Brandon J. Kessler's Blog

My Personal Ramblings

De-Converging Technology - Introduction

What is De-converging

De-converging, or de-convergence, is the opposite of converging or convergence. It’s a made-up word. The gist, the feeling, is that it’s breaking apart these bits of technology that we’ve melded together for convenience. Western society, and much of the world from what I gather, is constantly aiming to make the technology we use more convenient and do more and more functions, i.e. the smart phone. There are many benefits to this convenience and convergence, but there are also many unforeseen consequences.

To be clear, I do not approach de-converging and digital minimalism lightly. I’m a technophile, I love technology. I work in technology. I think that the net benefit of technology is huge for humankind. However, I also see so many other problems with both myself, and my family, on how technology is being used. I’ve read about Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport (It’s on the list to read, I swear), and I’ve been seeing more and more tech-tubers on YouTube having similar thoughts. Even in my own industry I’m seeing more and more folks in the technology sphere having issues with the tools we use everyday. I am personally discovering unhealthy habits and problems from technology and these de-converging posts will be a my exploration of having healthier habits.

Converged technology has a major key problem: Technology is a tool, and by combining multiple functions into a single device or app or website, we are effectively making that tool a “leatherman”. It’s able to do a bunch of small things okay in a pinch, but doesn’t really excel at any one thing. The difference between our analogy is that our converged devices have taken over so much of our toolset that we don’t have better alternatives available to do the task, i.e. we bought our little multi-tool and don’t have a screwdriver, drill, wrench, plyers, and socket set available, only the multi-tool. The other difference is that our tool is also addicting.

Smartphones have evolved over time to make accessing information easier. They’ve also become our viewports into the world at large. We get all our news, talk to our friends, make plans, cancel plans, order food, shop for clothes, everything through these tiny rectangles. The problem is we’re still primates and there are so many dark patterns on the internet, but also baked into the apps and services on our smartphones and tablets, our TV’s, our game consoles.

What about smartphone's built-in wellbeing or screentime or feature X?

This is an excellent choice for folks who have the willpower to follow through with it. The problem is that most of these tools are easy to bypass. Yes, they help you be more mindful of what you are doing, but they are more like strong suggestions than actual solutions for many folks. To use the tool effectively, you’d need an accountibility-buddy to setup the limits and lock them with a pincode only they have, much like parental controls for children. I have found that personally just deleting the apps from the device is far more effective than the “Hey, you’ve been doomscrolling for an hour” warnings that most of the wellbeing apps popup with.

I went a step further and deleted all social networking accounts I had, except 1. I deleted TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, and Discord. I kept Reddit, mostly because I only check it for answers, and without the app I almost always forget about it. I deleted all of those because even with the apps deleted, there’s always that urge to re-download the apps and doomscroll again. I removed news from my phone, and disabled the Google News drawer/homescreen thing on my Pixel so that I couldn’t doomscroll that. I still have SubStack installed, and wouldn’t have considered that Social Media until very recently, and it is potentially on the chopping block, now. In purging all those apps and accounts I no longer have a mental overhead of trying to A) avoid those apps and B) I don’t have the urge to re-download the apps. Not everyone can do that at the moment, as some folks use social media for advertising their small business, or finding their clients, or things like Facebook marketplace.

So you've minimized, why de-converge?

Because even with deconverging there’s ways to get sidetracked with a smartphone. I have Duolingo and Balatro still installed, along with emails and the afformentioned chat and messages. I have Calm and Fitbit installed, and Amazon and eBay. I have Play Books, and Kobo, and YT Music and Bandcamp. I have a web browser. I have a bunch of other apps still installed, and while not as addicting as social media, they can still cause me to go down a rabit hole. I use “Forest” for my pomodoro timer and also to help me curb some of that, but as I’ll talk about in the next post, that’s not enough.

I also realize our entire society has changed and evolved to require a smartphone or tablet of some sort to function. 2FA apps, banking, resturaunts, and many others I can’t even think of, all require smartphones. Sometimes there are alternatives, but there are enough occasions where I don’t think you can remove your smartphone from your life completely, without major sacrifices. As a parent, I know I can’t simply because of all the digital parental controls that I need access to. So with the goal in mind not to eliminate your smartphone, but instead remove as much dependence as possible from it, I hope to explore those options in the next year over multiple posts.

Conclusion

If you find yourself reaching for your smartphone instinctively, or if you feel like you could be more productive at home or at work, or want to be more present in the moment but find it hard, I hope you’ll read this series and at least see what’s working for me. There’s no “one-size-fits-all” solution to any of these problems, but I hope that you’ll find some ideas and inspiration.