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Can big tech really get you to put down your phone?

People on their phones.

Summer holidays are full of comforting clichés: barbecues, friends and family, a drink in one hand. But if you're anything like most people, you probably find yourself periodically checking your phone during all the relaxation — maybe too much.

That, too, is now its own sort of cliché. The way in which digital technology shapes or saps attention is a popular topic of conversation. It isn't just users of tech either. Recently, the dominant tech companies — Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Apple, and others — have all started to add features meant to help people curb or control their use of tech. Just this week, Instagram announced a new feature that will tell users when they've seen all posts from the past 48 hours. The implication? Without that little prompt, we might keep checking indefinitely.

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Navneet Alang

Navneet Alang is a technology and culture writer based out of Toronto. His work has appeared in The Atlantic, New Republic, Globe and Mail, and Hazlitt.