analogue renaissance

When using our devices, we’re pulled into and solely focused on the glowing world that exists on the screen. We lose both an awareness of self and of the real world context surrounding us. This extension aims to disrupt that trance and remind you that you are here and your computer is there and you are just staring at it and... wow is that really... See more

Our skin aches for mornings that begin with the light of dawn and not that of a screen. Before our feet touch the earth, our eyes have already wandered into someone else’s world. We didn’t notice when we stopped living and began watching others. We’ve become spectators of everyone and participants in nothing of our own.

Not using a phone taught me what a phone is really for. It’s not for communicating with other people, getting directions, reading articles, looking at pictures, shopping for products, or playing games. A phone is a device for muting the anxieties proper to being alive. This is what all its functions and features ultimately achieve: cameras deliver... See more

I think digital scrolling induces a kind of blackout. Not in the way alcohol causes one, but in the sense that time disappears without anything worth remembering. There are days I can barely recall—not because they were traumatic, but because they were simply unmemorable. A digital fog. Hours passed without touching anything real. No texture. No... See more

Granting the premise that the phone is an antidote to living, though, I was wondering: what is it I personally don't want to live through? If I paid attention, at precisely the moments my attention tried to veer away, what would I find I was doing and feeling and thinking? What about existence makes me reach for my pocket?

People like to point out that screens never appear in our dreams, suggesting that deep down we all long to get off our phones, but as I’ve wondered before, maybe it’s just that the dream is the screen, our phones framing our reality so comprehensively that we already think we live inside of them.