I turned off push notifications, and I’m never going back

Last Wednesday my classmates snickered after I confessed to turning off push notifications on my phone.

In the same way a social ping can trigger a dopamine high, a notification can send me spiraling into existential dread. I hate digital clutter, especially the likeable, shareable, retweetable, clicky kind. I hate Twitter with a passion, yet I am on it because I feel irresponsible as a news consumer and even more so as a journalist if I’m not constantly plugged into a spewing feed that churns out information by the second (regardless if said information is even true or not).

I love the news, but I dislike the way social media platforms disseminate it. Sifting through the millions of voices shouting at me to feel one way or another, clicking through multiple versions of the same story and being prompted to voice my feelings in the growing comment section below is both intimidating and tiring.

While social media has been championed by both creators and consumers as a useful tool that has made the news more accessible and interactive, it has also created a space that is cluttered and often inaccurate. By closing the gap between media and consumer, it has put everyone on a relatively equal playing field. People can retweet stories while adding their own snarky take or fire off a photograph and join the conversation in a split second. Really the only thing that separates credible news sources from your average Joe on the platform is the little blue verified button.

Few things are fact-checked and often, these sites prioritize quantity and speed over quality. For a news consumer who was born just as dial-up internet was being phased out, I primarily care about two things: depth and the ability to formulate my own opinions.

I prefer to read a story in its entirety, rather than as a “half-baked bulletins,” as Farhood Manjoo termed it. Yes, even if it means waiting a bit longer for the news. I unfollowed journalists because I didn’t care a whole lot about their hot take on the story — I signed up for the story, not someone else’s opinion. Show me the novelty in less is more. Media vies for our attention and suggests that we might never reach the highly sought after ideal of Most Informed News Consumer. But really, is a 280-character cookie crumb tweet going to help me process a breaking topic better in the grand scheme of things? I don’t mean to hate on technological advancement; it has created a more democratized news sphere that has hatched from the web, but media clutter has spawned partially as a result of the emergence of social media.

Maybe it’s easier to separate clutter by keeping content separate. Whereas emerging technologies affording the blending of genres and quality, perhaps social media should keep itself as a reporting tool rather than a news dissemination vehicle until it can weed through the clutter it creates.

The payoff is nicer: a more manageable news diet consisting of stories you seek out through traditional media. Instead of being pushed in many directions by a frenzied newsfeed, you can control content you want to see. The static is still there — there’s no way to completely shut off clutter or talk of it — but it’s a step toward a more palatable diet.