I have a lot of work to do these days but instead I find myself procrastinating. There are several papers to revise and resubmit, a grant deadline, plus an upcoming conference that I am organizing, so I should really be working at my peak efficiency instead of goofing around...
Since I started blogging nearly 2 years ago, posting and reading other people's blogs have become a habit on which, I am embarrassed to say, I spend way too much time. In recent months it has become painfully obvious that blogging, or more precisely -- blog-surfing -- is a major time drain for me.
I don't know how bad I am compared to other people, but I cannot imagine what those people do who have high-traffic blogs, and comment on other people's, and also tweet. Clearly there are people who successfully maintain an active online presence alongside a successful career. It just seems very challenging to me; for instance, I feel that if I started tweeting I would literally do no work whatsoever.
So I took down my entire blogroll, I hope only temporarily. I use(d) the blogroll to access the blogs I often read, and from their blogrolls continue to some other ones more or less frequently. It was just too tempting to constantly go back and check what's new from my favorite bloggers... So I removed it. I might go to Google Reader later on or bring the blogroll back, perhaps in altered form. For now, the non-existence of a blogroll is serving its purpose -- the barrier to accessing my favorite online writers is high enough that I may or may not do it only once a day.
How do you combat excessive blog-surfing? Do you feel that blogosphere participation has a net positive or negative effect on your productivity? Do you curb or embrace blog-induced procrastination?
14 comments:
I definitely understand how you feel. Sometimes it can be overwhelming to keep up with everything! That's why it takes me longer and longer to even consider using a new social media tool.
I've found moving to Google Reader has saved me a lot of blog-reading time. Now blogs pop up when they have new posts, and I can read them right on my Google homepage. If I want to comment, I can then click over to the page.
I tend to look at blogs/Facebook/Twitter at three points during the day: during breakfast (after DH has left with Evan), during lunch (if I'm in the office), and in the evening after I go to bed.
If I'm behind a bit on the list, I just scan the posts that aren't as interesting to me.
One of my problems is that I have to a) at least look at every post that comes through my reader and b) I have to clear out my reader (I can't stand having a backlog of posts). Luckily doing a) solves b) automatically.
The side effect of this is improving other's productivity as well- I've been lazy about collecting blog links, and I usually just use your blog roll to check my favorites!
I use a browser extension to limit the amount of time I spend on certain sites. It cuts you off after, say, 10 minutes a day. I use one called StayFocusd (sic). You could add your own site to the "limited" list.
I use google reader, too, so I have to second that suggestion. Also, I don't read all of the blogs I have there...some of them I save for when I have more time. It's 'smart' in that the home setting seems to identify which are my favorite blogs and lists updates from those first.
I agree with anonymous at 7:36am, I also use your blogroll to procrastinate. So what am I supposed to do all day now? Work?
I'm with anonymous at 10:13. I use Firefox with the Leechblock extension. However, every once in a while I defeat my own oh-so-clever setup and end up opening Chrome - mostly to read the news.
There is a concept called "me time" (google for it) which is time that you use for yourself to do whatever you really enjoy doing. For you, this may include time spent blogging. For someone else it might be frisbee or gardening or tinkering with antique car -- basically anything other than work or chores.
The trick is to really derive fulfillment out of the time that you spend on yourself. I mean, seriously, the best way to avoid excess is to be satisfied that you've already had enough! Then you can go back to your work with renewed enthusiasm and motivation. Scientists have it easier than others because we do, at some level, enjoy our work. We are all driven by curiosity and a desire to learn. (Equivalently, science is so hard that those who really hate it have already changed careers.)
I always prioritize "me time" above anything else. Counterintuitively, this does not lead to many missed deadlines, since taking care of myself first gives me more energy in the long term. Procrastinating right now gives me more time next week since I won't have to procrastinate as much next week. I know this sounds weird but it works for me. Each person is different and you'll have to discover what works best for you. I'm at a similar career stage as you (tenured mid-career), but I have little stress and I spend a lot of time with my kids.
At one point during the latter stages of my PhD I was writing blog posts on 2 scientific blogs, 2 political blogs, and a group political blog, as well being able to tell you what posts had been published on most of the sites in my blog roll. Major procrastination. On the other hand, I did write up my PhD and published 4 papers not related to my PhD as well. Not sure whether the blogging helped free up my writing in my PhD or hindered it. I think I am fooling myself if it didn't hinder it. However, one of the issues is the additional psychic burden of public procrastination, and the guilt that builds up knowing someone somewhere is potentially going to say "Have you finished that paper? I know you were twittering/blogging about subject X all weekend/night/week".
I also used your blogroll for my procrastination. Now I need to remember the names of the blogs I reached from your site and Google them to see if there is anything interesting. The advantage is that I liked only 2 or 3 of them, but used to click on many, just in case. So in the long run I might save some time since you removed your blogroll and work more :). I only wish it worked that way...
Google Reader. If I have time during the day, whenever that is, to sit down and read blogs, then they are waiting for me. I don't have to search, I don't have to click on a bunch of links and look for new posts or reread to see if something is new, I just open reader and start reading. Unlike Alyssa, I don't care if I miss a day on my Reader and it's not cleared out - to me, that's what it's there for. For example, I went on vacation for four weeks not too long ago. When I returned, I caught up on everything that had happened while I was away in the blogosphere in about a week via Reader. [You don't get to comment much that way but you can find out what has happened at least.]
Blog reading for me is not a guilty pleasure but a daily reward and a wonderful way to keep up with the goings on in the world. I don't watch the news (other than on Comedy Central), I don't read the paper, but I'm often more well informed on current events, scientific and otherwise, than many of my friends because of blogs. I tend to prefer asynchronous communication though.
Perhaps it is easier for me to avoid the urge to peak at the Reader when I should be working since I don't spend as many hours at a desk each day...
Twitter is fucken horrendous. Fucken that goddamn illiterate tweeting fucken gibberish. Twitter can go fucke itself for ever with a goddamn rusty sharkskin condom, and then pour fukcen turperntine on its fuckenm dicke. fucken billshoie.
For me, time wasting on the internet is more of a symptom than a cause. If I find myself wasting time (rather than just using blogs as a quick"mind-cleansing" break between tasks, which is what I usually do), it is a sure sign that I am not interested in what I need to be doing.
I don't really have a solution for that, but when that happens, I get brutal with myself about allowing any internet browsing at all. I use two different browsers- one for work and one for blogs, etc. So I close the one I use for non-work things and don't let myself open it until the next appointed time. I do cheat sometimes, but it works well enough.
I've been spending way too much time reading blogs lately. I don't feel guilty about writing blog posts, but I do about reading some of them.
I did do a major clean out of my Google Reader subscriptions lately—there were too many irritating or boring blogs that I was reading because they had once had a good post that induced me to subscribe.
Note: this is gasstationwithoutpumps.wordpress.com
Blogger is still refusing comments from wordpress-identified commenters.
I've unsubscribed from a lot of Blogger blogs because of that irritant, and Blogger blogs have been moved to a separate category in Google Reader, so that they are always the last ones I read now.
I use Reader too, so I can read most blogs without visiting them. I've found that reading blogs doesn't take that much time; it's the commenting that does me in. So I let myself read blogs through Reader when I'm at work, but only if I'm eating. That way I restrict it to proper breaks. And I almost never comment on anything when I'm at work because it just eats up too much time. This has the added advantage of not having my work url showing up in every blog's stats.
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