With time being scarce lately, I am jotting personal reflections when I can. These touches have been discussed aplenty elsewhere and, like many other posts, they have the vibe of a mediocre self-help book. But I don’t think that the redundancy hurts.

For few weeks I’m drafting some material on a bigger subject, it goes slow. That writing feels dull, I clearly miss the right words. While re-thinking once again the composition of said magnum opus, and whether it brings any value, I noticed an unusual clarity of thought. It was a while since the mind was that sharp, a good while—years, perhaps. The culprit names YouTube.

Smartphones are OK

Evil consumerist devices, drivers of the surveillance capitalism-based economy they are, the smartphones. However, I would refrain from blaming the tool. Spyware, a problem more serious, aside, smartphones merely facilitate the connectivity-based lifestyle. I never had phone addiction, could not care less about the apps (a very stupid word, btw) and most social networks—this train I missed decade ago. Contemporary trend, the brain rot, if it’s real indeed, didn’t affect me either. Of course, I’m no paragon of temperance: I use the messengers far more than I’d like; my circle has always been online.

Of note, dumb phones are dumb. I love The Matrix, and feel the nostalgia too (the last Nokia I had was E70, a beauty). But chasing the “digital detox” with products that are explicitly designed to sell minimalism? Delete that app, don’t pick the phone so often—any smartphone is a dumb phone.

The Infinite Breakfast TV

YouTube appeared in my life in 2019. Being late is totally me—to compare, took four more years to discover Emacs. Lots of good stuff in there: smart people, fine videos, useful guides, investigations and interviews. To watch it is not particularly wrong, and, speaking frankly, with all wrongdoings, surveillance-based model and the algorithmic hell, YouTube remains the world’s main educational platform. No denial, it democratizes many things.

Fellow bench scientists are probably aware of the great colloquial, the PCR music. I am okay with repetitive, spinal work. Back then, over the episodes of drudgery I listened to the schwarze szene, my flavor of the aforementioned music, and focused inward—processing thoughts, gathering ideas. This was a time of, a very snazzy word follows, enlightenment; I had my share of eureka moments. Lacking external load, the mind finds something to solve.

Later, YouTube replaced music, with some form of podcast being constantly played. For a good part of the day, someone was talking something. Doesn’t feel like a waste of time at first—all those stories, while passing by, grant sense of productivity. Of course, my rational self could see that all this knowledge seldom retained. The same myself has also sensed that, even though abstracted away and pushed to the periphery of perception, the constant influx of content disturbs attention and drains mental resources. No more good moments, brain fog instead.

Stephanie Meyer

Past month sums to the following activities: singing the Imse Vimse Spindel (gallophones know the character as the gypsy spider), making soups, mopping floors. For pedagogical and safety reasons, I’m trying to have no other irritants but the toddler himself. Consequently, there is time for an uninterrupted, refined thinking. A mental blast it is, should I say! Thoughts are back, sharp and focused, ideas are brewing continuously. Feels genuinely good, so much so taking a step further, I leave the headphones behind while going for runs (an activity I actually hate and find tedious).

As banal as it is, boredom doesn’t harm. It is good for my creativity, both in chemistry and on the hobby side of things. Once I mentioned that I’ve read Twilight. More generally, the soccer moms and their writings is almost a self-contained genre, an interesting one. I see where the imperative to write comes from, and, to own surprise, make an effort to scribble fiction myself.

The mandatory genAI rant

The proliferation of audio-and video-content comes with some problems. Dedicated watching or listening takes time, good chunk of it. For a seasoned platform user, even a carefully truncated daily playlist amasses more hours than a day has. Likewise, reading through a well-written guide is faster than watching a tutorial. But the latter format is clearly more popular, and the quality videos (many of them are, don’t get me wrong!) take precedence over well-written texts.

AI voice generation works great, some videobloggers are quite open about using it. No judgment passed; I share the overall bubble sentiment, but the technology and its applications are real. Ergo, production costs and efforts plummet, paving the way for a content deluge. Good that I no longer care.