If you don’t know anything about E ink devices it will be on your radar after reading this and I hope this helps to make them more mainstream. They are no longer just E readers like a kindle where you can only read books, they have evolved and are getting better. Like the Avengers in their next movie we also have to fight doom (scrolling) but unlike them we sadly don’t have any special powers but E ink devices could be the key weapon in winning this battle and be the solution to your doom scrolling syndrome.
You are probably like me, who on more occasions than I like to admit end up doom scrolling, then after the session it’s like woah where did the time go and how did I end up here getting pulled in? Then we forget about it and it happens again because the modern day smart phone has hacked our dopamine reward pathways. This will keep happening until you make a real conscious effort to break the cycle by either removing the distracting apps or keeping the phone away. Then you might start thinking you need to switch to an old dumb phone or maybe you will silence all notifications or just turn off WiFi and mobile data on your phone so nothing comes in. All these are solutions to be fair that can work. It does require resistance though and regulation to wean yourself off it. Like an addiction the dopamine reward pathways are set and your brain will still associate your phone with it, this explains the sudden impulse to just pick up and look at your phone! All of this especially isn’t easy to resist if you’ve grown up with this tech and haven’t lived in a world without it i.e our kid’s generation.
What must be acknowledged though is this isn’t all down to a lack of discipline and human weakness because the way apps especially ‘social’ media ones are designed, it is to keep you glued to the screen, they know how the human brain works and how to ‘hack’ into it to keep us occupied. It’s no longer even ‘social’ media, attention media is the right term; keeping you on the app longer by grabbing your attention leads to more ad revenue and profits. A phone is just a tool at the end of the day, a very good one at that and I am a fan of them and what they can do but addictive scrolling apps in a bright colorful screen in a pocket-able device that you can carry anywhere so conveniently.. the current modern day smart phone has become the perfect vehicle to grab your attention away from what matters. Is it a surprise we lose ourselves and lose so much time in the loud noisy place that is our phones these days so much so that we can’t focus fully on longer form quality content anymore?
I mean how many of you clicking into this blog will have got to this part to begin with then actually be able to read to the end is what I’m curious about. I sense the dopamine filled distractions on the phone will be trying to pull you away if your kids already aren’t!
So what’s changed in the modern smartphone
Older phones had smaller and worse quality screens so it wasn’t as pleasing to look at, the modern smartphones screens are bigger, way more clearer, eye catching and feel smoother to operate. Compare it an E ink screen which is static for example, it has 4096 colours whereas a smartphone LCD screen has 16 million colours.
Screen flicker, linking to the above smart phone LCD/OLED screens have screen flicker. The lights turn on/off so fast we don’t notice it but it strains our eyes because it’s a lot to process, ever tried taking a picture of a phone screen and noticed the camera picks up the flickering or have you noticed why it becomes difficult to read a long article? It’s that screen flickering strain. E ink doesn’t have that so it is a lot easier on the eyes.
Older phones were slower in terms of processors and RAM so they had limitations in functionality that would create some friction but that no longer exists.
Apps have also become more attention optimised and don’t feed you content from people you follow (remember old social media?) but rather what the algorithm clocks you are interested in, it might explain why one of my friends keeps talking about the small boats… negativity gets more attention so it is no surprise, maybe we will all be happier if we snap out of this.
Workarounds
Put a biscuit in front of a little child, tell them to hold it but to not have a bite, they will crumble because they know that dopamine hit is good and right there! Now try snatching the biscuit off that child and you will see the withdrawal symptoms in a second! It’s the same with this somewhat - you are welcome to suggest a better analogy in the comments section - if you suddenly take away the phone you will likely struggle. It is a wonderfully powerful tool that can do so much to the point it is almost impractical now to not have one. This isn’t a post to suggest to dump your phones although I’d happily accept if you wanted to donate your latest fold phone to me. They definitely have their place but you must be able to control the tool before it controls you, the tactics mentioned in the opening can help but what I think is also needed is some compartmentalisation i.e set some boundaries and embrace limitations.
In previous decades you’d have an MP3/iPod for music, a dedicated camera to take pictures/videos, devices that have a clearly defined purpose, somewhat limited but manageable because you knew it’s function and boundaries, perhaps not surprising that I was reading some article talking about young people wanting to own CD players to get some control back from their distracting phones and their own music again.
E ink devices - a solution?
Seeing as this blog title is about e-ink devices I should probably talk about it now. They are on the up and getting better but a typical smart phone is still more powerful and better in many respects. I’m not going to pretend E ink is a full substitute right now but they can still be a solution to help you get back your focus and control again.
The form factor varies in size but you can say it is more similar now to a standard tablet or more recently like a phone e.g boox palma. The screens are way easier on your eyes, it is like you’re reading off a paper. Most have black and white screens but you have colour E ink devices now too, the screen refresh rates and colors are way more toned down compared to your typical phone. It’s not as pleasing to look at, it’s slower to operate and basically makes doom scrolling especially with video content like tiktok and shorts a lot less addictive because the videos especially on the black and white screens look crap compared to a normal phone. On the up side it is set up to make reading content like ebooks, PDFs, articles way more enjoyable and manageable. I’ve found it difficult to focus on reading on a typical smart phone, even tablets, the eye strain kicks in but I can’t be surprised because it is more optimised for media consumption and varied multi tasking. However on an E ink device I’ve had no difficulties. If you want a device that could lend itself to educating your kids and nourishing their brains more I think E ink is the way to go.
They are still niche at the moment and currently there are 4 types of devices you can get that come to mind:
The standard e-reader: like a kindle, what you’d typically associate when you hear E ink. Main use to just read books, super effective at it but not much else to it.
Tablet form: e.g Onyx Boox Note 2, this is the one I personally own, it’s an older one that came out in 2019, runs on android 9 but I love it still. It is like a kindle and a digital notebook combined and with android running I can download various apps and still use it for stuff like web browsing, spreadsheets, hand writing notes, journaling, annotating PDFs and reading books is a genuine joy. If you want your child to have a device that can support revision or learning I think the boox devices are ones to consider. You have others like kindle scribe and remarkable but I can speak for Boox from my own experience and it running on android gives it versatility and more utility.
Phone form (but not a phone): Example the Boox Palma or HiBreak Bigme which I have been trying for the last few weeks, it is in the shape of a phone but you can’t make calls or texts on it because it doesn’t take a sim, it also doesn’t have GPS or NFC but you can do everything else on it. I would say it’s like having an iPod Touch except it’s E ink and android based. It makes a better companion device where you still have your modern smartphone, for example if you’re out commuting and want something easy to carry to do your reading this works or when you come home you can put away your phone or turn off WiFi/data and use this instead. What I appreciate about this form is it can really help come off the phone addiction because you can still use apps like Whatsapp on it and like a phone it is pocket-able and portable. This can help with compartmentalising i.e separating from your phone without any anxiety by gradually becoming less dependent on it by not using it at home or in your bedroom with this as a substitute device. This method means you won’t be losing connection to your phone or become unreachable. It can also help with your night time routine as there is little to no blue light to effect your sleep so if you did need to do some reading or web browsing at night this would be better and a lot kinder to your eyes.
An actual E ink phone: yes finally, a device that does whatever a modern smart phone can (just how spider-man can do whatever a spider can) but it has an E ink screen which you can get in black and white or a colour version. I think we will be seeing more of these became mainstream now as the demand increases and it wouldn’t surprise me if the big brands get in on it. The current standout model is a Hibreak Bigme Pro. Yeah a weird name but it’s got all the key specs on paper, a good RAM, processor, memory and comes in either a colour or black and white screen version. I think this could be a game changer. I will try getting hold of one soon and report back on to what extent can it do whatever a modern smart phone can.. and maybe even replace it entirely.
It doesn’t help that they are hard to buy used and aren’t the most cheapest but if you implement my tactics suggested in this post I’m sure you will find a good deal. I think in time with more devices coming out the used market will increase in supply and prices will start to drop. I will write separate posts focusing on each type to highlight pros and cons and give you more insight into their use cases. With E ink, black and white screens are the standard but can feel limiting, the colour e ink option are more versatile and more likely to replace a modern smartphone. The specs on paper are also behind typical smartphones and tablets but that is because the e ink screen requires a lot less processing power so they still function as good.
For my kids who are currently too small for anything my future thinking is to keep them off a modern smartphone for as long as possible. They could even have a tablet at managed times/places but without access to addicting scrolling apps. If they wanted something handheld like a phone and they break my resistance then they can have either a dumb phone which I’m sure they will hate or an E ink screen phone which is what I’d be more comfortable giving them simply because I know it is a lot less likely they will become dopamine doom scrolling addicts with an attention span of an excited puppy! Instead they might become book nerds, I’d be all for that, I might even consider making the tablet I get them to be a colour e ink one as I want to nurture smart well rounded nerds humans.
That’s it for now, I hope you didn’t doom scroll your way through this one but if you did manage to read this on your modern smartphone, respect. Either my writing is pretty good or you have amazing will power to get through it all.