How to read online writing again if your brain is cooked

A simple solution.

Shortly after I shared a list of the 8 best online articles I read in 2024, many readers wrote me something to the effect of, Cool stuff, but I can't read long texts on the Internet. Tab fatigue, digital overwhelm, attention drift—all that jazz. The spirit is willing, they said, but the brain is ⋉⟟⌁⟜⊶⟙⋔⤬⌇☖⟴⍑≇↯⟊⌦⤒⟢⟁. Here’s what I told them: Buy a Kindle.

Did you know you can send web articles to a Kindle? No one seems to be aware of this, and yet it is the single greatest digital feature in my life. I think kids should be learning about it in school, if we still have kids and still have schools, which I wouldn't know anything about now that I'm reading all the time. Just yesterday I read about the hippie capitalist who changed British food, a tragic wrongful rape conviction, and that we are, in fact, going to die. Could I have read these without a Kindle? Yes. Would I have? Not in this lifetime.

Partly to blame is the way we encounter new things to read online. Inboxes, chats, feeds, notifications, comments, push alerts, algorithms, and roundups are all terrible jumping off points for longform. After opening a link, I’ll read about seven words before a momentary lapse in mental vigilance sends me reeling back into the ceaseless digital churn. I don’t even try to read online anymore. Instead, I’ll send the link to my Kindle, to a future, calmer headspace.

The people I've tried to convert to the Kindle always say the problem is the screens, that they need to read ink on paper. I know what they mean but they are wrong. As a technology, the Kindle is, at its core, anti-technology, hardly more advanced than a Furby. It looks like it sounds like dial-up. Experientially, reading on a Kindle is maybe 10% different from reading a print magazine. Yes, it's a screen, but unlike a laptop or phone, the Kindle silos you in with the text, separating you from the ⩔⊘⨞⩞⧬⩈⧪⪸⧨⤈⩯. I imagine it to be like reading on Adderall.

You can use Send to Kindle™ through a Chrome extension or from the iPhone's share menu if you have the Kindle app installed. Presently, the extension has a 3.2-star rating in the Chrome store. Do not be alarmed. Send to Kindle™ does not cater to the modern consumer's insatiable appetite for sophisticated digital experiences. It operates with a refreshing single-mindedness, like Bluetooth or Velcro, sending your reading material from a place where it sucks to read to a place where it does not suck to read. Most importantly, it sends it to a time that does not suck to read, namely later. The transfer can lag a minute. Listen to Burial while you wait. File a content violation against a Zionist on Substack.

I’m guessing you’ve already been tempted to click away from this post and scroll elsewhere. This urge is now routine whenever many of us engage with something that doesn't deliver quick, repetitive rewards. I feel it all the time. I'll make it through half a page of The Master and Margarita before I'm driving around Patriarch's Ponds on Street View. Soon enough, I'll be reading reviews of Moscow restaurants I'll never attend. How to stop this? Reading, for one. The irony is that while reading can alleviate our attention span crisis, it’s also the first thing to suffer from it. Restoring our ability to focus involves not only reducing activities that shorten our attention but also increasing those that lengthen it. More deep dives, less dopamine hits.

With this context, I feel duty-bound to raise awareness for the ability to send longform to your Kindle. This feature has singlehandedly revived my habit of reading the transfixing type of work I think more people would love if only they could actually stay fixed on it. There is incredible writing everywhere. In the last month, I've sent articles from 19 different publications to my Kindle. More and more are coming from Substack, but this app and your inbox are horrible places to get absorbed in something. You wouldn't meditate in a mosh pit. Don't read online. Buy a Kindle.