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Tim Cook: 'I Don't Want My Nephew on a Social Network' (theguardian.com)
Tim Cook, speaking at Harlow college in Essex, shared his views on the limits on technology and social media he feels should be imposed on kids. He said: "I don't believe in overuse [of technology]. I'm not a person that says we've achieved success if you're using it all the time," he said. "I don't subscribe to that at all." Even in computer-aided courses, such as graphic design, technology should not dominate, he said. "There are are still concepts that you want to talk about and understand. In a course on literature, do I think you should use technology a lot? Probably not." The 57-year old chief executive, who took the reins at Apple after the death of Steve Jobs in 2011, said the company cared deeply about children outside the classroom. "I don't have a kid, but I have a nephew that I put some boundaries on. There are some things that I won't allow; I don't want them on a social network."
This sounds very unhealthy, why is he putting boundaries on a kid that is not even his?
I deleted facebook on my phone a week ago and dont think I'll ever reinstall it. those times of idle where i would scroll thru mindlessly are now spent observing the world around me and thinking about things that actually matter in my life.
I still log on via web on my laptop every 3 days or so as there are some professional groups on there that keep me in touch with some good people but outside of that I have little to no use for it - and I signed up in 2005 as a college student.
Tim is pretty wise in his advice to his nephew.
While you are technically correct, the problem is that these social networks are used overwhelmingly for socially negative reasons.
It was supposed to be used for people to be able to connect and discuss. Instead it's used for profiting, large-scale social manipulation, and even outright hate. SM has taken the natural human fear of "being left out", and abused it to such an incredible extent that people en masse are getting burned out and simply walking away.
There are lots of ways to accomplish what social media was supposed to do, but without being forced to expose yourself to all the negative aspects.
I personally have given up on facebook, twitter, and well, pretty much all of them. It's just too much. I'm much less up to date with how my friends are doing, which is unfortunately, but I also feel a heck of a lot less overwhelmed by the world too.
For similar reasons I've also stopped watching and reading news. It's very rarely relevant to me. If there wasn't a local incident, they'll fill up the time with remote incidents instead, so that you are constantly bombarded by a steady stream of "look how utterly shitty the world is".
Being bombarded by negativity from all directions *will* take it's toll on you, even if it doesn't seem like it at first.
..thoughts are thoughts. I don't want to see bad things come to people, either, but I don't know what's good or bad for them; I know only from my perspective.
Here's why I'm bothering to post a comment...
My girlfriend has severe social anxiety (so do I, so pot-kettle). Anyhow, I gave up Facebook years ago because I noticed how people that were former high school friends (good friends) would come back into town from a far-away place they now live. In the case of the one I'm thinking about, they fly all over the world rather randomly because of their career, so visits back "home" aren't frequent. When they would come back into town to visit parents/holiday/etc, they would post about how much they would love to hang with me and catch up on stuff (and can't wait to do it!) I would wonder, then, why that person would be leaving town because vacation time was over, and they didn't bother to make an effort to see me for even 5 minutes. I would look on Facebook and see this long stream of posts about their drinking and hanging with hot girls (pictures included of the drunken embraces and "fun").
Repeat this, like, around 10 times (vacations where they were back in town and expressed great interest in hanging with me, same outcome). I got the picture (no pun intended at all). I noticed that others were maybe interested in seeing me or talking with me, but it was mostly posts about their horrible days at work, stupid prices on things, random thoughts about their relationship that swayed from great to horrible to great to horrible to, cross-links to "funny" things or "statements that warrant a movement"... yeah. I got to seeing before long that I was basically looking at peoples' personal self-imagery they wished to express to the world. Others were calling for sympathy, etc. None of them wanted to leave the screen or phone they were posting from, though, unless it was getting them something to immediately satisfy their wants.
After a while, I deleted the Facebook account and don't miss it in the slightest.
Back to girlfriend. She is socially anxious and doesn't like being in crowds of people. Also doesn't like trying to join in on conversations where she hasn't quite heard 80% of it, so there's not much to say to get involved. She doesn't get welcomed in for conversations because she's not a drama enthusiast (playing into others' drama). However, she is a socially-minded person and wants to be part of groups or admired. She also expresses admiration toward others on Facebook to feel indirectly reverse-rewarded. Here's the kicker; we don't really do much. She spends most of her time off of work on Facebook, scrolling through posts and laughing at the simplest humor that a 5th grader laughs at, and having eyes glaze over as she's looking at others having "fun". This "fun", of course isn't anything but public-facing imagery, but she's living vicariously through these people and mentally becoming part of their lives and activities because she gets to see their forward-facing info and pictures. A friend posting a 100,000th-removed forward/cross post of something that's scary or "bad for you" becomes a huge deal like it's the one person them self warning her of these things and she needs to research them and try to alter her lifestyle to shape around the thing that's ultimately nothing but someone's boredom post of randomly collected information compiled into some big warning or statement about how bad things are *gasp for air*.
I look at myself not giving a damn about other peoples' Facebook lives, but really caring about them when I see them face-to-face or have nice conversations on the phone with them. The conversations we have don't even touch on the crap that's posted on their Facebook account. It's almost like two different people, or like I'm talking to the debugging code or the work going into the code; Facebook gets to see the constantly-changing alpha releases, respectively.
I love life without Facebook. What I don't like is seeing people so caught up in it
Re "Social Networks are tools"
Tools to push ads, track people as they interact with ads. Derank results, ban links and accounts. To see what trends are emerging.
Tools for the owners of the tech, not the consumers of the tech.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Life shouldn't revolve around social media at least in the beginning.
I think this statement can be improved by removing the last five words.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
I see people reading some agenda into what Cook is saying. But Cook is 100% honest and I totally agree with hin. Tech experts always have put technology into perspective, and rightfully so. Especially in education. ... Look at how difficult a job we have at getting it to the Ords that voting machines are a bad idea.
Steve Jobs did the same, as do Clifford Stoll and many others.
My daughter knows her way around the Linux Netbook she got in her teens and we use Google Docs for me to help her write her english applications to universities. I have however also taught her to be paranoid about her online presence and gave her a set of ready-made spoof accounts along with it. Which she uses. She also creates her own when the need arises.
That her dad is *the* computer expert in her closer and wider vincinity has the consequence that she is not half as addicted to social media and whatscrap than her friends are. She left high school in the summer and now travelling in south america for half a year or so. We occasionaly do chat on hangouts every odd day, but at times wifi coverage is a tad flaky in the rainforrest ... especially on your way to this place, apparently. She blogs to keep all her friends and family updated at once, but other than that has way better things to do than online-binge. She uses computers very efficiently, as a tool. But not obscessively. She is way more data safety/backup aware than her mom or any of her friends. And for computers/tablets/whatnot she looks at specs more like I would rather than an Ord (weight, ruggedness, battery time, data exchange & rescue possibilites, etc).
Bottom line: Tech like anything else is like medicine: Good fundamental knowlege and lean doseage is everything. Forget that and you raise dweeps adicted to the screen, not enabled grown-ups.
My two cents and two thumbs up on Cook on this one.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca