Prediction #5 in my "Great Logging Off" market
Blog post:
https://www.fortressofdoors.com/ai-markets-for-lemons-and-the-great-logging-off
This resolves YES, if, by the end of 2027, in my sole opinion:
There is EITHER a measurable and significant increase in the number of addictions related to the internet and/or computing devices, OR a measurable and significant increase in the severity of existing addictions while the overall number stays flat.
This covers everything from videogame addiction to social media addiction to online porn addiction, to online gambling addiction. The key is it has to have a clear aspect of harm to it.
@LarsDoucet Increase as measured in unique number of humans addicted, or percentage of addicted humans to unaddicted?
@MattCWilson The resolution criteria I posted was:
"There is EITHER a measurable and significant increase in the number of addictions related to the internet and/or computing devices, OR a measurable and significant increase in the severity of existing addictions while the overall number stays flat."
I assume you're referring to the first part. Let's say that in the US, we need to see both -- an increase in absolute number of humans, and percentage of humans, addicted versus nonaddicted, for that to count as "significant increase in number." This is because if we just have a bunch of population growth (which would almost certainly result in an absolute increase in any category we're watching) but the actual percentage of addicts overall is going down then that seems like it should count towards no rather than yes.
Content on the internet is getting stale with the abundance of new talent, it seems like every topic already has been talked about and the "parasocial relationship" has been a burnout topic for at least 5 years now, it's even worse than old media cause at least at that point the provider could just not run a show for a while to avoid burnout but on the new media every show can be watched voluntarily. the 2020´s was a big scoop for tech cause the only population that hadn´t adapted to that point were alone at their house for a while, so pretty much everyone was on the internet right there, but from this point onwards we´re going down brother. The internet is the type of addiction that can be replaced with anything else as long as you start getting buisy with other stuff. Or at least i think so.
@AxelRmz "The internet is the type of addiction that can be replaced with anything else as long as you start getting buisy with other stuff. Or at least i think so."
Not sure about that one, since all you need to engage in the addiction is to reach down and pick up the smartphone sitting in your pocket/in front of you. For most other hobbies/addictions you need to actually get off your butt and engage with the world in some way.
It reminds me of an anecdote I heard about people who struggle with overeating. That if you're addicted to heroin and you want to quit, you can attempt to stay away from any situation in which heroin might be present. But if you're an overeater, you can't help but be exposed to large quantities of cheap fattening food several times a day. There's no "going cold turkey" from food.
In the same way, unless you want to be socially/professionally/informationally isolated, there's no "going cold turkey" from the internet.
any public-facing measure of "internet addiction" in practice measures how the "internet addiction" subfield of psychology measures internet addiction, as opposed to internet use generally, i think
