Ever feel like The Scrolling never ends? Or, not even just The Scrolling, but the insistent race to keep up with the platforms that host that scroll? How, between one platform imploding and several more springing up to take its place, you can feel nothing but fragmented just trying to work out where to look?
Yeah, ok, it’s not a good fashion to follow. There’s a bigger question of how much we need to connect with each other across a hundred different networks, each forming their own tiny town square (maybe a hamlet square), their own watercooler, or a virtual coffeehouse of the day. But I’m happy to admit that I do like the people and the avatars I connect with. The fundamental lure that first attracted me to the internet, of being able to connect with strangers and find some kind of “fleeting tribe” is still a lot of fun, and a source of a lot of inspiration.
But I don’t welcome the pressure to keep up, check in, or hang out. For tech to go back to its roots of emptiness, it needs to bend to my will, not the other way around.
One little piece of string I’ve started holding things together with is the Random Bookmark plug-in for Firefox, by Steven Aleong a few years ago. The premise is nice and simple:
- Set up a new folder in your Firefox bookmarks, eg “socials”.
- Add a few feed sites that you enjoy checking. Mine are listed down below.
- Install the plug-in, and configure it to use the new folder.
- Set any other options (like your favourite kind of entropy)
- Add the plug-in icon to your toolbar, and just click it every now and then when you want a quick social break.
And that’s it. There’s something much nicer about having randomness guide you, which takes a lot of the overheads of decision-making out of the loop. A quick hit of novelty factor, with Ctrl-W (close tab) as your rapid escape hatch.
It doesn’t have to be social feeds either, of course. I’ve started trying it out for longer articles to read, and for other interesting sites that I think I should check in on every now and again (like, every 6 months). Embrace entropy and all is well.
Here’s my list of social feeds that I use currently, just for fun. X has been emphatically removed a few weeks ago.
- My Mastodon list of people I’ve chatted to in real life
- My Bluesky feed (which is currently pretty quiet, as I’ve only just started using it) (also here I am on Bluesky)
- aboutideasnow.com
- The forum for Playdate Pulp chatter
- My LinkedIn feed (rather than choosing to visit it…)
- Communities I’m subscribed to on Lemmy
- My itch.io feed
- … and a daily “minute cryptic crossword clue“
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