How listening to uninterrupted noise helped millions to focus

There is a constant tug of war between putting off tasks that need focus and being drawn to distraction.

We should rest. Billions of dollars have been made by machines designed to lure us away from what we wanted to do.

These thoughts have been going on for a long time.

A music livestream that had been broadcasting for more than two years, gathering 660 million views, was suddenly stopped by YouTube last month. There was a false claim that led to the reversal of the takedown. Fans of lofi girl were briefly bereft because of its popularity.

What's the reason? A video animation of a student working at her desk is set to a song called lofi girl. The beats of lofi are soft and have no vocals. The images of the student are important to the channel's purposes. As night falls, a cat wags its tail, and lofi girl keeps writing.

The appeal of the song is that it is reminiscent of a past era that may or may not have actually existed, according to EmmaWinston, an ethnomusicologist at the University of London. She says that the chat window is central to the channel's function, which is rare on sites likeYouTube. You can enjoy the music alone, nobody needs to know you're there, but you can still feel co-present with others in a space

While many types of music thrive on the internet, lofi beats is a genre created because of the internet to answer the cravings of those who aren't seeking silence but peace. Reed Arvin is a record producer based in Nashville. That range is called bright by us. The music of lofi girl is mellow.

Some of the core mechanisms underpinning the business models of Big Tech are not accepted by lofi girl. There are no moments in which new content and ads can be served up because of its continuous plays. The stream is like a still point in the storm of content that requires our attention from all sides.

The more satisfactory answer to the suggestion that we should ignore digital distraction is provided by lofi girl. According to Tyler Lok, a fan from Salt Lake City, the effect of the internet on our minds is that if something else is on, we can't interrupt.

Lok says that our brains lose the ability to be bored when we occupy ourselves with stimulation. It's possible to stay plugged into digital stimulation and still get some work done with streaming.

Dave Lee is a reporter for the Financial Times.

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