unraveled also

Project 13

For the first 13 weeks of 2010, I participated in Project 52, a challenge to write and publish a new entry at least once a week for a year. I didn’t intend to stop after week 13, but after not doing any new writing for the following three weeks, I felt that stopping the project was the right thing to do.

The main reason I stopped the project: I was writing because of a schedule instead of writing because I was moved to say something. The whole idea behind Project 52 is to create a schedule for writing “to get people to be creative on their websites.” Artificial time constraints are definitely one way to force creativity, but I often found the schedule more stifling than inspiring.

I’m also a relatively slow writer, and in the time that I had to write each week, I wasn’t producing the caliber of writing that I prefer. I’ve never had an issue producing this level of work when I have something compelling to say, but I do have an issue producing this level of work on an artificial weekly schedule.

I admire Anton Peck for creating Project 52, and I appreciate how it’s helped many bloggers, illustrators and photographers to generate more work. But it isn’t working for me the way that I hoped. So in line with my 2010 resolution of only doing things that feel good and right, I’m stopping Project 52.

This definitely doesn’t mean I’m done writing or interviewing, so you can be sure that I’ll create new pieces on unraveled when I moved to do so. As always, thanks to my readers for following along.

Project 52 on unraveled

Why I won’t buy an iPad (but think you should consider one)

So a lot of people are wondering why I’m not buying an iPad. There’s a really simple answer: I don’t need one.

“But,” they reply “we don’t need one but do you want one?”

Sure. I would also like a car, a new bike and a microwave. Doesn’t mean I’ll buy any of them any sooner. Except for the microwave. I actually wouldn’t mind having a microwave sometime soon. The microwave will make the the cut because it provides me with an exceptional level of convenience that I can’t get with anything else. While I definitely don’t need a bike either, I know the sheer pleasure of riding will eventually outweigh the relatively high cost of the bike I want. (I realize this is similar to the case for many people buying the iPad. They don’t need it, but the thing makes them so giddy that they can’t resist buying it.) I love living in the city, and I don’t like driving that much, so I’m pretty sure I’ll never be able to justify buying a car.

This is not to say that I don’t think the iPad is amazing device. On the contrary, I believe that Apple has really created a “magical and revolutionary” product. And the price is pretty reasonable too. Nor is this to say that you shouldn’t buy one — because there’s a chance that you do need a device that does all the awesome things that the iPad can do. Me? I’m pretty satisfied with my MacBook Pro and iPhone.

The most tempting aspect of the iPad for me is iBooks and the iBookstore as I do enjoy reading and like the idea of storing hundreds of books on a single device. The counter arguments are that the selection is still comparatively small; I really like reading on my iPhone; and I don’t mind reading a lot of other stuff from my Mac.

I won’t buy an iPad right now because I don’t need one. However, if you don’t have an iPhone and need a portable device that can do most of a what laptops can do — and a whole lot more, then the iPad is for you.

Sidenote: I Prefer Joshua

My name is Joshua Michael Kaufman. When I introduce myself to people, I always say “Joshua.” About a quarter of the time, people then ask me if I prefer “Joshua” or “Josh.”

“I prefer Joshua, but I don’t mind if people call me Josh.”

I say this because about three quarters of the time, and slightly less often if they asked me what my preference was, people will continue to call me “Josh.” I believe this is not because they want to shorten my name, but because “Josh” is so much more common over “Joshua” that they subconsciously don’t even think about.

“Joshua” appears to be relatively unique in this way as there aren’t many other names that people are so quick to shorten. Imagine if someone introduced himself as “Benjamin” and then you called him “Ben.” Or if someone introduced herself as “Elizabeth” and then you called her “Liz.” That’d be kind of weird, right?

But I don’t want to be that guy who’s always correcting people when they say his name wrong. So I’m not. But just so you know, I prefer Joshua.

Reactivating Facebook

Read Part I: Deactivating Facebook

For folks who weren’t following along, I deactivated Facebook back in January because I felt like it was slowly taking over my life. Basically, I wanted to prevent myself from being able to immediately logging in and using the site. It worked, and I didn’t use Facebook at all for a little over three weeks.

I’m proud to say that I use Facebook significantly less now. Essentially, I only use it as an extended address book and to RSVP for events as it’s practically become the de facto standard for events and invites.

A few services I use (Tumblr, Netflix and YouTube to name a few) still automatically post to Facebook on my behalf, which I’m okay with because I don’t ever have to worry about comment notifications on these posts. In fact, I don’t ever have to worry about comment notifications on any post because I’ve turned off commenting. If you want to reduce the time you spend on Facebook without deactivating your account, turning off commenting on your posts is probably my top suggestion. (As a sidenote, I tried disabling my wall for a short period of time, but I felt like that was going a little too far. Visiting a profile without a wall feels like visiting a site without a home page; I re-enabled it shortly afterwards.)

It’s hard not to pass through Facebook without at least glancing at the News Feed, which I’ve done on several occasions. I think I’ve read a small handful of posts and have left two comments. Overall, my 1+ hours a day has been reduced to a few minutes a day at the most. I’d say that’s a very good thing.

I feel like I can say that it’s a good thing because I don’t miss it at all and the little interaction I have with the site feels much healthier. If you do miss Facebook when you don’t use it, and you enjoy the time you spend on there, that’s great. But I would ask you to take a more critical look at your experience on Facebook and ask yourself, despite how entertaining it might seem in the moment, does it truly feel good and right?

The Rube Goldberg Complex

Note: This post has embedded videos that don’t show up in the Tumbler Dashboard for some unknown reason.

After wondering what I should write about this week (I haven’t had the time to take my own medicine) I was fortunate to see this great talk by Adam Sadowsky, which was part of the wonderful Ignite Series of talks. Sadowsky is the president of Syn Labs, which was asked by OK Go to build a Rube Goldberg machine for their next video.

As I was watching this, I immediately thought of software. If you’re unfamiliar with Rube Goldberg machines, Wikipedia describes them as “over engineered machines that performs a very simple task in a very complex fashion.” A lot of software is like this. Microsoft’s Office suite is probably the exemplar of this. Sadowsky’s team was commissioned to make their machine messy and complex; a lot of software ends up messy and complex.

Sadowsky mentioned three tips for creating Rube Goldberg Machines in his talk. Unsurprisingly, if you want to create messy and complex software, this is a great way to do it.

1. Small stuff sucks.
2. Put the reliable stuff last.
3. Planning is very important.

So if these are the three tips for creating complex, messy software, can we take the inverse of these them and use them to create simple and elegant software?

1. Small stuff is awesome. Simple and elegant software is all about the small things: small feature sets, small design/development teams and small timelines.
2. Put the reliable stuff first. This one doesn’t translate directly but if you’re creating creating simple and elegant software, you need to focus on what works. This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t experiment and innovate to create the best possible user experience. Innovation is often needed to simplify, but innovation should be secondary to using existing, tried and true methods.
3. Planning is not very important. As Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson state in their new book, Rework, “Planning is guessing. There are just too many factors that are out of your hands.” When your creating software, you can’t plan more than about a week in advance, so just give up the guess work and just go for it.

I couldn’t post this article without including the final OK Go video, could I? It’s pretty spectacular.

On Writing

Today ends the 7th week of Project 52, and so far I’m 4 for 6, not including this week. I did well in January and turned out a new article every week, but my motivation to write was clearly higher a month ago than it is today. As I had just started the project, I was actively and regularly thinking about it throughout the week. So when it came time to write the article it was easier and faster.

The past two weeks have been much busier than usual at work, but I feel like that’s a lame excuse. Everyone is busy. Some are just better at finding time to capture thoughts and write about them. So what are some ways that amateur writers go about their life but still find a way to write great articles at the end of the day? Because I haven’t posted anything for the past two weeks, and I’m keen to keep it from happening again over the coming year, I thought it would be fitting to explore this topic a little more this week. After thinking a little about this over the past few days, these are the top three ideas I had to improve the quantity and quality of my writing in the context of Project 52.

Pick your topic as early as possible

It’s easy to avoid the topic of your mid-term essay and wait until the last minute to write it. Many of us have been there. Similarly it’s easy to put off thinking about any essay until the deadline closes in - especially if you’re writing a series of articles which can be about anything, as is the case for Project 52. When I haven’t thought through the topic of a longer article before I start writing it, I often end up spending a lot of time nailing down the topic and determining what angle I’ll take. However, when I pick the topic early, I can spend short blocks of time thinking about the article leading up to the actual writing. So when I need to sit down and write, I have the topic and some notes — or at least some reformulated thoughts — about the topic.

Dedicate time for thinking and writing about the topic every day

Even if you pick your topic early, if you don’t set aside time to think and write about the topic — every day — you won’t have much more than an idea and blank slate when you need to do the real writing. Some writers have the uncanny ability to know what they’re going to write about and just write, planning and structuring their article in real time. While I can try to do this, it often takes me considerably more time than it would if I had some notes or some rough ideas about the the topic. Part of my plan to get back on track with with Project 52 is to reserve at least 15 minutes every day to do a short amount of research and record at least a few thoughts about the article.

When it comes time to write, just start writing

Just write. This sounds too simple, but it’s probably one of the most important writing tips that I’ve relearned since starting this project. Motivating yourself to start writing can be hard. It’s analogous to physics: it takes more energy to get something to start moving than to keep it going. But once you get going, it just flows. Or at least you have something to build your thoughts on. Don’t worry about quality the first time around; you can always revise and edit later. In other words, don’t be afraid to write a shitty first draft, an idea from Anne Lamott in her book, Bird by Bird:

Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something — anything — down on paper.

Writing isn’t easy for everyone, but it doesn’t have to be hard either. With a little bit of planning, a daily commitment to the task and an acknowledgement that just getting on with it is the best way to start, writing can be a easier and more enjoyable for everyone.

The Setup

The Setup is a bunch of nerdy interviews. I’m not (yet) popular enough to be featured there, so I thought I’d post my own version here.

Who are you, and what do you do?

My name is Joshua Kaufman, and I’m an interaction designer at Punchcut, a San Francisco based design firm that focuses on the interface design of mobile and convergent devices. I’m also the community manager for the San Francisco chapter of the Interaction Design Association.

What hardware are you using?

At work I use a black MacBook (2 GHz Intel Core Duo with 2 GB RAM), a Samsung SyncMaster 226BW monitor, a Goldtouch Adjustable Keyboard and a Logitech VX Nano.

At home, I use a 13” MacBook Pro (2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 4 GB RAM). I used to use a mouse at home until my last VX Nano died and I started using the trackpad a lot more. I realized how awesome the all glass trackpads are on the new MacBook Pros with more regular use. I could do 99% of what I needed to do at home without a mouse — and often faster — so I haven’t bothered with once since.

And what software?

My base setup is the same at work and at home. I use Safari for web browsing because it’s fast and syncs with MobileMe. Mail is just okay, but it’s been pretty dependable in Snow Leopard and handles multiple accounts nicely. I also use SpamSieve, but it’s become less useful now that I’m managing much of my email from my iPhone 3G. I use Evernote for most writing, and for saving account details, serial numbers, receipts and notes. I like iChat but I like how Adium let’s me customize everything to my liking even more. Despite needing an update, Tweetie is still a pleasure to use.

Most of my design time is spent in Omnigraffle and Fireworks. I can’t remember the last time I opened Photoshop.

Scanning my dock for the utility side of things, I use Skitch for screenshots, CrashPlan for off-site backups, iCal for calendaring, iTunes for music listening, Things for task management and Address Book for storing my contacts. Beyond the utilities sitting in my dock, I also use Hazel to automate some file management tasks, the aforementioned LiteSwitch X to replace the OS X app switcher, and iScrobbler to send my iTunes history to Last.fm. Launchbar is my secret weapon.

What would be your dream setup?

A 13” MacBook Pro, a 30” Monitor (but not from Apple because theirs are terribly overpriced) the same Goldtouch Adjustable Keyboard I use at work, and a Magic Mouse that’s designed for people with large hands.

The Twist on Product Design

I recently bought a Twist, the new portable espresso machine from Mypressi. I initially bought it because I love espresso, but I didn’t want to have the permanent footprint of an espresso machine in my kitchen with its limited counter space. The fact that the Twist is completely portable was extremely appealing. But once I started using the Twist, I realized it was so much more than simply a portable espresso maker.

It turns out the Twist is a great model for talking about product design basics because it embodies three key tenets of well designed products: it fulfills a specific need, it’s easy to use, and it engages the emotions.

It fulfills a specific need. People have been creating espresso machines for decades, and practically all of them have been cookie jar size or larger. It’s sufficiently safe to say that the counter top espresso industry is crowded and has options for just about every preference. There are steam driven, piston driven, pump driven, air pump driven; semi-automatic, automatic and super-automatic. If you’re looking to create a new entry in the espresso maker market, good luck.

However, there are very few portable espresso makers. In fact, a quick search on Google Products reveals that there are two main options: the Handpresso Wild and the Mypressi Twist. Granted, not everyone wants (or needs) a portable espresso maker, but for certain people, like me, they’re very appealing. Mypressi recognized that there was an opportunity create a product that fulfills a specific need and created an outstanding device.

It’s easy to use. While the Twist is certainly not as easy as pressing the button on a Nespresso machine, it’s easy enough that Mypressi explains how to use it in the manual with four simple illustrations. Unfortunately, I don’t have a scanner and wasn’t able to find a digital version to include here, so you’ll have to take my word that it’s as easy as I explain here:

1. Fill the basket with coffee.
2. Place the basket in the holder and lock the water bowl (the top half of the sphere) into place.
3. Fill the water bowl with hot water.
4. Pull the trigger.

Products designed to be portable often end up being overly complex because the designers attempted to cram every bit of full-size functionality into a device a quarter of the size. (As a mobile interaction designer, I’m painfully aware of this problem.) Mypressi wisely didn’t bother with the bean grinders, pressure gauges, water filtration or any other controls outside of a release button; they included only what was required to make espresso using a pressurized device. When you start with the absolute requirements, the product is already one step towards being easier to use by simplicity alone.

It engages the emotions. For true coffee lovers, just the thought of coffee makes them happy. If I told them that I’m making an espresso, they would immediately perk up. So before they know anything about how I’m making the coffee, their emotions are already engaged.

Then I show them the Twist.

“That’s an espresso maker?”

“Yes. And it makes exceptional espresso.”

“How?”

“With a pressure cartridge. The cartridge sits in the handle, and you pull the trigger to extract the shot.”

“That’s neat!”

This has been the common reaction of just about everyone I’ve shown the Twist to. They were happy about the thought coffee before, but now they’re truly excited.

Then I show them how it works, going through the four steps above. Despite the steps not being very different from typical espresso makers or very surprising, there’s something unmistakably delightful about handling the machine. I liken it to loading a gun. I’m personally not fond of guns, but gun collectors often talk about the experience of loading the gun as a distinguishing factor between various models.

Once the now excited coffee drinker goes through the four steps and pulls the trigger to release the compressed air, they have a feeling of accomplishment. And the more times you go through the process, the more you enjoy the process. Using the Twist is a routine I’ve learned to love.

Then they taste the coffee. I’ll be the first to admit that it doesn’t make the best espresso I’ve ever tasted, but it’s very good. This review from Espresso Parts said it nicely:

So… does it taste like espresso? Yes. Is is the same espresso? No. It has all of the flavors of a traditionally pulled espresso, maybe a little softer (to know what I mean you may have to try it yourself). The mouth feel is… well… like a draft Guinness; and why shouldn’t it be, it is pulled with the use of NO2.

The idea of coffee made them happy, the concept behind the Twist made them excited, the experience of using the Twist made them feel accomplished, the taste of the coffee made them smile. Good products look good and work well. Great products tell a story that you want to listen to every time you use them.

Next time you want to explain product design to someone - or make a great espresso from anywhere, look no further than the Twist.

The Crux of the Switch

It’s almost hard to imagine Mac OS X without a good application switcher. But previous to OS X 10.3, that was just the case. Back in 2003, I summarized why the previous application switcher was so poor:

To switch the active application in 10.2, you hit Command-Tab and a highlighted dock icon told you which application was selected. It worked, but it had problems. The biggest of which occurred when open applications were separated by several unopened applications on the dock. When this happened, the highlight skipped across these unopened applications in a seemingly unpredictable manner because almost no one could remember exactly which applications were open and which applications where closed.

A Better Switcher

In 2001, a small software startup named Proteron announced LiteSwitch X, an OS X update to its popular OS 9 keyboard application switcher. LiteSwitch was essentially a Mac implementation of the Alt-Tab switcher found in Windows, but with an additional slew of features including drag and drop support, closing multiple applications and windows layering control. I was unsatisfied with the 10.2 application switcher and started using LiteSwitch X soon after buying my first Mac.

Apple caught up to Proteron in OS X 10.3 and introduced its own application switcher albeit with significantly less features than LiteSwitch X. Apple’s switcher has remained relatively unchanged since its original implementation.

Hit Command-Tab and you switch from the current app to the next most recently used app. If you hold Command, all running apps are displayed, and you can continue hitting tab to switch to another app. You can additionally hold down Shift and cycle in the opposite direction, and use the H and Q keys to hide and quit applications.

Apple slightly improved the switcher with 10.5, introducing drag and drop support and then again with 10.6, allowing you to trigger Exposé and show all windows of the selected application by hitting the up or down key.

Blinded by the Lite

Version 1.1 of LiteSwitch X introduced a preference for sending the reopen event to applications upon switching to them. This meant that LiteSwitch would force OS X to reopen the window if it had been closed, or restore the window if it had been minimized to the Dock. I enabled this preference soon after I started using LiteSwitch as it felt like the most natural way to switch to an application. With every OS X update, LiteSwitch X was one of the first add-ons that I installed. So when I switched to an application, I expected to it to be visible — the only exception being if it was a document-based application and there were no open documents.

In early 2009, I noticed that the Proteron website was down (The Wayback Machine records July 24, 2008 as the last date the website was reachable), and over the past year I was concerned about continuing to use software that was no longer supported. So near the end of December I begrudgingly tried to use the built-in OS X switcher.

Having been blinded by LiteSwitch for so many years, I was completely set back that the OS X switcher didn’t reopen closed or minimized application windows. For example, say iTunes was open but the main app window was closed. If I switched to iTunes, no window would appear. Switching to to Finder, Mail, Address Book, Safari, Tweetie, Adium and other apps also didn’t reopen application windows.

Shortcut Madness

Given that switching didn’t reopen application windows, I expected a common keyboard shortcut for accomplishing this. Unfortunately, shortcuts only complicated the situation. To show the iTunes main window, I needed to hit the keyboard shortcut for opening the window (Option-Command-1 in the case of iTunes) or click on the iTunes Dock icon. There’s no unified keyboard shortcut for reopening the main window - even among applications made by Apple. Here are the keyboard shortcuts for the apps I listed above:

• iTunes: Option-Command-1
• Finder: None
• Mail: Command-1
• Address Book: Command-0
• Safari: None
• Tweetie: Command-0
• Adium: Command-/

These are just the apps that have a shortcut. Many, like Evernote, don’t even have one.

After tweeting about the lack of a standard shortcut for reopening main windows, Martin Polley pointed out that the OS X application switcher actually can reopen windows with some additional shortcut trickery.

It goes like this: hit Command-Tab to switch as you would normally, then when the app you want to switch to/reopen is selected, hit Option while continuing to hold Command. Then release Command before you release Option. Go ahead and try it now. When you first start using it, it’s quite painful after the simplicity of Command-Tab, but it does get slightly easier over time.

Personally, I love controlling OS X via keyboard, and most of the time I welcome consistent and standard keyboard shortcuts for commands. However, I believe that adding a shortcut for reopening windows is the wrong solution because it defies traditional keyboard shortcut expectations. For nearly every keyboard shortcut I use in OS X, there is a perceived before state and an expected after state. For example, if I’m browsing a site in Safari and I want to jump to the search input, I hit Command-Option-F. In the before state, I perceive that the webpage has focus. The expected after state is that the search input will have focus. In the case of the OS X reopen shortcut, the before state is that the window is closed or minimized. The expected after state is that OS X will bring the selected application forward and reopen or restore the window. The issue is that it’s very difficult, and sometimes impossible, to know if the window is actually closed or minimized. So for the shortcut to be truly effective, the user needs to remember which windows are open and which windows are closed or minimized. This is unrealistic at best.

Switching 101

Out of the box, the Mac offers three key ways to switch applications, and each of them behaves differently.

1. The Dock. Click the application icon in the Dock to switch to the application and bring all of its windows, including closed application windows or individual minimized windows (if the app has only one window and it’s minimized), to the front. Clicking on an application’s Dock icon to switch to that app is one of the first skills that a new Mac user will learn. So it makes sense that doing this brings that application’s windows to the front.
2. Selecting the Window and Exposé. Click within an window to switch to the application and bring the selected, but not all of its application windows, to the front. Exposé is a different way to visualize windows but the same behavior applies. This is even more straightforward that clicking on a Dock icon; clicking on a window brings that window forward. For the new user, it seems okay that only a single application window comes to the front because the user clicked a single window. (As a historical note, in OS 9, clicking within a window actually brought all the application’s windows to the front.)
3. Command-Tab. Hit Command-Tab and you switch from the current app to the next most recently used app and bring its open windows to the front. Let’s consider the new Mac user again. Clicking on an application’s Dock icon brought that app’s windows to the front, but using Command-Tab to switch to an app — which looks identical to the app icon in the Dock — only brings open windows to the front. It’s easy to assume that this isn’t going to make a lot of sense to the new user.

I believe that Command-Tab is the only way to switch applications without affecting windows because when Apple implemented the switcher in OS X 10.3, someone decided that it was the one true application switcher. And a true application switcher shouldn’t affect windows; a true application switcher only switches the application.

This is where Apple misstepped. Beyond being inconsistent with its closest switcher sibling the Dock, it doesn’t provide perhaps the most important thing that most users need upon switching: to see an application window.

Applications and Windows and Documents

Every application has at least one window. Some applications are document-based, meaning they allow the user to operate on multiple items at the same time. Mail, TextMate and Photoshop are all examples of document-based applications. Typically, document-based applications have one window per open document and often have multiple windows open at once. Other applications are non-document based; in these apps the user can only operate on one item at a time. As of this writing, iTunes, iCal and Address Book are all examples of non-document based applications. Typically, non-document based applications only have one window. For all practical purposes, that window is the application.

In the case of non-document based applications, the argument for always showing a window upon switching is easier. If you want to use iTunes, there’s practically nothing you can do without the application window. The same is true for iCal, Address Book and many other single window apps.

It’s a little trickier for document based applications. If the application has one document open, it makes sense to show that window — even if its minimized — because there’s a damn good chance that they’ll want to see that window. (People who keep their Dock hidden: have you ever switched to a document-based application and thought nothing was open because you didn’t see a window, later only to discover that you had a window minimized in the Dock?) If the application has two documents open, it makes sense to show the last document (window) the user interacted with.

Here’s the tricky part: what if a document-based application doesn’t have any documents open? Current apps handle this in different ways: some do nothing, some open a new untitled document automatically, some make it a user preference. Personally, I prefer apps to do nothing and not open any new windows, but ultimately I believe the window opening behavior should be based on the app. This, then, is the only exception to showing a window upon switching: if a document-based application doesn’t have any documents open, the developer should choose the window opening behavior and in some cases, allow the user to choose in the application preferences.

The Crux of the Switch

Switching should reopen closed and minimized application windows. It’s consistent with other ways to switch and therefore easy to understand. But most importantly, it’s what the user needs to use the app in most cases.

Given that Apple has released three versions of OS X since introducing the application switcher, I’m fairly certain that they would be extremely hard pressed to change its behavior at this point. The good news is that LiteSwitch X 2.6, despite being released previous to OS X 10.5, works perfectly in 10.6 Snow Leopard. There’s currently no official download site, but it’s still available on several software sites such as VersionTracker. Unregistered, it will work for 30 days.

If you end up liking LiteSwitch, you’ll probably want to use it longer than a month. While there’s currently no way to get a serial number, you shouldn’t panic. I’ve been in touch with Proteron developers, and we’re working on a plan for resurrecting an official download site for LiteSwitch in the near future.

Deactivating Facebook

My one resolution for 2010 is to only do things that feel good and right. Last night, as part of that resolution I deactivated my Facebook account. It wasn’t an action I took lightly, but it was something that I felt like I needed to do.

By the end of 2009, I was making several visits to Facebook a day. I’d have a moment of downtime during lunch, in between meetings, after dinner or before sleep, and Facebook was the first site that would come to mind. I’d hit the site, and of course I’d have to click through all of my notifications and see what comments people had left on my posts. Read, comment. And why not check the news feed? Read, comment, like In addition to the times I’d visit Facebook on my own, throughout the day I’d receive an occasional message or event invite via the site. Read, mark as attending, reply. And oh while I’m here, let’s check the news feed again. Read, comment, like.

(On Facebook, you can get notifications for a lot of things, but I didn’t really use Facebook apps, so I generally only received notifications when someone commented or liked one of my posts or when someone commented or liked a post that I also commented on. If you put a lot into it, you get a lot out of it. And me, I was putting a lot into it. Beyond simply commenting and liking news feed posts, I was posting updates and links almost daily. So the influx of notifications I received with every visit was mostly my own doing.)

I was probably spending at least an hour a day on Facebook. That’s 7 hours a week, 28 hours a month - and at least two weeks a year.** I’m not a terribly busy person but I personally find that to be a huge chunk of my time.

I realize that many people have no issues spending this amount of time browsing, commenting and liking on Facebook. While writing this entry, I asked a friend of mine how much time she spent on Facebook, and she answered “maybe an hour or two.” But she couldn’t use it at work.

I also realize that many people find Facebook entertaining, useful and/or valuable. I sometimes found it entertaining, useful and valuable as well. But many more things didn’t feel right: the compulsion to visit the site several times a day, the endless yammering, the “likes,” the dating ads, the distorted idea of “privacy” that Facebook promotes, the lack of control I felt when using the site.

I had a few options: I could post and comment on Facebook less, I could login less, or I could deactivate my account. Posting to Facebook less was easier. Restraining myself from commenting was hard. Logging in less was harder. In short, I couldn’t change my activity on my own, so I needed external moderation. Deactivating my account was really easy, and it would automatically keep me from logging in, posting and commenting. My plan is to keep my account deactivated for at least rest of January, watch how often I try to use Facebook (and for what reason), see if I miss it - or see if I forget about it - and then go from there.

Facebook isn’t just a website anymore. It’s become part of our lives. And like anything in our lives, especially something that we spend so much time using, it deserves a critical evaluation. I hope to reactivate my account someday, but next time I visit I want to feel better about my experience there. I want it to feel right.

** Some may be asking, “What about Twitter.” I feel like I have more control over my Twitter experience, mainly because Twitter only has a stream. It’s really just updates, mentions and an occasional direct message. No “friends,” no mysterious news feed, no notifications, no photos, and not a million other things have no need for. As a result, I spend much less time on Twitter, and the time I do spend there feels more valuable.

Read Part II: Reactivating Facebook