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    Avoiding outrage fatigue while staying informed

    (www.scientificamerican.com)
    757 points headalgorithm | 12 comments | 05 Feb 25 14:55 UTC | HN request time: 1.262s | source | bottom
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    joshdavham ◴[05 Feb 25 15:50 UTC] No.42950233[source]▶
    One thing to consider for those of us who are more sensitive to online outrage is to just quit social media all together. I’m technically gen z and I’ve been off of social media (aside from HN, WhatsApp and discord) for years and you wouldn’t believe how great it’s been for my overall state of mind.

    Reddit, instagram, X, Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn, Threads, etc are all the equivalent of digital junk food and I’d argue that we’re all a lot more negatively affected by it than we think. There’s a reason ‘brain rot’ was word of the year.

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    ge96 ◴[05 Feb 25 17:24 UTC] No.42951934[source]▶
    I quit reddit too recently, I still look at it for info but I'm not logged in/scrolling through it

    I find myself reaching for something when I have YouTube/chilling at my desk at the end of the day, can't code anymore/make something just on till I sleep. Sometimes have the desire to play a video game (I have a gaming rig too funny how that works)

    I've been trying to read HN or IEEE, TechCrunch stuff like that as my "lazy fun"

    I will miss posting stuff like "what is this car" or being part of the car talk for a sporty car I drive but idk kind of want to just live too

    It's unfortunate people expect you to have social media like a girl asks me if I have Instagram and I'm weird to not have one, I get it they can scope you out too for safety but when I tried using that stuff I felt this pressure to post about something

    Anyway my main goal in life right now is getting out of debt/staying fit and work on projects

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    1. jordanpg ◴[05 Feb 25 18:06 UTC] No.42952617[source]▶
    One healthy way to consume Reddit that I recently learned about is creating a "custom feed" (see left margin of new UI).

    You can just add subs that are of interest that lack the torrent of bad news and only ever visit that custom feed. It doesn't ever algorithmically add posts from subs you don't manually include, as far as I've seen.

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    2. boringg ◴[05 Feb 25 18:17 UTC] No.42952784[source]▶
    User groups you would be interested in get hijacked by whatever the overall sentiment of Reddit is. Threads that aren't political suddenly get political for no reason. It's completely dead in there - content quality is brutally low.
    replies(2): >>42953190 #>>42956908 #
    3. awfulneutral ◴[05 Feb 25 18:44 UTC] No.42953190[source]▶
    I just bookmark subreddits for things I'm interested in, and visit them individually. I hardly ever see any political content doing that.
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    4. bombcar ◴[05 Feb 25 19:32 UTC] No.42953857{3}[source]▶
    The key is to stay in smaller, dedicated subreddits and avoid anything remotely popular or generic.
    5. matwood ◴[05 Feb 25 20:09 UTC] No.42954404[source]▶
    > You can just add subs that are of interest that lack the torrent of bad news and only ever visit that custom feed.

    I still use old.reddit and this is the only way I've ever used Reddit. My homepage only shows me posts from Reddits I follow and nothing else. I don't see all the craziness people here are talking about.

    replies(1): >>42961601 #
    6. stevage ◴[05 Feb 25 21:23 UTC] No.42955364[source]▶
    Yeah I just use old Reddit, which still works like that.

    Cannot stand unsolicited content.

    7. tacticalturtle ◴[05 Feb 25 23:32 UTC] No.42956908[source]▶
    The wave of X bans was so frustrating. Particularly for sports subreddits where that’s where all of the breaking news and team announcements happen.

    In fact NFL teams are specifically banned from having bluesky accounts as an official media channel, and r/nfl still banned X/Twitter.

    sigh

    replies(1): >>42957269 #
    8. nmfisher ◴[06 Feb 25 00:11 UTC] No.42957269{3}[source]▶
    Why are NFL teams banned from having an official account on Bluesky?
    replies(1): >>42958559 #
    9. tacticalturtle ◴[06 Feb 25 03:13 UTC] No.42958559{4}[source]▶
    It’s not an “approved social media site”:

    https://www.nbcsports.com/nfl/profootballtalk/rumor-mill/new...

    Presumably there’s some money that needs to change hands between the NFL and a social media site.

    10. JKCalhoun ◴[06 Feb 25 03:38 UTC] No.42958759{3}[source]▶
    r/localllama, r/bambulabs ... Politics has a way of creeping in.
    11. lmm ◴[06 Feb 25 05:48 UTC] No.42959460{3}[source]▶
    Politicisation happens, though slowly. Therewasanattempt used to be funny pictures/videos and is now purely TDS. My city's sub used to have useful local content and is now about 50% national politics.
    12. roelschroeven ◴[06 Feb 25 12:09 UTC] No.42961601[source]▶
    Yes, that's exactly the same as what I do. When I tried new reddit, it looked awful to use and look at, so I always stayed at old reddit. Like you I don't see any of the crazy stuff. Just discussions in the subreddits I follow.