tavie.com

Is there a point when drugs or alcohol no longer offer any pleasure to the addict, but they are unable to stop anyway?

I think that's what's happened with me and the internet. I'm still addicted, it's still floating around in my bloodstream, but there's nothing left for me anymore. AOL's dropping Usenet was just icing; I still check my newsgroups on Firebird, but there's nothing left in them.

The only thing I use the internet for now is to obsessively read blogs (which aren't updated, except for Boing Boing, my favourite), obsessively check my email (for what? I used to get reams and reams a day. Now the cupboard is very bare. And I'm glad, because when I do get real email, I keep it as new forever because I'm so tired of sitting in front of the computer) and obsessively read empty newsgroups. My attention span has been almost entirely erased by over a decade of daily, obsessive email and newsgroup checking.

Oh, god, what has happened to me?

I don't even play games anymore. I just click from blogs to email to newsgroups, and nothing is new, and I start the process all over again. Click, click, click. My eyesight has eroded, my attention span has eroded. My social life is curiously richer.

The only thing I really like to do anymore is read old Usenet threads on books or movies or songs or topics of discussion that I'm distracted by at any given moment. I do love Usenet for that.

Why are you in Tavie's head? 11:12 PM | shower me with attention