Thanks for the insights!
> StayFree (Android)
Side note: Are you blocking StayFree from accessing the network? Their ToS make it rather clear that they will collect & share all possible data they can get their hands on.
I'm not sure if I am or not. If it's not too much of a write-up, how might I be able to check? Is this something that can be changed in phone settings?
Thanks for letting me know. I wasn't aware of this otherwise.
By default all apps on Android have the permission to access the internet (and thus transfer any data they collected about you). The only way to prevent that is 1) using a custom ROM like GrapheneOS which allows you to block internet for chosen apps, or 2) using a firewall like NetGuard and blocking specific apps there.
It's pretty manual (2-3 mins per week), but logging the new dates each week is a nice little "check-in" to stop me from drifting back towards more screen time.
I've never been a heavy user, but I noticed sometimes I drifted towards 1-2 hours per day and have since gotten down to an average of less than 15 minutes per day. I just use the phone for utility purpose now. I got scared straight seeing the UK average daily phone use statistics, including my own, and how much that adds up to over a year.
Digital Wellbeing was quite good but I noticed it counts things which aren't necessarily screen time. I kept having loads of time on the 'Clock' app for some reason, and spam calls I ignore seemed to also be counted even if I saw them on my watch.
As for the phone setup itself:
- no media apps (social, games, video, news)
- a web browser, but I try to just remember anything I'm interested in and look it up later on a PC
- absolute minimum notifications. phone, sms, email and messages (Signal/WhatsApp). I try to use only for emergencies or quick messages and meetups instead of having conversations over messages
- minimal launcher (Nova) with black and white icons
- no blocks, just screen time monitoring using StayFree. I don't want to use blocks as a crutch