FLIP - A DOCUMENTARY

“How can I take advantage of these tools, without these tools taking advantage of me?”

This is a quote from a filmmaker I follow, who goes by the name of Matt D’Avella. You might recognise the name from his popular YouTube channel, or from his direction, production and editing work on one of my personal favourite documentaries: “Minimalism: A Documentary about the Small Things”.

This idea of minimalism is a pretty big part of the topic I’d like to delve into with my documentary, ‘Flip’.

In the Minimalism documentary, there is an interview with Jesse Jacobs, an entrepreneur who started Samovar Tea Lounge, a place for people to get away from the hustle and bustle of a modern lifestyle and sit down and connect over tea. Jacobs said something in one of these interviews, something that I’ve been thinking about a lot lately; 

“As humans, we are wired to become dissatisfied. It’s an addiction really, and we are encouraged to maintain the addiction through technology and information.”

Now this begs the question, how did we get so addicted to satisfaction? And is that really a bad thing? Satisfaction is generally a good thing, I mean look at the definition; 

“fulfilment of one's wishes, expectations, or needs, or the pleasure derived from this.”

The problem here is tolerance for satisfaction, and what it takes to make us satisfied. This is where we have to look a bit at human evolution, and the subsequent evolution of the technology around us.

A hundred years ago, the average person would be satisfied by the most simple, almost primordial sensations; those being eating, sex, love, health, freedom, et cetera. The only way to obtain these basic needs was through physically experiencing them - cooking a meal, having sex, exercising, making money to provide shelter, or just building your own. This was how humans lived all those decades ago, and for the thousands of years before that.

Nowadays, getting our hands on simple pleasures is easy, thanks to the internet. Want food? Order some online. Need to talk to someone? Shoot them a DM. Want a self-esteem boost? Post a selfie. Haven’t seen a good set of breasts in a while? Welcome to the World Wide Web, baby.

In the course of less than a hundred years, humans have gone from having to go out and seek satisfaction, to having instant pleasure and self-gratification at our fingertips. This change has permanently altered our brains, from gaining bucket loads of dopamine from a simple task like making a meal - to only gathering little hits of satisfaction in byte sized packets from ordering a Happy Meal on UberEats.

I’m not here to tell you that the internet is bad, or that the modern age has ruined us and we’re headed for surefire destruction. I’m here to make you think about the way your brain has evolved from when you were a kid, to now.

I’m 22 right now, and despite my problems with social media, I still have it and use it very often, doom-scrolling and watching stories and liking posts. I've only learned to post less to avoid the discrimination and harm that was caused from online use in my teenage years. 

The problem for me has been that I haven’t been able to drop social media completely, mostly due to a reliance on the system, and because it’s all there at the tip of my fingers, just waiting.

The reliance on the system is a huge part of the problem. I needed Facebook when I was 15 to switch shifts with workers at my fast-food job, I needed Tumblr at 16 to create a digital portfolio for a TAFE course. Now I need so many different apps and social media, just to get by. I need LinkedIn to find a job. I need a Google account to see my emails. I need an Instagram account to market my business. I need the internet to study, make money, pay my bills, everything.

The biggest part of the problem is my smartphone. In 2023, getting by without a smartphone requires intense effort and planning, it’s not just about accessing social media. To order at some restaurants you need to scan a QR code, meaning you need your phone. To put in timesheets for work, I have to use an app. To get prescription medication, I need to show a QR code that is texted to me. To log into accounts I need to use two factor authentication, which is reliant on having authentication apps. To be able to even get home, I need my phone to look at maps and bus routes. 

How many times whilst reading this have you pulled out your phone to check the time? Maybe you felt a buzz in your pocket and had to make sure it’s not your roommate telling you the rent is overdue, or that a nuclear missile is headed straight for our direction. It really could be either nowaday, right? The need to gratify the unknown is what leaves us reaching into our pockets whenever we feel the slightest vibration… and it is a need, not a want. How often do you find yourself looking at your phone, not even realising you picked it up?

Even worse, are you so sensitised to the “meaning” of a vibration from your pocket, that you’ll mistake a slight touch or an unfamiliar sound for the sensation of a notification, only to open your phone and not find one there and be utterly disappointed?

Our brains have hardwired themselves into believing that the small shot of dopamine you get from watching a TikTok or receiving a DM, is equal to the dopamine shot you should get from having a real, face to face interaction. 

This complete lack of regulation of dopamine in our brains, that has only appeared in the last decade or so, has led to people with a dependency on social media and their phones to accrue symptoms typically associated with substance-use disorders.

I’d like to welcome you all to the “feedback loop”, the trick your brain is playing on you, and has been for the better part of a decade. Your brain is getting you addicted to new interactions by releasing a little dopamine every time you see a notification, or scroll through social media, and then snatching it away from you whenever you’re not on your phone or otherwise connected to the internet.

This change in the way our brain creates and emits chemicals to make us feel good has led to the wider population unknowingly adapting to this new feedback loop. We’re more connected to our devices than we have ever been, and it’s putting a strain on our relationships outside of our phones - the real life connections we should have with families, friends, and ourselves.

I am making ‘FLIP’ with the sole hope that I can get even one person to think differently about how they use their phone. How much they rely on it. How different their life would be if it was taken away from them without warning. 

For FLIP, I’ll be quitting my smartphone for 30 days. Not to prove that we should stop using smartphones, but to make the point that we rely on them too often, for far too much. 

“How can I take advantage of these tools, without these tools taking advantage of me?”

This is the quote that started this ramble. I told you it was said by Matt D’Avella, but I gave you no frame of reference. D’Avella said this after quitting his phone for 30 days. The tool in reference here is his phone. 

The problem with this quote is the use of the word ‘tool’. A tool is something that sits and waits for when you need it. It doesn’t beg to be used, it doesn’t yell at you when you haven’t needed it in a while. 

Once upon a time, our phones were tools. Now we are.

It’s no longer us going to our phones because we require it for its intended use. We go to our phones because they beckon and call at us with endless ringing and buzzing, needing us to use them so that the people behind the advertisements and social apps are making money. 

We are the tools. Can we FLIP it?