Uncanny Valley: The Future of Unplugging
Introduction
As summer draws to a close, we delve into the concept of unplugging in 2025, an ultimate luxury in the digital age. With a growing number of apps aiming to reduce screen time and some tech leaders striving to reinvent the internet's early days, the question arises: where is this digital journey headed? WIRED's features editor, Jason Kehe, joins us to explore how users can reclaim power in this digital landscape.
Mentioned in This Episode
“Going Dumb: My Year With a Flip Phone” by Jason Kehe
“Bluesky Is Plotting a Total Takeover of the Social Internet” by Kate Knibbs
“Alexis Ohanian’s Next Social Platform Has One Rule: Don’t Act Like an Asshole” by Katie Drummond
Event Information
Join us live in San Francisco on September 9. Get your tickets here.
Host Social Handles and Contact
You can follow Michael Calore on Bluesky at @snackfight and Lauren Goode on Bluesky at @laurengoode. Write to us at [email protected].
How to Listen
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Transcript Note
This is an automated transcript, which may contain errors.
Podcast Content
Live Show Announcement
Michael Calore: “Hey, this is Mike. Before we start, I have exciting news. We're doing a live show in San Francisco on September 9th, in partnership with local station KQED. Lauren and I will be joined by our editor in chief, Katie Drummond, and a special guest for a conversation you won't want to miss. Use the link in the show notes to get your ticket and invite a friend. Lauren, how are you?”
Lauren Goode: “I'm great. I made a late - night purchase last night while browsing the internet.”
The “Brick” Device
Michael Calore: “You made a late - night purchase? What is it?”
Lauren Goode: “It's not what Reese talked about before on this show. I bought a Brick.”
Michael Calore: “You bought a brick? What's a Brick?”
Lauren Goode: “It's not the building brick. It's a small silicone device. You attach it to your fridge or another surface in your home, away from your bedroom. At night, you tap your phone to it, and it automatically disables certain pre - set apps. When you get into bed, you can't doom - scroll on your phone as you can't access those apps. It's a physical block.”
Michael Calore: “So, it 'bricks' your phone.”
Lauren Goode: “Yes. I heard our colleague, Adrienne, talking about it, so I decided to get one.”
Michael Calore: “What if there's an emergency?”
Lauren Goode: “Well, you know, you might miss out on some things, but at least you're not scrolling Instagram Reels. It's a kind of bliss.”
Topic Introduction: The Future of Unplugging
Michael Calore: “This sounds very relevant to today's show. Our phone and internet addictions are worsening, and we need to figure out the future. This is WIRED's Uncanny Valley, a show about the people, power, and influence of Silicon Valley. Today, we're discussing the future of unplugging. Going off - grid, being offline - it's an aspirational goal for many. Apps like Opal and physical devices like Lauren's Brick, which block distracting apps, are becoming more popular. But these products still place much of the responsibility on users, even though we're part of a larger system designed to keep us connected. Technology is inescapable. We often read or report on people going back to flip phones, landlines, or entrepreneurs trying to revive early - 2000s - era internet. Our question is, who can really unplug in the future? Does unplugging become the ultimate luxury? And how can the rest of us achieve it? I'm Michael Calore, director of consumer tech and culture.”
Lauren Goode: “I'm Lauren Goode, a senior correspondent.”
Jason Kehe: “And I'm Jason Kehe, features editor and all - around Übermensch.”
Guest Introduction and Screen Time Discussion
Michael Calore: “Thank you for being here, Jason. Jason is in the middle of closing the print issue of our magazine, so the next two weeks are hectic. We really had to persuade him to come to the studio today. We're very grateful. Let's start by sharing our daily average phone screen time. What is everyone's, to the best of your knowledge?”
Jason Kehe: “I recently checked mine, and I'm pleased to say it's under an hour a day. I was with three other people. One had three hours, one had five, and another had nine. I 'won' in that regard. I checked the digital wellness setting, and it said an average of 59 minutes for everything, with 20 minutes on email, seven minutes on text, etc.”
Michael Calore: “How about you, Lauren?”
Lauren Goode: “I'm stunned. I originally didn't want to answer this question. Not because I don't love you both, but I feel like no one really cares about my screen time. What matters more is how I feel after spending too much time on Instagram and other social media. It's a qualitative rather than quantitative thing. But if you insist, it's hours. Holistically, not just social media, as I'm constantly reading, texting, and communicating with sources on multiple messaging apps.”
Michael Calore: “I'm a little over two hours a day.”
Lauren Goode: “Let me check. Oh, my God. Eight hours and 43 minutes. Mostly Safari, Slack, and messages.”
Jason Kehe: “Back to the conversation I had with friends about screen time. The person with nine hours was weirdly the most at peace with their phone use. I recently subscribed to the print edition of the San Francisco Chronicle to avoid looking at news on my phone. I think we should disaggregate our technological lives. The phone tries to be everything, but what if we re - atomize our life into dedicated experiences and devices? Buy an alarm clock, a car GPS, and subscribe to a newspaper.”
Michael Calore: “Many people are doing these things to reduce phone time. These were normal before phones. I took active measures to curb my screen time. Now, when I'm eating or watching TV, I turn my phone upside down, which silences notifications and puts it in Do Not Disturb mode.”
Lauren Goode: “Mike, you're one of the few who abide by the time limits you set on Instagram. Sometimes I send you a meme, and you say you'll check it later because you hit your limit.”
Michael Calore: “I use the digital well - being settings on Android to limit myself to 15 minutes of Instagram a day.”
Lauren Goode: “I agree with Jason. What you're describing, Mike, is an early - 2020 solution. We're WIRED. What's the future of unplugging? Is it this disaggregation? Since we're not actually going to unplug, how do we build a meaningful life in all aspects of our internet use?”
Michael Calore: “One answer is to buy technology to get off technology, like the Brick.”
Experiment with Flip Phones and Anti - Distraction Tools
Michael Calore: “Jason, you had a flip phone for an experiment for a year back in 2018, before the pandemic. Lauren, you bought the Brick?”
Lauren Goode: “Yes, it hasn't arrived yet, but I'm excited.”
Michael Calore: “There are also products like the Light phone and Punkt's phone. They work as phones but have limited features. I'm curious about the Brick and other apps. Lauren, have you used Opal?”
Lauren Goode: “I haven't.”
Jason Kehe: “Nor have I. I philosophically oppose using apps to get off apps or technology to get off technology.”
Michael Calore: “Apps to get off apps have been successful for me. I've used digital well - being timers on Android and Clearspace, which helps declutter my phone.”
Jason Kehe: “My issue is that modernity has removed the human element from the conversation about phone addiction. I don't think it's as hard as the tech press makes it seem. Discussing phone addiction adds to their power over our lives, making us think our connection is inevitable.”
Lauren Goode: “I'm glad we brought you on. I think we've become beta testers. Technology purveyors promise that agentic AI will do tasks for us, like shopping with a prompt. But right now, it requires a lot of management and authentication, sucking us in further with the promise of making life easier.”
Jason Kehe: “AI will likely change or even replace the phone as we know it.”
Lauren Goode: “Tell us about that future.”
Jason Kehe: “Look at how people use AI. For example, when asking ChatGPT a question, they use the side button on their iPhone to launch its voice. Conversations are faster than typing. This could become the norm for everything.”
Michael Calore: “This is interesting. We've been talking about barriers to technology to reduce its harm, but you're talking about removing the phone from the equation, making it just the user and the cloud.”
Break and Transition to Internet - Related Discussion
Michael Calore: “We need to take a break. When we come back, we'll expand beyond phones and talk about how the internet affects us.”
Internet Toxicity and Tech Leaders' Efforts
Michael Calore: “Welcome back to Uncanny Valley. Today, we're talking about brain rot. In the first half, we discussed phones and how AI might replace them. In the second half, we'll talk about the internet. While parts of it are amazing, there's still a lot of toxicity. Some tech leaders are trying to fix it, like Alexis Ohanian, co - founder of Reddit. He partnered with Kevin Rose to relaunch Digg, a social media platform similar to Reddit from the early 2000s. Our editor in chief, Katie Drummond, interviewed Ohanian for the first Big Interview episode of this podcast. Alexis wants the new Digg to be less toxic. Lauren, what do you think?”
Lauren Goode: “I love Reddit and the idea of a revived Digg as a healthy internet space. But I'm not sure how much traction it will gain. Twitter has changed a lot in recent years.”
Jason Kehe: “Has anyone successfully brought back an early - internet - glory - day site?”
Michael Calore: “Bluesky could be an example. It launched as an open - source, decentralized alternative social media network. It gained users after the 2024 presidential election when people didn't want to be associated with X (formerly Twitter). There seems to be less toxicity on Bluesky compared to X.”
Lauren Goode: “When I published a story about vibe coding, there were strong opinions on Bluesky, mostly from seasoned coders worried about code quality and bugs. And some people jumped to call me an AI booster, getting angry.”
Jason Kehe: “The early internet was also toxic. I'm not sure where we're going back to or what we're moving toward. Bluesky seems just as bad as other platforms.”
Lauren Goode: “It feels insulated, like an echo chamber, a liberal - leaning one. Say the wrong thing, and you get criticized.”
Michael Calore: “Jason, you're right. The early internet had toxic chat rooms and forums. But now, toxicity is amplified on every platform. You can't go back to the old internet. A nice internet community needs to be formed with rules, moderators, etc., but it often turns toxic as it scales.”
Lauren Goode: “I disagree. I think the future of the internet could have spaces with more taste. There's a part of the internet with high - quality, curated content, and people are curating their experiences. But there's also a toxic, low - quality part that spreads quickly.”
Jason Kehe: “I call the high - quality part the 'prestige internet,' and I hope WIRED is part of it.”
Lauren Goode: “I think people can enjoy both high - quality Substacks like Emily Sundberg's ‘Feed Me’ and Dylan Patel's ‘SemiAnalysis and the Semiconductor and AI Industry.’ People are putting effort into what they say to their audience.”
Michael Calore: “That sounds great, but a video of someone stuffing Big Macs in their mouth will get more views than high - quality content.”
Jason Kehe: “There will always be elevated media and everything else. In a world of AI - generated content, people will seek quality experiences.”
Michael Calore: “This puts the onus on the user to find less toxic content. The people we're talking about are trying to create a platform where you don't have to do that extra work. The platform is designed to be a happy place without the need for curation.”
Jason Kehe: “But isn't the pleasure of consumption in finding something special on your own? I don't know if people want an externally curated list of high - quality content.”
Michael Calore: “I think many people do.”
Jason Kehe: “When we were kids, we took pride in finding things. That impulse to be an individual still exists.”
Michael Calore: “I agree. With the internet at our fingertips, we'll find our happy places on it.”
Lauren Goode: “We may be making a wrong assumption about kids' media consumption. There's also high - quality, curated video content, not just low - quality viral videos.”
The Concept of Unplugging as a Luxury
Lauren Goode: “Mike, we've talked about what it would mean to have made it in life. I joked it was having real wallpaper in my home. You said it was not having to carry your phone, wallet, or keys.”
Michael Calore: “Right. Because someone else is managing those things for you. You don't need a phone or key. You can move around freely.”
Jason Kehe: “I love that. I often leave the house without stuff in my pockets.”
Michael Calore: “Never. I never leave without my phone.”
Lauren Goode: “Never. We're getting to the idea that the future of unplugging is the ultimate luxury. Jason, you seem to be suggesting ways to steal some of that luxury.”
Jason Kehe: “I don't think only the wealthy can disconnect. Many people I know with little money can live a disconnected life. The control is with the user.”
Michael Calore: “Yes, we have the power.”
Book and Media Recommendations
Michael Calore: “Thank you both for this conversation. Now, it's time for our recommendations. Lauren, you go first.”
Lauren Goode: “I recommend a book, ‘The Ministry of Time’ by Kaliane Bradley, a 2024 fiction novel. It's a spy thriller, romance, comedy, sci - fi, and time - travel all in one. I haven't finished it yet, but I'm loving it. It makes me laugh out loud.”
Michael Calore: “Jason, have you read it?”
Jason Kehe: “No, but I've heard of it.”
Lauren Goode: “I can loan it to you. I know I still have the book you loaned me months ago. If I return books on time, will you reconsider?”
Jason Kehe: “It's my turn. Since I'm not a regular on the podcast, I want to talk about a movie on Netflix, ‘K - Pop Demon Hunters.’ It's about K - pop saving the world, with a girl group fighting a boy band of rival demons. It makes a case for K - pop as a global and world - saving phenomenon. It's a genius movie, and now I want to go to a K - pop concert.”
Michael Calore: “Nice. My recommendation is a podcast, ‘The War on Cars.’ The episode is ‘Should the Bus Be Free?’ It's about two weeks old. It's related to Zohran Mamdani, a leading candidate for mayor of New York City, who wants to make buses in New York fast and free. The podcast examines this from a research perspective, looking at pilot and permanent programs in other cities, ridership numbers, and all the implications. It's an interesting thought experiment about making seemingly impossible things, like free transit, a reality.”
Jason Kehe: “I don't use podcasts. We should do an episode on why I think podcasts are the most dangerous medium today.”
Conclusion
Michael Calore: “Thank you for participating, Jason. Thanks for listening to Uncanny Valley. If you like the show, follow and rate it on your podcast app. If you have questions, comments, or show suggestions, write to us at [email protected]. Today's show is produced by Adriana Tapia and Mark Lyda. Amar Lal at Macro Sound mixed this episode. Mark Lyda is our San Francisco studio engineer. Sam Spangler fact - checked this episode. Kate Osborn is our executive producer. Katie Drummond is WIRED's global editorial director, and Chris Bannon is Conde Nast's head of global audio.”
