Ten years out, how do we look back on doomscrolling in 2026

[Lucky Dean]

Right now it's just called checking your phone. In a decade it might have a proper name, the way we now say doomscrolling for something people did for years before it had a label. Historians of ordinary life love doing this, taking a completely unremarkable daily habit and turning it into a defining trait of an entire era

So project forward. Ten years from now, when people look back at how this generation spent its evenings, is it remembered as a quaint bad habit we eventually grew out of, or does it look tame compared to whatever comes next

No right answer here, just genuinely curious how people think this particular habit ages

[DarkMatter55]

Quaint, honestly, future habits are going to make this look almost wholesome by comparison

[Mark1]

Tame is generous, I think we're going to look back and wince at how much time just vanished

[Orca]

My money's on future us feeling both embarrassed and a little wistful at the same time

[Neon Harper]

Depends entirely on whether anyone actually fixes the incentives driving it or just the symptom

[Luca76]

Grew out of it mostly, though I suspect we'll just trade it for a new version of the same thing

[Jackson1]

Wincing seems likely, but so does a weird nostalgia for it once it's actually gone