# The technology addiction trope — BuzzMachine

<https://buzzmachine.com/2024/10/17/the-technology-addiction-trope/>

- Host: [buzzmachine.com](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/hosts/buzzmachine.com/)
- Saved: October 21, 2024 (2024-10-22T01:58:07Z)
- Record: https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/742330a6dad7/
- JSON: https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/742330a6dad7.json

## What Jamie wrote

Jarvis suggesting that the Internet itself isn't addictive (emphasis mine).

> Griffiths’ observation speaks to much controversy about the net: it is blamed as the cause of many ills when often it is merely a conduit for them. I emailed Griffiths and asked whether his opinion had changed in the intervening decades of research. He replied with a paper that expressed his current view: “There are also much wider problems with the use of the term ‘internet addiction’: though the number of studies in the field of internet addiction has certainly grown, most have really investigated addictions **on the internet rather than to the internet**. . . . In short, the overwhelming majority of so-called internet addicts are no more addicted to the internet than alcoholics are addicted to the actual bottle.”

I tend to agree with Jarvis. There are many things enabled by the Internet, but that as a network it is itself without addictiveness. Similar to gambling, the room of a casino is not addictive but the games in it are. Is social media addictive? I believe yes. Is an online poker app? Very much so! Is the Internet, I don't know that it can be. Is your phone? Hmmm… I’m not sure.

## Facts

- Kind: [Page](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/kinds/page/)

## Appears in

- [WT298: Weekly Thing 298 / Tool, Solar, Circles](https://weekly.thingelstad.com/archive/298/), Notable

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## Elsewhere

- Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/*/https://buzzmachine.com/2024/10/17/the-technology-addiction-trope/