The success of “disconnection” applications, a wall against algorithms

For Hélène, a 23-year-old Frenchwoman who did not want to give her last name, the smartphone and all its applications became a temptation that was difficult to avoid.

“Sometimes, without even realizing what I was doing, I would open Instagram. But it was a bit of an endless trap, because once opened (…) it could last an hour,” he explains to AFP.

“For the good of my studies, it was necessary to try to put an end to all that,” adds this law student, who resorted to applications to limit mobile use.

Connected to other applications on the phone, such as games or social networks, These tools allow users to take digital breaks, or maintain a discipline.

Although they emerged a few years ago, they have recently multiplied in application stores.

“It is happening as a kind of collective awareness,” says Laureline Couturier, co-founder of the Jomo application.

This application, launched in 2022, proposes to restrict the use of other applications and websites, by blocking access at certain times, limiting the time per day or requiring a wait before opening an option.

Self-financed by its two founders, it now claims 300,000 downloads in 149 countries and has become profitable.

In Hong Kong, Jenny Wat, a 25-year-old research assistant, schedules her “disconnects” from other applications with Focus Flight, which simulates an airplane journey by displaying the flight path or the view from the window on the screen, along with aeronautical background noise.

“Really helps create an atmosphere to work“, he says. “I have been teleworking for a short time and I see that there are many distractions at home, so I wanted an application to help me concentrate instead of scrolling,” he explains.

The Opal app, which claims 10 million users, also promises to regain focus.

According to its founder, Kenneth Schlenker, The application makes up for the shortcomings of the usage limitation options already integrated into applications or smartphones.

For large technology companies, “the main objective is to exploit the psychological vulnerabilities of users,” considers Schlenker. “Google and Apple are not interested in people spending less time interacting with their devices,” he says.

Opal seeks to ensure that users can “benefit from everything that technology provides (…) without suffering the negative consequences,” he adds.

But even if you want to limit the use of the platforms, for many, stopping using them completely remains an impossible mission.

“I never wanted to completely eliminate social media,” says Austin, 33.

This orthopedic technician in Paris has been using two applications for several years to track the time he spends online. “It’s really to have a more defined, more controlled relationship with social networks.”he explains.

At Jomo, Laureline Couturier also advocates this “voluntary use”. “The telephone, whether we like it or not, will continue to be present in the coming decades,” he adds.

Hélène, for her part, says she no longer needs apps to limit her screen time, after having deleted Instagram from her cell phone to check her account only on the computer. “From there to say that I have completely stopped… I still have the phone less than a meter away from me 20 hours a day.”