· 2 min read
Making Internet Less Distracting
Dodge Recommender Systems
The following should reduce influence of recommender systems significantly. Making internet less distracting and help improve privacy.
Least Access Principle
This is a security principle.
By default, the number of accesses granted to a user/role/application should be least needed to run that application.
The more access someone/something has, the more will be probability of a security risk.
Reduce Data Points
A recommender system can only work with data we provide. If data is reduced, it will have hard time figuring out what to recommend therefore making things less distracting.
Specifics
Phone
- Do not allow notifications
- Do not give any permission for the application if it is not necessary.
- For iOS 14.5+: Turn off app tracking for all apps
For Services
- Turn off personalized ads
- Do not store unnecessary data. Even after deleting, most services will take 6 months to delete it from all their servers.
For Example: In YouTube you can,
- Delete all playlists
- Unsubscribe from all channels
- Change locations to some other country (I Choose Japan)
- Turn off Personalized Ads
I found that Google services are good at providing these kind of features and changing these settings have an immediate effect. Facebook Products and Amazon hide a lot of details.
Resources
Set it up such that the tab autocloses. Because this reduces a touch point.
Once you realize you had opened a distracting website. Take a moment to notice, what were you thinking or feeling just before opening.
Was it because something that requires relatively-hard thinking came along and your brain decided to switch to something known and easy?