-useful for them to learn what’s going on in the world. You literally let your kids use the screen way less than this guy allows himself to. You’re in agreement with him…
Only until I started smoking cigarettes and later stopped I realised what addiction really means, and how hard it is to kick it.
2. There aren't billion-dollar corporations, staffed with teams of PhDs in psychology, whose sole purpose 24/7 is to get me to use a hammer more. That's a false analogy.
> My kids love watching TV...we don't have a physical TV in the house
What do they watch "TV" on? Or do you mean they watch their shows on your laptop? Their tablets? What are the black rectangles that show them the shows? Without this it's hard to understand why you are patting yourself on the back so much about the lack of a TV. If the solution is to give the kids tablets 24/7, then the looming black rectangle with parental control might be preferable. If you're showing them the shows on your laptop and taking it away later; congratulations, you are just "taking technology away".
> there is no looming huge black rectangle in the corner reminding them all their waking time (we adults just watch netflix/whatever on a laptop after bedtime for the kids)...I think this is part of the problem.
What is part of the problem? That there is no looming black rectangle? There is no obvious phrase that corresponds to "part of the problem".
> Get help for your addiction...I do not understand this rejection of hugely beneficial tools and technology that has made our lives so much easier.
You are acknowledging that there is addiction, but then saying you don't understand why people would choose to "get help" for it by avoiding said technology 1/7th of their week (incidentally on a rest day when they get to decide what they do)?
Using obscure French words while talking about English comprehension...you really might be overestimating your own fluency and clarity of communication in English.
Just because it's your native language doesn't mean that you're automatically fluent.
Personally my biggest complaint is not necessarily screen time in itself, it’s that the tech giants are dedicated to maximising your (and your children’s) watch time by showing a stream of addictive slop.
It’s a shame, there’s good content for kids on YouTube but the algorithm always biased towards addictive crap. And they’re cornering the market to the extent that other operators producing good kid-friendly content (like the BBC in the UK) get sidelined.
It's not the screens, it what you do with the screens.
We do not need to reduce our lives to that of Luddites - we do not need to throw the baby out with the bathwater and avoid all screen use - just because people are addicted to social media or short-form video content.
They're not addicted to the screens, they're addicted to YouTube/tiktok/twitter/whatever.
Congrats on being a good parent, but there's a lot of people out there who put much less conscious effort into it than you apparently do.
Read some of the news URLs about "AI slop children's videos" for example, and try to imagine what happens when people give a 3 to 6 year old a tablet and unrestricted use of youtube to keep clicking on recommendations.
https://www.google.com/search?&q=ai+slop+children%27s+videos...
I'm not saying that having a day without screens or going completely no-screen is the best and absolute solution, but that it's a very real category of problem to grapple with and decide for yourself what's most appropriate.
Alcohol addiction is bad. But no one is saying we should have "bottle free days" or "try not to use a glass until you've been outside" or whatever - no one is saying "bottles and cups cause addiction! We should not allow children to use liquid containers until they are 16!" just because they could conceivably contain alcohol. That is obviously absurd. You are not addicted to the glass or bottle, you are addicted to the alcohol.
Yet we as a society are basically doing that for screens. Screens/bottles are not in themselves bad, but it's what you as an individual actively chose to put in it that leads to the problem. Don't use tiktok or whatever, but do use the screen.
The original author isn't trying to ban all screens from public life (e.g. screens that show bus information) or religiously avoiding them, it is obvious that by "screens" they specifically mean the "addictive entertainment that is usually delivered via screens". This does not mean they will run screaming from a screen at the doctor's that's displaying their vitals.
Actually, there's an analogy right there in your argument! We often say "he's been hitting the bottle" as a metaphor, that doesn't literally mean someone is hitting a bottle, it means that they are addicted to the alcohol in it.
The page is in Dutch, it explains that they're closed because get believe Sunday is a day for rest: https://www.babypark.nl/zondag/info-bp.html
It's their site, they can do what they want. And as long as there's competition I can even admire them for making a sacrifice for something they believe in.
This kind of stuff becomes a problem when it starts arguing that others must do this too. If someone argues that all shops must be closed because their religion forbids working on that day, then that's an issue. But as far as I know, the Baby Park people haven't done that. They made a personal moral choice and sacrifice. Good for them.
I share few of their values but I quite appreciate this one.
He said, you can already see the opening hours of all the stores and stuff on Google Maps.
I said, no, not a website like that. I mean, the website itself is open 9 to 5 Monday through Friday, and outside of that it’s closed.
My friend looked at me and just said, why?
Idk, I think it would be neat, I said.
My friend didn’t get it. This guy gets it.
Example: the government e-tax service's operating hours schedule
https://www.e-tax.nta.go.jp/info_center/index.htm
There is a full week of maintenance this month, and it's unavailable after midnight on Mondays and Sundays until 8:30am.
They laughed at Einstein, but they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.
So you want people to read your blog at work because when they are off it's closed?
When you visit my website a notification pops up on my phone and I have to set HTTP response manually.
It's also audio-only, because if you called me on the phone you wouldn't see any UI, would you?
We are already killing the deterministic part with LLMs. I can't trust the machine anymore to do tomorrow what I told it yesterday.
Now we also want to remove the always-on aspect? Arbitrarily? Because it's ...cool? I don't get it.
Lighting, audio stuff, equipment cases, backpacks, tripods, battery packs, that sort of thing. It's also stuff in the category of "Accessories" that have much profit margin built into them, much like how a Trek or Specialized branded road bicycle store makes much more profit from selling lights, bottle cages, shoes, than the bicycle itself.
Additionally they sell tons of the accessories that can be used to turn a modern $1500 2160p60 video capable smartphone into something more useful for amateur/youtuber level videography, like smartphone gimbals, bluetooth lap mic/receiver setups, extra batteries, cases... Stuff like what the 'smallrig' phone cages do.
https://www.smallrig.com/ca/list/Phone-Rig.html
B&H is much more than just still photo cameras.
https://www.google.com/search?&q=new+jersey+blue+laws+tools+...
As a person from the west coast it is always funny to me to encounter places with "blue laws" for no product sales on Sundays, or "dry counties", primarily in the US south/southeast.
Still makes me wonder how anyone gets anything done, OTOH it explains how door dash, uber, etc could happen there - other places had less demand...
For example:
https://www.babypark.nl
If that’s the case, you could consider using pre-render JavaScript to detect what day it is in the browser. Then temporarily redirect Sunday-identifying browsers to a “Closed On Sunday” page.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=b%26h+sab...
But the site still functions to browse.
(edit: one theory would be they're tracking how many URLs are copy/pasted and shared by firefox users to non-firefox users and then loaded by people with different browsers, there has to be some value to them in that data in the aggregate of millions of search page loads).
I figured leaving it into the copy and pasted URL is harmless and ultimately mozilla derives the bulk of its revenue from its search deal with google, so it's also a way of supporting continued firefox development in the most minuscule way.
It would never be allowed in the US, but I do think a designated "don't buy stuff" day once a week would be a really good idea, as well.
On Sundays, you can send packages via paczkomats (outdoor lockers) and convenience stores (Zabkas) but the post office, DHL, UPS, etc. offices are closed.
https://cejrowski.com/sklep/
Spot the five differences.
https://www.nbb.be/nl/balanscentrale/raadplegen/consult
It contrasts with times before, when we actually had to wait for a monthly magazine, and even if we wanted to watch a movie, it was aired (say) the next Tue 7PM.
While now we have all convenience, there is no anticipation - or rest.
Sundays last about 50 hours globally. From Kiritimati (UTC+14) to Baker Island and Howland Island (UTC-12).
I wish more sites would apply the 50 hours closing window, preferably 3.36 days a week.
https://poste.it
* JR central - you can buy, but not reserve seats, as the system actually registers your ticket at 5am
* Jr east - you cannot buy.
Some banks/government sites also simply don't want to work at night.
Very frustrating. To me it spells incompetence, but maybe there's some non-technical stakeholder who made a stupid rule once. For JR its probably some nightly accounting system - not 100% sure but I assume all the modern systems are just plugged on top of the ancient ones just like the airline industry does it.
Sorry but I find this incredibly paternalistic.
What if I am avoiding screens one day out of the week—on Saturday? Heck, maybe I avoid screens Monday—Saturday and Sunday is my only screen day?
It's great that you're avoiding screens on Sunday! Really! Blocking pages for everyone else just makes the world a very slightly worse place for no benefit.
[0] https://www.unscroll.ch
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_law
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_laws_in_the_United_States
Sunday is my day for boycotting religion's effects on society, so I take a break from observing any form of worship, abstinence, or superstition on Sunday, just as I do every other day of the week.
Mitch Hedberg would appreciate my internal consistency:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqHA5CIL0fg
If screen time is bad for you, why not reduce your own screen time every day? That would be seven times as effective. And why go out of your way to eliminate other people's screen time instead of your own?
You don't have to turn off your server to keep yourself from opening your own web page. In fact, the server isn't off at all: it remains online all Sunday to serve a paternalistic sermon telling everyone to go away, complete with a link to a swag shop that remains open for business, like a church with a gift shop.
None of this prevents you from reading a cached copy, working on the site locally, or watching stand-up comedy and cat videos on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kf9oitkXG3Y
There is a purely client-side, and far more effective, solution: just don't open your own website, or anything else on your screen. Withholding it from everybody else substitutes access control for self-control.
Obviously this is nowhere near as malicious or consequential as opposing same-sex marriage. But it follows the same logic on a much smaller scale: "I choose to abstain from this, therefore you must abstain from it too."
The bigots aren't satisfied with simply not marrying someone of the same sex themselves; they feel compelled to make love illegal for everyone else, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 1/4 days a year, for an entire lifetime.
He owns the site and is entitled to close it whenever he likes. But calling the inconvenience "encouragement" doesn't make it any less paternalistic.
If he practices what he preaches, it's a pity he won't see or engage with this discussion of his Sunday closure while it's still open -- or at least while it's still fresh.
But if I love his website, I can read it on archive.org any day of the week.
So what's next -- blocking archive.org?
"This site is closed on Sundays -- except the shop of course, the actual type of thing that is usually open or closed in the physical world, because when money comes into play, there is no pretending it wasn't just for show."
2025 What if your website had business hours? (2022)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43647598