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Reading in the Age of Constant Distraction

www.theparisreview.org Essays & writing Essays & articles Culture & media Candidate

Resurfaced independently across 3 calendar years, with breakout response in 2 of them.

submissions
3
submitters
3
observed span
2019–2023
peak thread · 170 comments
488 pts
latest 20+ return · 2021-04-08
136 pts

Submission timeline

2007–2026

One slot for every year since HN launched. Height is that year's peak points; orange marks a 100+ point or 50+ comment breakout. Select a bar to open its strongest thread.

First comments on top threads

HN comment order

I've come to love books intensely. Not only because I enjoy learning--before I read books, I found blogs to be great educators. I love books because they create time and space to be alone with a thought. It gives me time to consider things that I normally have no space for. I remember Seth Godin saying once that every business book can be summarized in just a few pages but the book itself is a story. I think it goes…

A lot of the comments in this thread confirm that a) the Internet and social media are problems that distract us, and b) there are ways to fight the addictive behaviors they encourage. They can be made succinctly. (I agree with both points, and admire those who attempt to regain control of their attention.) This comment is about the tone of the post in The Paris Review. There's a kind of elegiac primitivism circulating among the cultural elite that rubs…

blueyes·136-point thread·

The first top-level comment from each of the four biggest threads, in HN’s own order. Excerpts are shortened; open a comment for full context.

Breakout years
2

100+ points or 50+ comments

Total points
628

reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking

Total comments
254

reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking

Every submission

DateTitle as submittedByPointsComments
2019-02-12Reading in the Age of Constant DistractionFirst breakout · Best threadwormold488170
2021-04-08Reading in the Age of Constant Distraction (2019)Latest 20+ point returndorchadas13684
2023-10-28Reading in the Age of Constant Distraction (2019)blueridge40