More Information Won't Help You

Data are less democratising than we suppose

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Gentle Reader,

At the age of 17, I discovered podcasts. A friend from school told me you can download a German language-learning podcast to your phone, and listen to it whenever you like.

The idea was new. Did this mean I would never waste a moment of my life again.

There would be no more downtime. Whenever I would wait in a queue, go to the bathroom, or sit on a plane, instead of sitting there uselessly, wasting my life, I could be getting better at German.

At the time, as a spotty and somewhat ambitious teenager, I did not see how this could be a problem. I soon expanded from languages to all manner of content and now, many years later, podcasts remain one of my favourite forms of media. I even fall asleep every night listening to a podcast, usually something slightly interesting but not so exciting as to keep me awake.

I listen to a broad variety of topics. Here’s a snapshot: Conversations with Tyler, Coffee Break Italian, The Blindboy Podcast, History of English Podcast, The Mad Fientist, Making Sense, The Pathless Path, My First Million, I Will Teach You to be Rich, Art of Accomplishment, The Examined Life, Ram Dass, The Curbsiders Internal Medicine.

The Yield

What do I get from listening to podcasts? Initially, I valued the information which was provided to me, but later I also came to value just the pleasure and almost social feeling of listening to a conversational podcast.

Information & Instruction

This was the first reason I started listening to podacsts – I wanted to gather information about the world or, to be more specific, about the German language.

My world view at the time looked something like this: the world is full of information. Some people have access to this information, which grants them power, influence, access to money, and so on; others do not have access to this information, or choose not to access it, and they suffer as a result, and will not be successful.

I had been aware, beforehand, of the sheer volume of information which was available on the internet, but my mind was blown that this information could be piped into my brain, passively, via my earholes, often at a speed of 2x that of normal speaking. The possibilities were endless.

Vibes

I like to think that some podcasts are ‘vibe’ podcasts. They don’t necessarily provide information, or at least that is not the explicit goal of the podcast, but rather they focus on the dynamic of a chat between friends, or shooting the breeze.

I often wondered about why the sitcom Friends is so popular amongst Gen Z. It occurred to me that it’s because it showcases the final period in society when a group of friends lived together, hung out, socialised without looking at their phones, which makes Gen Z deeply nostalgic for that era which they just missed out on.

Similarly, vibes podcasts make you feel like you’re a part of the conversation, almost like socialising without socialising. A good example of this is My First Million or Not Investment Advice, where the podcasters know each other well and joke around. In the background, they generally discuss topics of general interest, which also provides news and opinions, but the chief purpose of listening here is, simply, to vibe.

I wonder if listening to such podcasts, by filling a conversation-shaped hole in the heart of the listener, sort of simulates a social interaction, and dampens down the desire to actually go out and participate in society? It’s possible.

What is missing?

In light of the above, what’s not to like? The podcast, a truly remarkable medium, is a fount of knowledge, and even a friendly companion on a lonely day.

Like many things related to technology usage, it’s complicated.

I began to listen slavishly to podcasts, spending almost two decades now in the thrall of receiving information and, supposedly, getting smarter on every conceivable topic and yet…I didn’t really learn much, in a way. Probably, the one exception is languages, where listening really did help.

Why didn’t I become a billionaire and all-round perfect person after listening to thousands of podcasts? There are, I believe, three reasons.

1. The brain does not store irrelevant information.

I consumed vast volumes of information on many different subjects, learning about the history of the English language, about how to start a company, about how to do this, that and the other. Sometimes, after a period of time, I might accidentally listen to something I had listened to years before, but I would be half way through the episode before I would realise this. What could this mean?

It meant that, since the human brain is not designed to receive 50 pieces of advice every day, I had forgotten almost everything I ever learned. This is kind of crazy. Granted, I didn’t need to retain all this information, but I kind of was kidding myself going around believing that I would remember exactly who killed Franz Ferdinand or the etymology of ‘nice’ or what the best way to write a novel supposedly is.

Often, I found myself listening to something that was not relevant to me at all, like a parenting advice podcast (I have no children). On some level, my brain was saying ‘hey, this might be handy in case you ever have kids’, as if I would remember or care at such a time in the future.

On some level, the ‘use it or lose it’ principle always applies.

2. The utility of information is limited.

Information is only useful insofar as it is actionable. I basically wasted my time by showering my brain with terabytes of data. Was it useful? No. Was it also kind of fun? Yes.

Even if I somehow remembered all of the advice and information that was ever broadcasted into my brain, I know that I wouldn’t have a hope in hell of being able to contextualise or prioritise this information into any kind of remotely actionable shape.

Again, the information would be useless, and potentially even harmful or distracting in some cases. Gathering information is often simply just another way to procrastinate, albeit one of the more sophisticated and sly forms that procrastination takes.

What is important, however, is action.

3. Access to information is less democratising than I had supposed

In the early, heady days of the internet, I remember reading information online which I thought was very important, or even somehow secret.

My heart was beating very fast at having been granted access to this informational treasure trove, but then I realised: if I’m reading this, can’t everyone else too? And if we all read it, and learn the information, then I guess the playing field will be level.

The playing field remained level, dear reader, but not because everyone read the magical secrets. It remained level because information is just not really all that important, or at least not as important as we thought.

Think about the world’s greatest universities: access to them was restricted, and they purported to hold information which would only be granted to the chosen few. Now, in the internet days, you can teach yourself anything online, so why are universities still thriving, and still maintaining a moat of elitism?

Because information is far less important than personalised instruction, arbitrage, peer group connection and…blind luck. The concept of university education is still going strong, it’s “lindy” – if it were all about the information, then these universities would go bankrupt. Yet, our children will likely still attend these institutions.

Where does this leave us?

It’s not just podcasts, by the way, which propagate this subtle yet potentially insidious mind virus that we must always be learning and consuming and ‘developing’. Podcasts are simply another part of this craze. The same can be said of many other media, be they social or otherwise, and even of books.

Podcasts, however, come in a very palatable format, and received so palatably, at an increased speed so as to supposedly receive the valuable information all the quicker, they can be a rather intoxicating opium. Recently, I slowed down all my podcasts to ‘normal’ talking speed, which honestly feels a lot better. These days, I tend to avoid anything that feels like a superstimulus, or dopamine scalping, for obvious reasons.

Zooming out, what is the big picture? There is no problem per se with podcasts, as long as you are honest with yourself as a consumer of media. I still love them, but I no longer kid myself that they are really going to change everything for me, or that they are even a significant or actionable informational resource, in most cases. Of course, I still hear useful tips and guidance all the time, but I am better able to contextualise such advice, and I acknowledge that I am a little guilty of consuming the podcasts as ‘infotainment.’

What should we do about it?

I don’t know. I seem to be a fan these days of a very laissez faire attitude to many things in life but, if I were a betting man, I would say I might have been better off, all those years ago, to define a few areas in my life and select a few actions or experiments to carry out. Then, having actually done something, and gained real world information, I could adapt my approach accordingly, and perhaps achieve the success talked about by Henry David Thoreau, a success “unexpected in the common hours.”

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Gentle Reader,

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