while it's undoubtedly true that not having a cellphone is a romantic way to live, i think that the true middle path is having an internet device as a tool. it's neither a place to visit nor an all-consuming whatever-it-is-now. it's what you make of it. to a hacker, the whole internet is a partner in crime. to a paranoid, the whole internet is a surveillance scheme. this goes deeper than just metaphorical. most botnet websites are algorithm based. they literally reflect the psyche you input, directly back at you, to keep you engaged.
regardless of your approval of this new normal, which, let me be the first to say, i find it deeply unsettling and disgusting, and not just because of some "old world nostalgia"-- try to use the information provided by the web as a tool. rather than trying to remove the technology from your life, try maybe setting a challenge for yourself that would increase your understanding of the technology before you while also limiting your access to slop. instead of "i'm going to quit social media", maybe try "i'm going to try and do as many things possible in my command line, because that way i might learn some very interesting things in the process."
for me a big part of social media detox is that i like to rice my desktop. i like my desktop to be visually pleasing and to feel special as opposed to just another windows 10/11/etc... machine. social media is far too closed in nature for me to run instagram in my terminal. used to be possible for some things. you can still sometimes get ytfzf to work but because invidious is suffering, all software built on invidious is also suffering.
i believe we can heal the internet to suit my ricing and ethics agenda. if you also have an agenda for the modern web that you believe can be possible, first be the change you want to see in the web. then do what you can to change the web.
my apologies if i've rambled totally off-topic to your post, or if this comes across as some kind of preachy call to action, or if i've spoken too much about myself. i don't really understand what exactly your ideal version of the internet is and so i've just tried my best to use mine as an example of what kind of thinking i employed to achieve the best-fit lifestyle that suits me. maybe you can recycle some of these ideas and processes into a lifestyle that suits you. i wish you the best in that, regardless of how helpful or unhelpful my ideas may be along the way.
feel free to stop by the bar whenever you've got stuff like this on your mind, it makes my day a little less boring and i love browsing the midnight pub because.. well. i can browse a little social media in my terminal. it's awesome. thank you for posting, sydwhitty. enjoy.