Social Media Is Designed To Drain Its Users

“are you using the computer or is it using you” —@amusechimp

The existence of social media detox proves how draining social media is. If these apps were tools, we would use it like we use our hammer, or bike, or chopsticks: only when needed. But these apps are not just tools of communication; these apps are the modern attention beasts.

This applies especially to YouTube: there’s something about it that makes it so addictive. YouTube is amazing: it’s becoming a modern university because of the sheer amount of useful knowledge contained there, but it’s a double-edged sword: the rabbit-holes on YouTube is a massive attention devourer.

These apps are both a blessing and a curse. Are we using it, or is it using us?

P.S. A related video by Naval Ravikant.

December 11, 2021