For the last few months, my algorithm has been feeding me content about one particular conversation.

And at first, I thought it was hyper-specific to me. But as it continued to fill my feed day in and day

out, especially on YouTube, I started to realize, wait, I think this is actually a bigger cultural

conversation that's happening in general,

and it piqued my interest. This particular conversation is the conversation around being offline.

I can't tell you how many video essays I've watched about how being offline is the new cool,

the new status symbol. Why I ditched my phone and got a flip

phone. Well, I guess that's still a phone. Why I ditched my smartphone to get a flip phone.

Why I started listening to music on my old iPod, how I picked up analog hobbies after iPhone

addiction and so on and so forth. This seems to be the cultural

conversation of the moment right now, being offline, which on the surface level is wonderful.

For years, I've been talking about how we all got to get offline a little, you know, but not that that's an

original idea. I've just been chiming into a larger conversation that's been starting to build,

you know, especially with like psychologists and stuff online who are like, the phone's really

bad. Be careful. And I think because I have a job on social media, perhaps I became sensitized to the negative

side effects of internet usage, maybe a little bit sooner and more extremely than more casual

internet users, right? But I've been saying this.

I've been saying this.

I've been feeling this.

And it seems now that everyone else is too.

I don't think there's anyone on the planet right now who's like, I love being on social media.

I love posting pictures.

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