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Discussion on: Stop Arguing with Software Developers on the Internet

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metalmikester profile image
Michel Renaud

"you should probably stop arguing on the internet altogether."

Yup. I had noticed that I was increasingly angry, tired and depressed in the past few months. I realized that all that online crap had been taking a toll, to the point of being dangerously close to the tipping point from a health perspective.

On my birthday (50th, ugh) two weeks ago I decided to get out of some social media platforms such as Reddit. I would like to get rid of Facebook, but I do use it to keep in touch with friends and appraised of upcoming metal shows, so that wasn't an option. Instead I unliked or unfollowed a bunch of pages - especially those where the comments section could get ugly (that includes all news outlets). My Facebook news feed now takes about two minutes to scroll through daily and it's only my friends, some funny meme pages and, of course, a few sponsored posts. I still have two Twitter accounts, but those are for specific purpose (posting links to updates to my site and to keep up with things like tech and developer news), so nothing to deal with there.

Web sites: I try to steer clear of the comments section. Even if I did not participate, I knew I was getting angry at some of the stuff I read there. It takes a toll on your health after a while, especially with all the online content we don't realize we consume daily. Same for online forums. Unless I could block the usual suspects, then, boom, I won't be visiting any longer.

Anyway, somewhat different reasons for stopping, perhaps, but ultimately all the arguing and even just reading nonsense was just a major waste of time and a health hazard. I've been using that newly-found time for better things - Exercise, reading, etc.

Dev.to is one of a handful of places I still post at and read comments, which are usually well thought out or funny.

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daedtech profile image
Erik Dietrich

Different paths, perhaps, but same result and same benefits, in a sense. If I zoom out a bit, it's all about time management and asking yourself "is arguing with this person on X media really the most valuable use of my time?"

Whether you could spend your time (in my case) writing content for your site or (in your case) exercise and reading the revelation is finding more constructive ways to spend your time.

Glad you found your way away from the toxic back and forth, and I'm with you on dev.to. It's a remarkably positive oasis in the sometimes-negative-desert of forums for people in our industry.

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metalmikester profile image
Michel Renaud

Working on redesigning my site is on the todo list, but for the past few weeks I've felt a need to take a break outside work hours. Or maybe I'm just stalling. Yep, let's go with that. lol