[Sir_Cmpwn]

How about letters via snail mail? It's a lot more personal, since you have to set aside some time to sit down and read/write the letters without the all of the distractions Facebook presents to you, and you're able to filter it to the subjects that are important to you rather than a constant stream of thought from everyone you know.

[bluGill]

That would work for my parents. It means my second cousin and I exchange "Christmas cards" and no more which leaves a lot out.

[Sir_Cmpwn]

You have almost 9,000 hours in a year. Surely you can find time in them to write to your second cousin.

[yawz]

How long does it take to write a 2 page letter? I'm not even talking about preparing the mail, posting, etc. I'm in software development, just like yourself, and I can probably type many times faster than I can write.

I think you're being too romantic about the good old snail mail. ;)

[Sir_Cmpwn]

You can write snail mail with a text editor on a computer and print it off...

[yawz]

(replying at this level, because HN seems to have a depth limit for nested messages)

Drew, I think I understand where you're coming from. But as stated earlier on, I don't even connect to Facebook daily, let alone spending hours on it.

[Sir_Cmpwn]

You didn't answer my question, though. I didn't expect you to write letters daily either. How does the amount of time you spend on Facebook compare to the amount of time you could see yourself spending writing letters?

[yawz]

I prefer not to repeat myself and spend that time for more happy memories ;).

[Sir_Cmpwn]

How many hours per week do you spend on Facebook instead of making "happy memories"?

[Symbiote]

(I downvoted you for excessive repetition. You have posted 17 times in this thread, mostly antagonistically, without saying much new.

That's even less useful than the time I spent on Facebook this evening :-)

[yawz]

This is hardly practical :), let alone slow and expensive with all the pictures printed etc.

[Sir_Cmpwn]

Of course it's practical! How do you think people kept in touch before the internet? How difficult is it to write up a letter, put it in an envelope with a stamp (which you can pick up at the gas station, grocery store, etc) and drop it in your mailbox?

Printing pictures is only a few bucks, and as a side effect the recipient can easily frame it and put it on their hearth!

[yawz]

Seriously?!? Would you write that letter to dozens of people in 3 different languages? Or should I pick "only one" of my aunts and uncles to share my son's first school day pictures? Or maybe we can create a human chain where one sends the letter and pictures that he/she receives to the next one in line. (hmm... maybe there's a business idea there...)

[Sir_Cmpwn]

You're used to pushing information to them with a firehose. Use a bucket instead. Send letters out infrequently, one per household.

[enjdbsgaga]

This assumes the recipients have consistent addresses, and requires significant additional time and labour. Why would he drop Facebook in favour of snail mail, when e-mails (a more convenient version of the same thing) provided an inadequate solution for him in the past?

You can put just as much time and thought into an email as you can a letter. Technology is not the issue here, merely etiquette.

[Sir_Cmpwn]

I wrote about the difference between snail mail and letters here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15031357

[yawz]

Instead of writing letters, I guess I prefer to have hobbies.

[paulcole]

How many handwritten letters do you send?

[Sir_Cmpwn]

I never said handwritten. I send printed letters every month or two.

[yawz]

Why would you print a typed letter and send it by mail instead of e-mailing? Waste of resources, if you ask me, and pretty expensive depending on the country you're sending it to. Good for USPS, though.

A typed letter is not more personal than e-mail, I'm afraid.

[Sir_Cmpwn]

>Why would you print a typed letter and send it by mail instead of e-mailing? Waste of resources, if you ask me, and pretty expensive depending on the country you're sending it to. Good for USPS, though.

I just checked with USPS. It costs _a dollar_ to mail a letter from Philly to Madagascar.

>A typed letter is not more personal than e-mail, I'm afraid.

Comparing it to an email is clever, because it helps your point seem more valid. But this is about Facebook, so I'm going to compare it to that - though many of these points are valid when comparing against email as well.

Facebook is a constant barrage of snippets from constant mini mind dumps of everything each person is thinking, mixed with ads and distracting videos all carefully served by an algorithm that uses machine learning to steal your attention for as long as possible and addict you to the service.

A letter, typed or not, is going to be read in the real world, probably sitting down somewhere comfortable without any ads or distractions. It will be written more thoughtfully because it is an infrequent occurance. It may have been mailed with photos or a small trinket that made you think of them. How would you react if you received a thoughtful letter from your sister instead of of a hundred thoughtless shouts into the void? I certainly hope you would be touched, and I feel bad for your sister if you wouldn't.

All you're doing in this thread is deflect, deflect, deflect. I have no idea what you're trying to accomplish. I am fully convinced that you are a Facebook addict in denial.