a new page for personal technology

(or: I want all my technology to feel like an iPod)

Last night, I got to bed around midnight. I tucked myself in between my thin sheets (it’s been very hot) with a bubbling excitement for the book on my bedside table: part one of A Thousand and One Arabic Nights (so really, Two Hundred Something Arabic Nights). I was about halfway, and couldn’t wait to continue reading, into the night, these ancient stories that so many of our fellow humans have told and retold over thousands of years.

But I didn’t read. Instead, I spent the time on my phone, scrolling X. Every movement of my thumb, every new bit of information, scratched an itch. It felt… unstoppable. Around 02:00 AM, I finally put my phone to the side, and felt exhausted. I remembered the book, the excitement of getting in bed, and felt sad about the passed time. I switched off the light.

How often do you pick up your phone to play music, and end up doing something completely different? After all, it’s quite the informational jungle to navigate. You open your phone, and are greeted by a stack of notifications you didn’t ask for. If you successfully dodge those and make it to Spotify, it shows you some home feed with (sponsored) recommendations to arrive to your music library; and there, you scroll through all these albums you rarely listen to (all placed there with a single click), overwhelmed by the optionality. Finally, you find an album you like, put it on, and your lizard thumbs automagically open your algorithm of choice (Instagram, TikTok), and you spend 20 minutes scrolling without ever really intending to.

Nineteen years after the historic introduction of the iPhone in 2007, we’re deeply entrenched in the current paradigm of personal technology: a pocket-sized slab that we carry around everywhere, which allows us to do anything. Well, in theory: in practice, it seems we do quite a lot of the same few things. The premise was that of a bicycle for the mind, but perhaps it turned out to be more of a dopamine dripfeed: an IV of IG, that we carry around everywhere, and can go nowhere without.¹

The impact of this iteration of personal tech on society has been a public talking point in the past few years, and you’re likely aware of the sentiment: you might very well share it. We’re weary of our smartphones, because they’ve proven to be amazingly capable at stealing our attention. We’re weary of the online world, for what it lacks from the offline. And, we’re starting to dream of ways in which it could be different.

But what should the new paradigm look like? What form will it take? We’re seeing some proposals being put forward: some using novel forms, like Meta’s AR glasses and Apple’s Vision Pro (although I’m not sure a second version is ever going to come), others creating variations of our current paradigm: Light Phone, Sidephone, Meadow.

For me, my dreams about this form factor became more concrete about one and a half years ago. Around that time, I started using an iPod (a nano, 7th generation — the only non-touch model that has Bluetooth). And when I used it, playing music became playing music again: I’d open my iPod, select something from a handful of albums — each of which I really liked because I’d consciously put in effort to get it on there — I’d press play, listen, and that would be it: I’d have nothing more to lose my attention to. Sometimes, I’d notice my thumbs twiddling with the device after, seeking the algorithms that weren’t there: I’d be observing the literal muscle memory of my addiction to information.

At the same time, I can’t express how refreshing my interactions have felt. There existed nothing outside of engaging with my favourite music. Every time I’d put a few new albums on, I was happy for weeks after seeing them appear on that tiny screen. Using that little device was quiet, calming, and soothing. Today, it still gives me joy to tap the screen and pick out my music. It feels like sitting on a hill, and there’s a gentle breeze caressing the skin of your arms. By comparison, an iPhone feels like heavy gusts that exhaust you with their noise.

Comparing the experience of playing music from these two devices, it seems to me all that noise mainly arises from two underlying patterns:

1. It pushes information to your brain that you didn’t request: through notifications; apps’ homescreens of unread messages; red bubbly badges.
2. It allows you to access anything at any time: it’s a single portal to any app, site, or service.

I understand that these two patterns were designed with a bicycle in mind: facilitating your agency, letting you ride into the world. But that world has been optimized to get you to step off your bike, and settle in the opium dens of Meta and Bytedance.

I recently read an essay titled The Intellectual Obesity Crisis, which compares information to sugar. Our brains evolved to crave it because it was scarce, until suddenly it wasn’t anymore; and so we’re left consuming junk food (and info) en masse, cheaply produced and unhealthy, but giving us that sweet release of dopamine.

That’s why the iPhone only half-works as a bicycle: it is a continuous battle with our lizard brain. By removing all constraints from our interfaces, we’ve placed the burden of enforcing them upon our own shoulders. That’s why your thumbs move towards the strongest dopamine feed of the moment, all by themselves.

Perhaps all this is “no-one’s” fault, but a lesson we inevitably had to learn. Perhaps we needed to fuck around and find out that we’re susceptible to information addiction, before we could look for another way: one that doesn’t exist yet.

I can sense it’s time for a new paradigm. New hardware, built by people who accept that we are just advanced lizards looking for the next neurochemical hit. What principles would this tech be built on? Here’s some of my guesses:

Hold intentionality in high regard. Personal technology should empower people to do things with intent, and understand that a user’s intention can be encroached on. It should not push information, it should not encourage us to overindulge.

Single-purpose, not omni-purpose. The reason the iPod works really well is because it just does a single thing; it’s not a black mirror to every single thing I could want at any moment (which will always lead to the most addictive thing, the dopamine dripfeed). The physical friction/effort of switching the device in my hand from an iPod to iPhone is enough to prevent me from opening Instagram after I hit play on an album.

Friction is how we feel value. Anu Atluru writes that in the physical world, we intuitively tie weight to value, but in the digital world we forget this: “we’re creating more than ever, but it weighs nothing.” We want to make things easier, minimize the effort it costs to do anything. But when we make something effortless, we take it for granted, and it loses its value. (How often do you consider the miracle of tap water?) This is why it is more beautiful to have 20 albums on vinyl (or on your iPod) than 2000 albums in your Spotify library. It feels better to put one of those 20 albums on. It feels better to send a handwritten letter to your love than to share a reel. This isn’t an argument for living like a hermit; less isn’t more, but more isn’t more either. It’s an argument for letting the things worth doing cost a little, on purpose.

I hear many many people around me who are tired of our current tech paradigm and how we get sucked into a digital world by our devices. It feels like we’re waking up from the fever dream, and are getting ready for a fresh direction, a new philosophy. We’ve eaten the Apple, now we need to deal with a world riddled with byte-sized knowledge and dopamine dripfeeds.

If you, like me, are exploring how we can make personal technology feel more like playing music on an iPod, and not an iPhone, let’s chat!