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  steve1977
  What I find interesting is that the article seems to imply that wearing earbuds to isolate is somewhat "unnatural" (for lack of a better term).However it does not take into account that the kind of social interactions where people wear earbuds (i.e. loud and busy environments with many strangers, often physically closer than comfortable) is unnatural to begin with.For me, isolating myself acoustically is a way to normalize such environments back to a more "natural" setting.
• ExoticPearTree
  It is an amazing piece of technology that allows you to ignore people at will by pretending you're not hearing what they're saying if they insist.AirPods for sure do not make you more lonely. It's about your personality. Either you are an introvert or not.> “No one talks on the bus. No one greets the barista. Even in class, students are choosing to listen to music instead of their professors,”Why? Bother them for no good reason? I am incredibly annoyed when people come to me to make small talk. Same with classes... if the topic is interesting or the professor is good at its job people will listen. If the professor has a very non-interesting class or is a boring person, why bother listing to it? You read the notes, get a the lowest passing grade possible and go on with your life. Before tablets people would read their newspapers and be very annoyed if you bothered them. Now they have AirPods instead of tablets or newspapers. Same thing: no everybody wants to talk to everybody.
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  bejd
  After reading about the default mode network here a few times recently, I think missing out on all that critical "daydreaming" time is a bigger problem. I've stopped listening to things while I'm out walking, and I've noticed a lot more solutions and ideas coming to me. The DMN seems to fall into a similar area as meditation (remember when that was all the rage among tech leaders?); the lowered input noise gives the brain time to clear things out.
• alun
  Anecdotally, when it comes to talking to strangers I've often felt it's easier to converse with older people than those my own age. For example, the conversations feel more genuine and less "forced" on both sides, and overall I feel more comfortable being myself.The reason might be because they grew up in a world where social media was non-existent, so interacting with strangers was more common. As a result, they tend to be more socially intelligent than the younger generations.Will be thinking about this article the next time I reach for my AirPods as I'm about to leave the house.
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  tptacek
  I don't remember any time in my life where it ever felt normal to me to randomly talk to strangers. I went to London when I was a teenager and was made uncomfortable by how chatty the cab drivers were. Later, I worked at a startup and my boss was preternaturally gifted at chatting up strangers, which he did habitually in every setting we were in when we traveled; on the plane, on the bus from the airport, &c. I remember feeling like he was a freak of nature.And I'm not an introvert!All of this long predates Airpods.I think this is a cultural difference, not a technological shift.
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  hnthrow10282910
  I live in a big city and notice this a lot as well. I’m starting to reduce my headphone usage. My hearing is getting worse at a young age.I don’t think the default should be needing to have a soundtrack to your life. I’m a long distance runner and often run 15-20+ miles without music or headphones. It’s nice
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  MBlume
  I'd much rather be surrounded by people wearing earbuds than have people watching tiktoks through their phone speakers on the subway
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  NoGravitas
  Everything old is new again; observe this song from 1983: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR_b3WYHZ7o
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  jorisw
  > Where I live, in southwest Germany, AirPods are far less common.FWIW I live in Amsterdam (also western Europe) and anyone in the streets under 50 is wearing them, myself included.> They keep them in while ordering and paying for things in stores and supermarkets.As a GenYer I find this rude and I'll take them out any time I interact with someone.My point being that their ubiquity doesn't have to mean people being rude or indifferent to eachother.I think people have the right to choose comfort and focus, anywhere outside of a conversation with another person.
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  shevis
  > Heavy headphone use makes people feel lonelier, the survey found.Correlation for sure, I’m less sure about causation though. It seems equally likely to me that other factors are driving increased social anxiety/isolation which in turn drives people to wear headphones to avoid social interactions.
• bschwindHN
  Tangentially related, but it's interesting to use airpods in hyper-busy train stations in Japan like Shinjuku station, where you have a huge mass of people, and a large majority of people using bluetooth earbuds of some sort. A train rolls up and the sheer amount of 2.4GHz traffic can jam your own audio for a bit. It's an interesting stress test of radio interference.
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  tacker2000
  The author is a "Firm believer that humankind took a wrong turn with the invention of the smartphone." and has a new book coming out, so naturally he is trying to push some anti-tech narrative.No, headphones don't make people antisocial. If someone is wearing headphones, respect their privacy and just leave them alone. Some people just don't like to chat to random people on the subway or at the supermarket. Some people just don't see the value of mundane conversations with strangers.It depends on the culture and personality. Some people like it, some don't. In the US, people are more inclined to chat to strangers, and in Germany for example they aren't. These differences are actually what make us "human", so it's not a binary decision of: talking to strangers == good, and headphones == bad.
• mitchitized
  The author has clearly never tried to leg press 300+ pounds in the gym to Madonna's "Like a Virgin". Sometimes the biggest sell of earbuds is noise REDUCTION, not what sounds they can make.I do agree that there are "social interactions" that are greatly devalued by people wishing not to be interacted with. But for me the earbuds are usually in to block annoyances, not avoid human contact.
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  Sweepi
  I think "Your Brain Needs Idle Time" is more important than the effect on random social interactions.
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  try_the_bass
  The thought of intentionally deafening myself to the outside world, even partially, is unnerving, because I can't stand the thought of nerfing my own situational awareness to that degree. Especially in fast-paced environments, like city streets, where sounds can carry such important signal.Even watching someone else walk around a city with headphones/earbuds in is something that makes me uncomfortable by proxy. It's like someone deciding that walking around with beer goggles is a good idea
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  collinmcnulty
  What I would really love is an option to have a small indicator light or visible signal on my earpiece that means “there’s no sound playing”. And if I’m using them just for noise cancellation but want to appear approachable, I can turn it on. Honestly would be great for sound my home, as sometimes I keep them in when doing chores just because I don’t have a free hand, but I would like my wife to know she can talk to and I’ll hear her.
• robert-boehnke
  > Where I live, in southwest Germany, AirPods are far less common.Seems like there’s a high probability the author just drives everywhere at home.
• Tade0
  > People now wear their AirPods all day at the office.Hey, that's me! Not with AirPods specifically, but I do have noise cancelling headphones. We can talk over lunch or during a break.> They keep them in while ordering and paying for things in stores and supermarkets.Now that is just rude.
• swesour
  Walking around cars or in cities, especially in New York, is incredibly loud. The ANC protect my ears on the subways and streets.
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  alberth
  TinnitusI swear my tinnitus is a result of use of AirPods.I never wore any type of earphones ever. Then started using AirPods for calls, during workouts or on a plane. A year later I developed tinnitus and the only thing that changed in my life was wearing AirPods.I’m no doctor, and who knows what caused my tinnitus. But it’s irreversible. I constantly hear a humming ring now and it’s super distracting, especially trying to go to bed.I’m no doctor. But heads up for those who haven’t used inner ear headphones.
• jzb
  This is not new. AirPods are newish, but this is not new. People have been wearing headphones in public spaces since the Walkman, if not before, in large numbers. You can probably find opinion columns bemoaning this shortly after the introduction of the Walkman.
• lonelyasacloud
  Like huge SUV and pickup trucks in urban environments, guns and the like; their usage - and the perceived need for them - is a strong code smell of inhumane environments.
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  korginator
  The noise levels everywhere in our cities overwhelms me. The constant chatter of people all around, e.g., a loud conversation in close proximity, people blasting some TikTok garbage on the train, or someone approaching me trying to sell me something when I'm simply walking - I'd rather avoid all of this.I'm usually playing dark noise on noise cancelling earphones most of the time, and that helps me tune out the constant, stress inducing bombardment of unwelcome auditory inputs.
• jimlawruk
  > The number of spoken words uttered by the average person fell by 28% between 2005 and 2019This effect started well before Airods and even smart phones became ubiquitous. The airpods were released in Dec of 2016. Before Blackberries and Iphones, people on the subway all had daily newspapers in their face. In DC we had a free abridged version called the Express.
• ro_bit
  The author's going to be floored when he hears about video games
• PaulHoule
  Kinda funny but I think this situation is less bad than it was a year ago.For a while it seemed like young people were hard of hearing like the elderly, somebody would be camped in a weight machine at the gym resting for 30 minutes and I’d have to stick my hand in their face to get their attention or they’d be walking down the street and I couldn’t warn them about hazards on the sidewalk.Maybe it just doesn’t bother me anymore or maybe they’ve wised up.
• havaianaslife
  we all have a choice to use or not and the depending of the context we live in there could be more or less benefits overall (metro city vs bucolic small European village). But what this article capture for me is something more philosophic, anthropologically as Aristotle told us we are social animal, and for about at least the past 5k years we benefited a lot as a group by contamination, etc.. now we live in more bubbles, bubbles are more diffused than previously and we must at least acknowledge what we are missing in the process. It's the same difference between old generalist medias, tv shows, books culture, and the more different possibilities and bubbles we live (more importantly grow, sometimes without touching the "local" "proverbial" grass). It's interesting to observe a social phenomenon that is mostly recent:+ walkman 80s but diffused as today the Bluetooth headset only years later but not comparable+ mp3 player 2000s not comparable as capabilities and more of a young adopt early technology+ smartphones 2010s mass adoption but at least you hear mostly people around you.+ air pods 10y ago on September -> in 10 years are adopted more than any of the previous tech. Adoption rate is hug (i consider also other brands)and to be honest there is another topic correlated -> most young people have lived the covid pandemic and interiorizited some behavioralso grown up in some white collar sector live with headset after the pandemic, cause of smartwarking but also the more diffused use of team/zoom/meet in the workplacenow there is also ai (and it's a matter of time we will want a constant access to it that can also be headset related) and smart glasses are near than ever.there could be consequences in less than 10y.It's a social science matter nobody taking seriously.
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  comrade1234
  Do tattoos too. American living in Switzerland and it's shocking when I go back.
• crote
  A lot of women wear headphones / earpods without playing anything on them. It is a great way to stop men from trying to flirt to you, as you've got a convenient excuse to just completely ignore them!And the lack of music is for the same reason: you need to be aware of the men trying to harass you.
• 9x39
  I didn't fight a culture change in our work dynamic as we went from an extroverted office to a mostly headphones-on culture where people would even sometimes type instead of talk in certain meetings. In the end, I don't think it mattered except that resisting change and insisting on my way could have (would have) backfired.Didn't see any data in the article, not that I disagree, yet what if AirPods allow a return to normality for those who wish to have some distance?Maybe everyone's just had to put up with extroverted norms until AirPods and mobile phones came along.Q: Do you consider yourself more introverted or more extroverted?9% Completely introverted29% More introverted than extroverted31% About an equal mix of extroverted and introverted15% More extroverted than introverted7% Completely extroverted9% Not suren=1000 2023 YouGov internet pollhttps://docs.cdn.yougov.com/rwpllcwimy/Introverts%20and%20Ex...Also, Susan Cain's book Quiet claimed 1/3 to 1/2 of the population are introverted. (Who knows)
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  ryukoposting
  I didn't realize that research on this topic was so sparse, I just took it as a fact that people wearing airpods don't socialize in public.When I was in college, the line "he can't hear you, he has airpods in" was a meme. It was used as a jab at someone who wasn't paying attention because they had wireless earbuds in. So I know I'm not the only one who feels that way.
• gspr
  > They keep them in while ordering and paying for things in stores and supermarkets.This hit me. I often use headphones during chores, including going grocery shopping. I love human interaction, but not while pickings things into my shopping basket. For years I'd also leave them in when paying (audio paused, of course). It took a cashier tell me I was being rude before I realized. She was absolutely right, of course. I do make an effort to visibly remove my headphones when expecting human interaction now. A big thanks to that cashier, and my apologies!
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  tines
  > Americans are speaking less and less to one another. The number of spoken words uttered by the average person fell by 28% between 2005 and 2019.Is it just me or does anyone else turn skeptical when seeing these precise numbers given to something that seems essentially impossible to measure with this accuracy?
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  imaginationra
  Control group here- Adult from Silicon Valley that has never used a mobile phone/flip phone etc and has never used airpods either of courseMy take- phones and social media have made everyone socially retarded and airpods are driving them further off that anti-social/socially retarded cliffWhen I still lived in Silicon Valley I'd see people post things on local subreddits like "How do I make friends here?"The simple answer is don't be a socially retarded dork- trying being a socially flexible and available human and not a socially retarded robot that wants the rest of the world to compromise for you-In my opinion they have traded para-social relationships(podcasts, youtubers etc) for real social relationships-They feel more "comfortable" with the para-social ones because they can control everything about it which has made them more uncomfortable with the real world they can't control-You can't control when people might talk to you- or what they might say- BUT that's the beauty of real life- you might make the best friend or start an amazing relationship from chit-chat about nothing in the most random place-Lock yourself out of those spaces/places/instances with your phone/airpods and your doomed to a life you "control"- a lonely boring fucking lifeBUT hey, at least your "consuming" more "content" generating more profit for big tech instead of having friends- good job!You probably also are helping out big-pharma consuming more anti depression meds with your self enforced loneliness instead of just talking to other human beings-Put your phone away, don't wear your airpods and live in real life- or continue with your airpods and your neck cranked down into your phone- you don't need friends anymore, AI will be your friend.
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  cadamsdotcom
  To me it’s just a proxy for the amount of economic activity in a place.Every time I go to Melbourne airport in Australia, I’m shocked that nobody - nobody - has their laptop out. In Sydney a few people do. But go to any airport in the US and if not a majority are on laptops at least a large minority seem to be..So yes - airpods in ears, laptops in airports, city lights at night. Just a sign of how plugged in everyone is to “something” that’s happening.
• groan
  Lack of shared values and things to bond over.
• karpovv-boris
  I did notice the self-isolation effect of wearing any headphones a long time ago. Now, after a few years of using AirPods and finally switching back to cheap cable headphones only for work calls, it actually helps a lot for my brain to register context changes much more easily. And if you have adhd I highly recommend trying to do the same.
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  SpyCoder77
  Public, not pubic> I felt like half the people around me in pubic had some kind of device-connected earwear on their head.
• h0nd
  Most headphones these days are also a headset, allowing for bi-directional communication. Does it make a difference?
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  hydrolox
  looks like the seashells of Fahrenheit-451 were inevitable
• lograv
  This sounds sad to say, but I went on a walk outside, my AirPods died and realized I hadn’t listened to the outside world in a long time. Was a nice reminder to take a breath sometimes and enjoy the world. I think we all forget that
• micromacrofoot
  I actually use AirPods to assist my hearing in loud environments, but this aside...I think there's also the consideration of: how often have you really wanted a stranger to talk to you on the bus. I've talked to a few women about this, and they don't leave home without headphones because it gives them an excuse to ignore strangers hitting on them in public.
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  kylemaxwell
  Eh. I'm autistic and audio overstimulation is very real for me. When out at a restaurant or similar public place, I often have my AirPods in with nothing playing, just noise cancellation. I can still chat with my wife or whomever is with me and hear them, albeit muffled, but it keeps everything else down and manageable. Perhaps I could get some of those Loops, which I understand are less obtrusive.
• Barbing
  I’m so with you, thanks Markham!
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  trhway
  When Walkman came out:https://www.freethink.com/consumer-tech/sony-walkman-technop..."Some said it was a sign of a continued rise of Reagan- and Thatcher-style individualism. Cultural critic Allan Bloom deemed the Walkman “a nonstop…masturbational fantasy” in his 1987 book “The Closing of the American Mind.” Neo-Luddite John Zerzan saw the Walkman as part of a modern trend that encouraged a “protective sort of withdrawal from social connections.” Thomas Lipscomb, chief of the Center for the Digital Future, equated it with the euphoric drug “soma,” from Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World,” creating, as he put it, “an airtight bubble of sound” that was nothing but a “sensory depressant.”...The Walkman, critics claimed, was more than just music to one’s ears. It was a tool of societal disconnect ... "Personally i wear AirPods only in one ear - don't want to be struck by anything i didn't hear coming, and that also doubles the battery time.
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  righthand
  Phones/Screens and headphones are being optimized to blind you and deafen you from the real world. You dont care though because it creates a pseudo-safe-zone through social status signaling (look at my expensive headphones in my ears, I look so cool and technologically advanced!).
• sublinear
  If you want that warmth, you have to invite it in. It has nothing to do with the airpods.Do you ever sit somewhere in public fully relaxed without a care in the world? Do you ever poke your head up to see who else is looking at what you're looking at? Is your expression neutral or natural?There's always someone nearby doing the same. What happens when you spot them? Don't overthink it.
• ForHackernews
  "And in her ears the little Seashells, the thimble radios tamped tight, and an electronic ocean of sound, of music and talk and music and talk coming in, coming in on the shore of her unsleeping mind. The room was indeed empty. Every night the waves came in and bore her off on their great tides of sound, floating her, wide-eyed, toward morning. There had been no night in the last two years that Mildred had not swum that sea, had not gladly gone down in it for the third time."
• k2xl
  "You Can't Miss It" https://k2xl.substack.com/p/you-cant-miss-it
• walth
  Come to the Midwest. Over friendly. Zero air pods effect.
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  lorecore
  > People now wear their AirPods all day at the office. They keep them in while ordering and paying for things in stores and supermarkets.I wonder how people do this or if my ears are just shaped weird, because I can’t even sit totally still at my desk without them falling out.
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  Mistletoe
  All my co-workers wear those and I hate it. Any attempt to talk to them about work or personal subjects means they have to hit their ear and pause it. It just makes me want to say nothing.
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  ActorNightly
  > Americans are speaking to one another far less than they used to. According to that study, the number of spoken words uttered by the average person fell by 28% between 2005 and 2019. Each year during that time period, the number of words people spoke in an average day declined.I wonder what the difference is between this, and culture in EU where small talk isn't really a thing.
• chadgpt3
  I started using them recently but I already wasn't talking to strangers for a long time before that.I suspect the constant stimulation suppresses the default-mode network, the idle wandering your mind normally experiences when you're doing nothing.Before that, I'd sometimes hold my phone up to my ear to listen to a podcast (even on the subway at minimum volume) but it was awkward so not ubiquitous. I think buying a paid of wireless earbuds was one of those decisions that made my life subtly worse overall, like eating a whole tub of ice cream.
• hirvi74
  [dead]
• wolvoleo
  Meh. When I was young the old people complained that everyone was wearing walkmans (with those metal band orange foam headphones lol). It's just old man shouting at cloud. And no, I don't want to talk to everyone. Piss off and leave me alone.I also hate noise and I really love wearing my earbuds (I don't use Apple) with no audio but just the noise cancelling on when I'm on public transport or walking. Sometimes with nature sounds like rain if the coverage is not strong enough.I never listen to podcasts by the way, I truly hate them. Same with youtube videos, I just don't have patience to consume content at someone else's pace.