067: [MINDFULNESS] Off the grid: breaking your phone addiction & going "light" with Joe Hollier

Hi everyone! Today I'm speaking with Joe Hollier, Co-Founder of Light -> a minimalistic, non-addictive smartphone alternative. 

For those of you who have known me for a while I've been on a long-time mission to become more intention with the information I'm taking in and to cultivate more focus and flow into my day. Partner that with my long-time meditation practice and over the past few years it has become obvious to me that my phone... as convenient as it is... is definitely part of a larger problem.

This year I "upgraded" to a Lightphone and started to set more serious boundaries with my phone. I noticed that on retreats/vacations/weekends when I don't have a traditional smartphone on me I feel more focused, intentional, and peaceful. On days when I am on my phone a lot I feel overwhelmed, more anxious, and "rushing" non-stop. I also found it more difficult to participate in things I loved: reading, learning, and tapping into that state of "deep focus".

Well, it turns out I'm not alone. According to recent research: 

• Checking phones has become so prevalent that more than 40 percent of consumers said they look at the devices within five minutes of waking up, according to a 2016 survey by Deloitte. 
• Fifty percent said they check them in the middle of the night. 
• “The brain starts learning how to switch rapidly from one task to another to another,” says William Klemm, senior professor of neuroscience at Texas A&M University and author of Teach Your Kids How to Learn. “It becomes a habit. But this habit conflicts with focused attentiveness.” 

Y'all, IDK about you but I don't feel good feeling so distracted - I want more peace and a sense of calm groundedness in my day-to-day. Enter Light - and this conversation.

 
 What we talk about: 

• Joe and Kaiwei's journey of creating a "light" phone in the era of "more is more" (more apps, more features, more addiction)
• What it was like building towards a very polarizing vision: the challenge of fundraising in an era where smartphones were all the rage & VC's were looking for "hockey stick" growth
• The power of community: bringing customers along the journey of building a complex, multi-year hardware tech product (How crowdfunding made all the difference)
• The research behind going light + the benefits seen from case studies like schools that went 100% light phone and the benefits seen from customers
• What "actually" makes smartphones addictive?
• Why "screentime" often isn't enough
• Joe's own journey of cultivating an "intentional" life (as an artist and multidisciplinary designer)
• What Joe predicts the future of social might look like AND tech companies he's loving these days

+ so much more!

About Joe:

I'm a multi-disciplinary artist and entrepreneur. I studied design at the School of Visual Arts and graduated as the valedictorian. I started a design studio & skateboard company called Five on That, working as an animator, film maker, and illustrator mostly. I was also selling and exhibiting my painting and collage work. The Smithsonian commissioned a short film called "Diary". Other clients i

Chapters

• 0:02 Intentional Living With Light Phone
• 13:39 Creating the Light Phone
• 28:05 Impact of Smartphone Addiction on Habits
• 42:24 Social Media's Role in Marketing
• 55:37 Future of Social Media Evolution

Transcript

Kasia: 0:02

Hello and welcome to the Other Way, a lifestyle podcast exploring uncommon, unconventional or otherwise alternative approaches to life, business and health. I'm your host, Kasia. I'm the founder of InFlow, a women's wellness brand that designs intentional products to help women reconnect to their unique cyclical rhythm and find a balance between being and doing. This podcast is an extension of my mission within Flow. Here we provide intentional interviews with inspiring humans, trailblazers, researchers, spiritual teachers and more on the journey of doing things the other way. On the journey of doing things the other way. Hi friends, welcome back to the podcast.

Kasia: 0:51

Today we are going light, metaphorically, figuratively and literally. I am speaking with the one and only Joe Hollier, who is one of the founders of Light Phone. If you aren't familiar with Light Phone, this exquisite piece of hardware is what I would call a minimalistic and essential phone. It calls it texts, it provides directions, it has an alarm, but it is designed in a way to be completely not addictive and to really enable you to be intentional in your life and how you spend your days. I think it is absolutely no secret at this point that our phones are addictive and that they are having an impact on our mental health. They take us away from being present in our lives. They truly distract us. They are designed to be distractions the apps on them, the design of the phone itself, most smartphones and the light phone really seeks to combat that. Today's episode is for anyone who is looking to bring more presence and intentionality into their lives, perhaps looking to let go of a feeling of overwhelm or a feeling of always being plugged in and the anxiety and mental turmoil that comes with that. And we're talking email, social media, news, all of that nonstop noise. How can we bring more ease into our life and how can we choose technology that supports us in that? And Joe and Kaiwei's vision behind Light Phone truly embodies that.

Kasia: 2:29

We dive into Joe and Kaiwei's journey of creating a Light Phone, especially in the era of more is more. Light Phone was founded in 2014. So you can imagine this is like the height of the smartphone. How did they raise money? How did they stick to their vision and stick to their core values as a business, as an intentional business that focuses on truly the meaningful essentials. We talked about what it was like building towards a very polarizing vision, the power of community, how bringing their customers along the journey was a game changer for them, and not just from a feedback point of view and design point of view, but also from a fundraising point of view. We're going to talk about some of the research and case studies behind light phones and light phone users, including some details about schools that went 100% light and the benefits that are seen from customers all around the world.

Kasia: 3:23

What actually makes smartphones addictive it isn't what you think why screen time often isn't enough, and if you're struggling with that yourself, know that you're not alone. We're also going to dive into Joe's own journey of cultivating an intentional life as an artist and multidisciplinary designer. He dives into how he structures his life as a founder. I think for a lot of us out there that are working these days or have any sort of responsibilities, we can sometimes feel like we're not doing enough, we're not plugged in enough. There's this feeling of FOMO, and so how can you balance the responsibilities that we have with the other things that fill our cup and how that is important and how can we set the right boundaries? Joe shares some examples of how he does that himself. We talk about what Joe predicts the future of social media might look like and what are some tech companies he is loving these days and so much more. Without further ado, let's welcome Joe Hollier to the podcast. Joe, welcome to the podcast.

Joe Hollier: 4:32

Thanks so much for having me.

Kasia: 4:34

It is such a joy. I have to say that I have been a Light Phone fan for several years. I finally got one for this holiday season. It was gifted to me, which I'm so, so, so excited about, and I have been spreading the saga of going light like crazy. So to have you here is such an honor.

Joe Hollier: 4:58

This sounds so wonderful to us. I'm glad it's working out for you.

Kasia: 5:01

Oh yeah, it is so powerful and I'm really excited because, well, we're going to get into, of course, the story and some of the background, but one of the things that I'll just share anecdotally, in my experience, is that what was previously a very like wait, what are you doing, kind of conversation is now starting to turn into oh, I heard about that, or I have a friend who might be going light, and whether or not they're even using the light phone. I've actually gone to several networking events where I've had people whip out a flip phone, a light phone, and that is so exciting, especially here, like in the Bay Area, where, you know, people are kind of like cutting edge on these things. So to see this movement really growing is so exciting.

Joe Hollier: 5:49

Totally agree. I mean, we started the light phone in 2014, and I think a lot of people were still just getting their first smartphones. Obviously, it had been around for a couple of years, but I think by that point it reached full kind of ubiquitousness across the phone market. And so to see the conversation shift from 2014, where people were still kind of gung-ho and really excited about all these, the potential and social media and all these things that the smartphone promised or offered or you know, alluded to, uh, and to see it kind of come full circle where at first people were definitely like why would you ever get a light phone, why would I ever want to go back? And now even people who can't use the light phone for whatever excuse, valid or not. It's much more of a I wish I could, but conversation and a lot less just like I don't get it.

Kasia: 6:42

So, so, so powerful. Okay, I have a very important question, but before we dive into that one, I want to start by having you share three words that you would use to describe yourself. I know that's random, but that's how we kick off the podcast and I want to give everyone a feel for who you are before we grill you on all things. Light Phone.

Joe Hollier: 7:01

Yeah, I'd like to say curious. I try to remain curious and relatively open-minded as I can about things that maybe don't seem immediately related to my interest as an artist. I've always found reading physics to be really exciting and inspiring, even though there's seemingly no correlation. But this kind of imagination of you know how the universe might work, gets touched and you know that can be inspiring in ways.

Joe Hollier: 7:31

I try my very best to be genuine and authentic in everything I do, whether that's, you know, ordering a sandwich from someone downstairs or, you know, trying to launch this company and how we structure our business model and run the operation as a team.

Joe Hollier: 7:48

And then the third adjective I'm going to try to say optimistic, not necessarily true of every day, but I've been really trying my best to try to not see everything as so dismal as it can seem when you're especially kind of in a scroll hole of you know news and all of these things and FOMO and jealousy. But you know, I think stepping back and realizing that the Light Phone Project has taught me this a lot, that like we all have way more in common than we realize. And I think you know, sometimes if you're just looking at an echo chamber you start to think like, wow, everything is completely crumbling around us and to some degree there's, you know, a lot of very real problems, but trying to remind myself that we are more on the same team than we realize and that sometimes this divisiveness is more illusionary than it has to be. So I'm going to stick with optimist.

Kasia: 8:39

So powerful. I think those are incredible words that, honestly, I would say kind of come through a bit of the brand and the vision behind Light Phone, frankly, and so I just I like to reflect that back, because I know that you've poured a lot of effort, you and your co founder, into, you know, building this project since 2014. 2014. And so it hopefully is nice to hear that, on the other hand, consumers are feeling a bit of your DNA in there too, which I think is just so important. So I want to bring it back to maybe one of the words that you shared.

Kasia: 9:14

You talked about your curiosity and that optimism, and I feel like those two themes are just so important for the venture that you've started, because when you started Light Phone, you mentioned this was like at the height of when people were really getting an iPhone, like a smartphone, and you decided to go light and I was reading a bit about the story behind it, which came out of a Google incubator. This is like left field back in the day. This is like when, in tech, everyone's talking about how can we make things more addictive, how can we hook people longer, like there are trainings on this. Design is focused on this. Can you take us back to where this idea originated, because this is way ahead of its time. This is before the smartphone became a problem. Quote, unquote, right Like it was just on the market.

Joe Hollier: 10:03

Yeah, so I was, you know, previous to 2014, working in New York City as just a freelance artist and designer, and even joining the Google program was a sort of curious stretch. My name got thrown into a bunch of names that you know. This program kind of reached out and, though I had no interest in technology in any sort of tangible way, I didn't see myself wanting to start a startup but I think the curiosity got the best of me of just an opportunity to step away from the art I was doing, dive into the tech world and learn how and why these different companies were being built. And I think initially I probably thought that might inspire my art and that I'd probably leave this program with a new perspective and I could maybe make art about technology with more conviction, having seen, so to speak, some of the inner workings a little bit better, and actually in the program, through learning about how and why these companies were being built. That's really where the Light Phone idea was born, and I met my co-founder, Kaiwei, in this program and I think the two of us just sort of had this natural alignment about just our hesitation on this more is necessarily better kind of attitude that we were seeing, and all of these companies, smartphone apps particularly, were getting mass amounts of funding, this VC kind of hockey stick business model, and it was all just about more, more, more.

Joe Hollier: 11:35

How much attention can you capture of someone's day? How can we get someone to spend one more hour a day on some app? And I think Kai and I just both sort of had a reaction to that. You know, could we actually be any happier if we spend one more hour on some new smartphone app?

Joe Hollier: 11:52

Or like in you know, our own personal lives or the people that we were interviewing, we kind of felt this trend of people were habitually overwhelmed. They were actually like craving escape, but they weren't necessarily pinpointing it to the phone, and I think that was probably like. Our insight was all these people talk about how at dinner, their kids aren't looking at them and everyone's just on the phone and they wish family time was better, or weekends at the beach aren't as relaxing as they used to be because they're actually just on their email even though they're out on the beach in between changing songs or whatever. So we kind of, you know, heard all these insights and we said what would it be like if we took away someone's phone for a couple of hours here or there, or a whole weekend even, and that was our initial hypothesis.

Kasia: 12:37

That is so powerful to recognize a like intuitively, some of the side effects of smartphones like so early on and then really pursue that. And I'm curious, what gave you and Kaiwei the courage to do this right Like this is a time where, as you mentioned, all these other companies are getting tons of funding to invest deeper in this smartphone technology. What did you hold on to and how did you go about launching the Light Phone from a really unconventional place, kind of going against the grain?

Joe Hollier: 13:12

Fortunately, I had this program as a kind of catalyst where we were encouraged each week to pitch ideas for different companies. So when the Light Phone kind of became tangible enough to start pitching as a, you know, very hypothetical at this point product, the reaction that we received from, you know, different investors or thought leaders in the space was incredibly polarizing and incredibly strong, you know, more so than some of the other products in the company. We found that you know the guests would be talking about the Light Phone a lot and they either immediately resonated like oh my God, I totally get this, I want this today, or like, wow, that is maybe the dumbest idea I've ever heard. Who would ever want to go backwards?

Joe Hollier: 13:55

And then through that, these really rich, almost existential conversations would come up and I would almost step back and let these two people kind of go through the like is it responsible to be a dad and take three hours off email to play catch with your kid on the weekend? Or is that irresponsible as a high C-level executive at some big startup? And these are existential questions in a way, and as an artist, that just really struck such a nerve. These are the conversations I wish my art could speak to, and we didn't even have a product. It was really just a piece of plastic and some Photoshop and a couple of taglines. Incredible amount of naivety in terms of thinking that it would be much easier than I've come to realize to make the company, and so I think I got really excited and was naive enough to think that I was capable of pulling it off.

Kasia: 14:55

Naivety does help us sometimes. It's a very powerful tool to get to like having your toolkit early on. So you know this is obviously a very expensive undertaking. I heard you talk on another podcast where you really shared. First of all, this was like product that took years to really develop and build and obviously quite a bit of funding to bring it to life. I'm curious what were the early days like? Did you bring on board a lot of kind of early user testers to really kind of feel like you knew who you were building this for? Like how did you stay motivated, like keeping the eye on the prize, especially in the early days, without quite knowing how long this would take, and, of course, all of the funds that had to go into it?

Joe Hollier: 15:43

Yeah, I mean, getting from zero to one phone was an enormous stretch, that took years, but we started. You know the premise of the program, or the kind of philosophy behind it, was to try to find your MVP, the minimum viable way to test your hypothesis. So Kai and I, you know, pretty early on, started just giving people these flip phones with up to 10 speed dials written down on a piece of paper. Their calls from their smartphone would forward to it, but really it was, you know, they'd only get a call if it's an emergency, they'd get no text messages and they would experience, for you know however, many hours or weekend going light. And that really proved to be quite a valuable experience for those users and through that we actually learned that no one used the flip phone. It was this kind of peace of mind in that all the beautiful things they talked about doing that weekend, or feeling rejuvenated and calm and productive, appreciative, grateful had nothing to do with our product or what might become our product, and that the real value was what we claimed our coin designed to be used as little as possible. And so that kind of became our design philosophy of approaching the form factor. Each feature is just like. The real value of the Light Phone isn't that we invented some new technology, that we are pushing everything forward, but actually we're intentionally branding and stripping back and not reinventing the wheel of testing the hypothesis.

Joe Hollier: 17:25

And then at the end of the program you know we had all these investors that you know said interesting, very interesting idea. But you know I could never commit and you know hardware, unlike even software, has such a high cost of just R&D. To get that first prototype made is, you know, millions of dollars for the tooling and the software and everything that has to go into it. So it's an incredible risk to even get one product to market, to even see if there's a chance where software can be much more iterative. So we resorted to crowdfunding because we couldn't initially find any investor that was willing to really kick off the project. And the crowdfunding raised a really good amount of money, more than Kai and I could have ever imagined. But ultimately we used that as the traction to then get the manufacturing partners excited and investors.

Joe Hollier: 18:13

But those early days it was very hard to get investors because we were so contrary, it seemed so niche of an idea. I know everyone was like it's interesting, we love the idea. We wish the world might move that way. But to actually put your money down and commit to it is a different story. But slowly through the years we were able to find what we call mission-aligned investors and I think a lot of our investors obviously see that there is a business potential behind the Light Phone. It's not a donation, but I think there's a very strong moral interest in the light phone. Whether they come from big tech previously or you know, they made money in a completely different walk of life and are just like. This is a problem we would love to see solved. Good luck, joe and Kai.

Kasia: 19:01

We support you. There's this running joke, I swear. Like you know, I live here. We support you. Like all these founders in tech and like people who end up kind of working in tech during throughout their careers are all secretly just trying to go back to, you know, like living under candlelight no blue light like they're kind of structuring their lives that way. It's actually pretty fascinating. A lot of them are like in terms of having lighting light fixtures in their houses that don't emit blue light at night, so that way they can mimic nature, and they're limiting their kids' access to a lot of this technology. And I think it's so fascinating that you mentioned that some of those mission-aligned investors actually came from the very industry that creates the problem in the first place, and I think there's something really interesting there.

Joe Hollier: 20:04

Definitely. And I mean, I think it's inevitable that that would happen, that people would get so deep into it they're obviously incredibly talented and then to come out of it saying, well, you know, maybe this isn't the best way forward.

Kasia: 20:19

Yeah, yeah, absolutely, and I think it takes somebody, an innovator, really with heart. I think you and Kaya are both that can kind of see that moral and the human aspect behind the technology that we're creating. I think that conversation is being had now, but there are, you know, different kind of almost like pillars in that conversation. Maybe think about the impact that the technology has on our mental health or the impact the technology has on our privacy and the downstream effects that that can have later down the line. And I think it's so incredible to have had you guys really thinking about this really in the earlier days, because we need founders that have that sort of philosophy. There aren't as many of those. Especially when there's like a shiny carrot in the form of fast growth, kind of increased revenue, just like that hockey stick that you see in terms of growth and revenue combined, that can make it really hard to focus on kind of the human aspect behind the tech too and the moral values that can go into the design.

Joe Hollier: 21:24

Totally, and I mean, we saw so many founders that really started their companies with great intention. But I think as you start to take more money and the expectation is to match that unrealistic growth that you projected, different trade-offs and sacrifices start happening and products drift away from maybe their initial goal sometimes, and I think Kai and I have never been motivated from the infinite growth side and it's always been about trying to do something very genuine and we've always felt like it may not be that we're going to overtake the smartphones, but there would always be a big enough market for us that the world could sustain an alternative and that that would prove to be a successful enough business. But yeah, I think we've had our expectations in check in that degree. Our investor decks don't have hockey sticks in them.

Kasia: 22:19

That is such a good call out. So I'm curious, especially when it came to the design, because, as a light phone user, I will share and attest to the fact that, yes, I feel so much better. Every one of my weekends are off of. You know, I still actually I have my iPhone split with my light phone because I do need it in some cases for work purposes. So during the week I will still use my iPhone if I'm like at a conference or something like that, but then on the weekends I go completely light and in the evenings and in the mornings I try to timebox any sort of regular iPhone usage in the cases where I need it to really constrained periods of time.

Kasia: 22:57

But I will attest to the fact that switching to a light phone, even over the weekend, even though I'm doing it regularly as a habit, I can feel these addictive urges to pick up my phone and check it or go see what's on Instagram. But I don't have Instagram on the light phone. And so there is this element of not just doing things differently from a philosophy point of view, but from a product design point of view. There are things there that people may intuitively think that they need until they realize, maybe a day or two later, that, wow, I don't really need this. I feel so much better not having that feature. How did you and Kai, as founders and designers of this product, decide which features to include and which features not to include? Because there's I'm sure that there was a lot of feedback from users kind of going into that as well.

Joe Hollier: 23:49

Yeah, I would say we had some of our own ideas, but we had the luxury actually of using crowdfunding. One of the best parts is that the people most interested in your product are there to join the journey with you and you have this wonderful pool of people that you can survey and get constant feedback on each update. So we definitely tried to not just work in our own bubble. But I think some of the ways we've constrained the Light Phone 2 are on the hardware side. It's an incredibly small phone with this really small e-ink screen that's just never going to be capable of mass consumption of information. It's inherently black and white, it can't play videos, none of our interface shows photos and even if you were to try to read long form text, it's really not a great medium. So I think you know we almost like handicapped the phone from a hardware perspective in that way to be incredibly limited. But then on the software side, we've decided to build everything essentially ourselves and to make it a lot more of an a la carte phone that you can add these tools as we roll them out over time. That makes sense for your phone, but obviously you don't want to have unnecessary tools and apps on your phone. So when you actually get the phone, you have to log into a website and intentionally choose which tools you want to add to your phone. And then, when you're out and about and perhaps bored and finding yourself wanting to tinker anything, the light phone really makes it almost impossible to do any of that because you can't even like add and remove tools. You really don't have much to do at all.

Joe Hollier: 25:27

So you know, we've really tried to build every tool with intentionality I think that's a word we keep finding ourselves coming back to Even something like music or podcasts, which can start to err on the side of entertainment and perhaps get it to be a little bit more of a slippery slope in terms of like, is this a utility or is this a distraction?

Joe Hollier: 25:47

We've tried to build those tools in a way that it is intentionally used and can't be abused in any way. Just to add that as we add tools because the phone actually started shipping just calls and texts our goal isn't to obviously turn this into a smartphone in any way, but really just to minimize unnecessary friction that someone might have switching to Light Phone. I think that feeling you describe of almost like phantom notification pulling out your phone as a nervous crutch, like that's inevitable. You know, we've all felt that. We've heard from so so many users that you know have experienced exactly that and making a lifestyle switch, like going light, is going to have friction. But I think what we don't want is like if texting is so prohibitively slow without spell check, you know, let's add spell check so that you know you're not getting hung up on something that we don't deem a distraction.

Kasia: 26:43

You know I love that you use the word intentionality and obviously I'm excited about like a concept of spell check or kind of ease in that way. But I will share that. I remember when I, you know, when I first switched to the light phone, I was kind of like you know what. I realized that I had spent so much time having these halfway conversations with people over text and I just literally mass, I messaged all of my friends and I was like look, I'm not going to be checking my messages, like if you want to talk to me, you can call me and or like we can chat on WhatsApp like during the week, like cause, I still have that on like the web so I can check it.

Kasia: 27:20

But I just kind of came to realize like how fragmented my relationships have been as well. Like you can't. It was way harder to go deep when I'm having like distracted conversations in between waiting at a gas station and boarding a muni, or at a coffee shop in between ordering, and that was just the way that I was interacting with people. So, yes, I hear you on like the ease of use with things like texts, but I also will attest to the fact that I think that changing the medium by which I communicate and how I communicate has had a positive impact on my relationships as well, which I wasn't expecting. To see that at all.

Joe Hollier: 28:01

Yeah, I can also attest to that in my personal use.

Joe Hollier: 28:05

But we hear all the time that people's texting habits change. When they go to the light phone, it's the ink screen, it's a little bit slower to text. When they go to the light phone, it's the ink screen, it's a little bit slower to text. So you know, one that I hear a lot is like you can't fight with a spouse over text message on the light phone because you're just on a different speed and you know people are like that's my favorite feature, because now it's like we can either talk about this when I get home from work or you can call me if it's urgent and there'll be a lot less chance for misunderstanding between the lines of text and even just something like practical if someone's like, hey, how do I do this? It's so much easier to call them than to try to explain via text. And then you know, obviously once you're on the phone you get to catch up in other ways that it's just I don't know. I love that part and I'm glad to hear that's, you know, happening for you as well.

Kasia: 28:55

Hey ladies, Kasia, here I'm popping in to chat quickly about the power of pause, which, in many ways, is one of the themes of this episode. We gain back when we pause and are intentional with our actions and time, instead of just being mindlessly distracted. As many of you know, I'm the founder of a analog meaning physical planner called Inflow, which is a planner designed for women to help women align their schedules with their hormones and energy. My choice to design a physical instead of digital planner and tool for cycle syncing was very intentional. I spent over a decade leading software teams in developing technology and tools that are rooted in the tech space, but I wanted to offer a product that helped women connect to their bodies as they plan out their days and their schedules Because, frankly, one of the downsides that I found in using a standard calendar and planner app was the sense of disconnection from my body. So if you're feeling into the vibe of mindful, intentional planning that helps you align your schedule with your cycle, inflow may very well be the planner for you. You can check it out at inflowplannercom and use podcast 10 for 10% off of any purchase.

Kasia: 30:22

Okay, now back to the episode. So I'm curious from the perspective of a designer, kind of looking at what you and the Light Phone team have now created. Do you think that smartphones are inherently addictive, you know, is it kind of the apps that we're installing on them? Like what part of the smartphone, like? Is the smartphone itself an addiction, Like? I'm sure you must have reflected on this quite a bit as you think about your design. I'd love to get your thoughts on that.

Joe Hollier: 30:58

Definitely and I mean reflected, as well as read a lot of different studies that have come out. There's a lot of great books in this space, but I would say, naturally it feels like the apps are what the culprit is. But one anecdote that we saw in going into Light Phone 2 is we did some testing where we, you know, checked people's screen time on their smartphone and then had them delete the one or three most problematic apps, the one that they were spending, like you know, hours a day on Instagram or whatever their social media platform of choice was, and then, for like two days, their screen time would be an all-time low, but slowly we saw it creeping up. Of choice was, and then, for like two days, their screen time would be an all-time low, but slowly we saw it creeping up. And you know, when we talked to those users and looked at the data, we saw that like they just found themselves coming home sitting on the couch and they're like what now? And then they pull out their phone and, yeah, they don't have the app, but now they're like, well, let me go on craigslist or etsy or shopping or reddit or check the news.

Joe Hollier: 31:54

You kind of like the devices are so powerful and you know, and unless we really break that habit of using them as a nervous crutch is something we pull out, that I find that even if you were to take all the apps off, you still are going to find yourself pulling out the smartphone and wanting to do something to distract yourself, and I think that's where, like having a completely different form factor, the small e-ink screen really like feels like a completely different experience, and actually Sherry Turkle in one of her books alludes to this study where the presence of a smartphone, even if it doesn't vibrate or ring, just like you touch it in your pocket or see it on a table, can actually distract you because it reminds us of the Instagram message that we didn't reply to or that thing we saw in the morning, and it can actually, like, make us anxious and think about things that aren't actually pinging and vibrating.

Joe Hollier: 32:48

So you know, that sort of led me to think like, actually maybe the phone is the problem and maybe a software solution isn't the right one, or at least not for everyone. I'm sure for some users, maybe screen time limitations or removing certain apps might really prove to give them a much more healthy relationship, but probably not everyone.

Kasia: 33:07

A hundred percent. Wow, that's so powerful. It almost makes me think like the addiction is the addiction of the distraction in a way right, and like the technology is enabling that distraction from whatever is uncomfortable, like boredom can be uncomfortable for people I think for most people and that's really like a lot of studies show that boredom is the kind of the fertile ground for creativity and coming up with new ideas. But I think that's such a powerful perspective to look at it as not just the apps itself or the fact that you know it's colorful and that gives you dopamine hits which it does, and like switching to grayscale might help you there but that it's also just the act of like distracting yourself with something maybe Amazon, craigslist, instagram, all the things right.

Joe Hollier: 33:57

Yeah, and I mean the other side of that is like when you try the light phone, you're going to be confronted with that same experience of sitting on the couch and now what?

Joe Hollier: 34:06

So we do encourage people that are looking to try the light phone but maybe nervous or, you know, maybe not even nervous at all but to think of things that you would want to do ahead of time to fill some of that time, Because I think we all have some bucket list of I wish I was reading more, I wish I was practicing piano, or you know I'm listing mine, but you know there's some list of things we wish we were doing more of and we try to remind people to like go into going light with those in mind, so that when you have that bored moment of like, oh no, what now? Pick up a book that you've been meaning to read, and you know that's a way to slow down, while still, you know reacting to someone else and not a fully blank piece of paper, but you know one voice and a train of thought that's much more paced.

Kasia: 34:53

Oh, I love that and I will also just echo for people that I don't know if everyone has this experience, but switching to slower activities in a way that aren't at the pace of technology might be uncomfortable at first and so, like that kind of takes about, I noticed 24 hours to get over right, which is like when I go on retreat.

Kasia: 35:15

This is even before the light phone. I go on a lot of meditation retreats. I would leave all tech at home and I struggled reading at first and I think that was like the biggest signal for me that wow, something's not working here, because I used to love to read and suddenly, like our brains end up being reprogrammed to operate at a different pace. So I think that I love the idea of like having the list of the things that you should do and then call out that. You know it might actually feel a little bit weird to be going at this different pace because you're used to just like going at the pace of every minute. You have free scrolling through your phone and going at that pace, right.

Joe Hollier: 35:50

Totally Well said. Yeah, I think that's what I was getting at with the book. It's like it's such a slower pace, um, and you know, I see people all the time reading in a cafe and then checking their phone every other page, you know. No, no shade. But like it's just, we are so addicted to that little dopamine hit that, yeah, even reading something that I also love, I find myself being like where'd your intention span go?

Kasia: 36:16

100%. I'm curious, on a personal level, do you feel like you know how, do you consciously and maybe you could even tell me this isn't something you do but do you intentionally set up your life in a way that can be conducive to these quote like slower, more intentional mindful practices and habits? Because it does have to be in a way like a conscious choice. I think not having a smartphone is already helpful because it reprograms your mind to maybe think more intentionally and be able to do things like read. But just the pace of life and the pace at which building a business goes or fundraising goes, like all these things are just so immediate and fast, like the news can be over, like all these things can overwhelm us and you know, kind of drive up our systems in to this faster pace. And do you structure your life intentionally differently to kind of stay in alignment with these different ways of being?

Joe Hollier: 37:14

Yeah, I mean, my life is definitely structured differently. I wouldn't say that I feel like the light phone drastically changed that. If anything, it like brought me back to you know.

Kasia: 37:26

Lucky your default.

Joe Hollier: 37:30

As an artist, I've always kind of gravitated towards more analog things. I've never really owned a television or been into things like that, so it's not like I have any of these vices that I'm going to, but I did find that, like the smartphone and Instagram in particular, I guess, to your point, like I do run this company now that I didn't run previous to the Light Phone and it is a significant amount of work and I think for me actually, like, the Light Phone helps make that manageable because we, you know, obviously practice what we preach and I have this wonderful laptop that I'm using to chat with you today and you know it's super powerful. I can open it and I love even that physical act of like I am now opening the email and the internet and then at certain points, whether it's because I need to, like, focus on writing something for Light Phone, or you know it's the end of the day and I'm calling it quits for the evening to actually close that, and you know, know that work is now, you know, done and I think the structuring part is really about communicating with, you know, your colleagues on a work level, but also people in your own personal life that you know I'm making this switch. It may take me longer to answer your iMessages, as you alluded to or whatever it is, and I think people are afraid to talk about it. They have this like expectation that like, oh my God, they're going to think I'm dead if I don't reply in five minutes. But if you talk to people and let them know, they're much more receptive.

Joe Hollier: 39:03

I've found to that and in fact, usually intrigued like whoa, that's cool, you don't have a smartphone. You know, yeah, can you email that to me or whatever it is. Or, you know, even within the light phone team, you know we really respect people's time off and we have a hierarchy of urgency. If it's an emergency, you know Eileen or Kylie or one of the other team members, they're going to call me. But if it's something I can maybe see tomorrow and you send me an email at 7 PM, I might not see it till the morning, but they know that. You know, relatively nine to five, you can expect me to be checking periodically the email throughout the day. Obviously sometimes doesn't end at five, but uh, you know we kind of have a cadence of like. You know, if you send someone this kind of message, it's because of this urgency and, uh, I think setting those boundaries helps a lot.

Joe Hollier: 39:51

Uh, other things you, you know I have a secondary computer. That's a little bit, you know, maybe luxurious to have, but it's my personal computer where there's no light phone, email, no calendar, and it's just my art, my music and, you know, personal things. So on the weekend, if I'm, you know, not expected to check in with light phone, I can really remain light but still like go on the computer and do things. But you know I have the Light Phone separated from you know, joe's own stuff. And I know people you know find all sorts of other balancers, not really like a one size fits all. I tend to have a lot of film cameras, but that's what I had even when I had a smartphone, and even when I had a smartphone I always carried a notebook. So those things didn't really have to change. But for someone switching to Light Phone, those are definitely things that they find themselves figuring out what works for them.

Kasia: 40:42

I love all of these suggestions and kind of getting some insight into how it is that you're structuring your days, your life, in order to not just obviously become and continue to be an amazing leader of this company and founder and designer, but also, to it sounds like, cultivate and foster the other things that make you you.

Kasia: 41:04

And I feel like if we don't, as individuals, take back and like set those boundaries for ourselves, no one else is going to do it for us, right, like we live in a society where there is this notion that more is more right, as you said at the very beginning, and we're starting to learn that it doesn't quite look that way.

Kasia: 41:22

There was a study that was published the other day that, like teenagers are getting, on average, like under seven hours of sleep because they're staying up on their phones all night, and the phones are one of the main major problems in this whole dynamic. But it can extend to all other aspects of your life. If you're going to be on Slack all day, you're not going to have time to do focus work. If you don't set boundaries over the weekend, you're not going to have time to do the other creative things that you love, knowing that obviously it doesn't always work that way and that you will have emergencies and need to take care of things, but I think deciding what's important to you and like kind of structuring your life and being intentional with that is just so important for, like, maintaining mental health and sanity as a individual and like part of society. Well said, the individual and like part of society.

Joe Hollier: 42:12

Well said.

Kasia: 42:13

Yeah, I love that, so okay that you know. That really does bring me to another question that I have from a founder point of view. The Light Phone is on social media. Obviously, that's how I found you guys. You guys have a pretty funny account, which I do love. It's pretty cheeky. I'm curious what went into the decision to continue to be on social media, especially knowing that, out of all the distractors out there, social media is probably one of the biggest. Now, is it just out of necessity? It's a great way to reach people organically. Tell me about that decision, and are there things that you as a company, or you all as a company, are doing differently in terms of your interactions on social media?

Joe Hollier: 42:56

Yeah, I mean, I guess to some degree we feel like it's probably a necessary evil for us for that exact reason that it's a great marketing tool. We don't, as a company, really spend any money on paid advertising, so we rely very much on organic people sharing about the phone. You know, one great thing about the light phone is that people see someone with it in public and it can spark this whole great conversation. Iphone is that people see someone with it in public and it can spark this whole great conversation. But in terms of social media, we see it mostly as a means of reaching people that maybe haven't heard of us or have heard of us, and continuing to touch them in a very respectful way, with more reasons or more touch points as to, maybe, why they want to get off the phone. And it's not really for us. How we communicate with our existing users, that's usually through email updates and whatnot. So you know, it's kind of a different channel, targeting a different user, like maybe someone that's heard of us or never heard of us, and, you know, just kind of bringing awareness to some of these things that maybe are obvious to us, having been so deep in this space for so long, but to other people. They're like oh wow, you know, I never thought about it like that. They really are using us as the product that they're selling to advertisers and you know some of those things.

Joe Hollier: 44:10

And I think we do try to keep it lighthearted. We're not trying to be like you're an addict, doomsday, everything's going to rot, you know, everything is ruined. We're just like isn't it funny that we all bring our phones to the bathroom with us? Isn't it funny that we all do this and so trying to make light of what is, you know, a kind of dark reality that you know, social media has this really omnipresent thing on us and it has become, you know, not really our friend and not really aligned with our quality of life. But to try to talk about that in a way that isn't just like so depressing but maybe inspire someone to be like yeah, you know, maybe I will try a light phone.

Joe Hollier: 44:48

And in terms of our users, we tend to have people hear about the light phone for many months, if not years, before actually trying the phone. I think, you know, people kind of get intrigued. But it's such a lifestyle switch Carriers are so confusing to people. They're like oh, I don't know, I don't want to go back to the Verizon store. I figured that out two years ago and I just don't even want to ask any questions. So you know it's a little intimidating to switch to a phone. So I think you know it's not a spontaneous purchase and if you were to spontaneously purchase the phone it might not meet your expectations or you might not be ready mentally for the friction that might come with overcoming some of that quote unquote addiction of smartphones.

Joe Hollier: 45:31

So we use the social media as a way to keep in touch with those users. But the way we see it is, we just never want to overpost. We never want to over post, we never want to like over market. We want to treat the people that are following us like we would want to be treated by a company. And that comes from, you know, our customer support, interactions with people, our newsletters. You know we're not just sending a newsletter each week to be like buy our phone, buy our phone. We only try to send them when there's actually relevant new information that we think might be important. And even then we probably send to like segments. If it's just a LightOS update, maybe not every single person on our newsletter needs to see that, but the users affected might really care, or something like that.

Kasia: 46:12

I love that. Did you come up with creative, maybe against the grain ways to spread the message about Light Phone, or has it just truly been like word of mouth, you know, the kind of GoFundMe not GoFundMe, but the Kickstarter type campaign probably kicked some of it off. I'm curious if you did anything creative there in terms of connecting with your users in a unique way.

Joe Hollier: 46:35

Yeah, I mean money has always been our tightest resources of really small companies, so we can't distribute in any large nationwide scale. But we have at times tried to be clever with a couple of campaigns that we hoped would be able to grow with some of their own organic viralness to it, so to speak, and one of those I really loved was we had a campaign about do not buy the light phone. From the eyes of this organization, we created the Alliance of Big Tech and so using these kind of sarcastic things like the light phone claims to promote happiness, but the light phone can't even tell you how to buy it. Or you know, the light phone says it cares about your mental health, but it doesn't even listen to your conversations. So you know the light phone says it cares about your mental health but it doesn't even listen to your conversations. So you know, kind of like poking fun at big tech in a reversal way, and you know we paste and stickers of that all around Brooklyn and we got such a strong reaction for, realistically, how kind of small of a campaign it was and then even sharing that online. It just you know people thought it was clever and reposted online it. Just you know people thought it was clever and repost it.

Joe Hollier: 47:42

And we've done similar things like that, where we use our very limited resources and try to be as clever as we can. And I think in marketing, one thing we try to remember is that, like we're not trying to immediately convert someone to a sale, we're trying to bring them into the conversation and, you know, maybe the result is that they delete Instagram from their phone and turn it black and white and that's enough, and that's wonderful. It's like there's a layer of education, I guess or awareness is probably a better word that we try to inspire with our marketing and then over time let them know, like this is maybe why you might like the light phone or, you know, maybe some other options as well, and so that's kind of been our attitude with it.

Kasia: 48:20

I love that.

Kasia: 48:21

It's such a good reminder that you know kind of forging that initial connection and not just going straight for the end, in mind of you know kind of just getting people to purchase right away is so important because it is really building a relationship with your customers, which I think you guys have done so well.

Kasia: 48:38

And I love your content. You're on my favorites. You don't post that often, but when you do I see it, which I love because the content is just really funny and it's good. So, as we start to come to a close on this conversation, I'm curious what are some of the problems out there that you are personally perhaps really excited about seeing some solutions to as we think about technology and really where things are going, especially with all the changes that are happening with AI and some of the you know really, I guess, dire mental health challenges that we're running up against with, you know still, phone addiction and technology addiction as a whole. I'm just curious A like what problems are you really excited about and also, what do you predict is going to happen as we look at kind of our tech addicted, phone addicted society?

Joe Hollier: 49:38

Yeah, I mean, I think what keeps us motivated or inspired is that it does seem like there's a growing shift. You know, it's almost like each week or month a new book, movie or article comes out that's talking about it from a different angle, from a parent's perspective, from a privacy perspective, from a economic perspective, from an environmental perspective. You know what happens when a billion people get a new smartphone every single year, forever because of planned obsolescence in the name of corporate profit, and these are obviously very daunting things to realize. And we try our best to make a phone that we don't make obsolete on purpose in any way, and that's something we're really proud of. Going forward With any other products, we're thinking about repairability and just trying to make phones last as long as they can.

Joe Hollier: 50:28

And you know, I think at first those kinds of things like privacy or the environment kind of are like a back burner reason to buy something. You know consumers tend to buy with themselves in mind first, and then those are kind of like nice to haves and I think we might be able to address that in the future. And obviously we don't have, you know, all the answers, we don't have all the resources to completely change the landscape. But I think we can keep that conversation growing and that's always inspiring when someone you know is really interested in the privacy or really interested in these things. That kind of can be on the back burner of people's priorities.

Joe Hollier: 51:22

So that's been exciting to see Some of the EU mandating charger cables and things like that. I'm not sure that's the holy grail of solutions, but I think some degree of that might really help keep things tame. Some of these antitrust things we've been seeing coming out, but I think mostly it's like individual groups of people coming together. There's a school that went exclusively Light Phone in Massachusetts. That was a really great experiment Buxton School about 60 and a half students and all the teachers smartphone-free campus, and that was really cool to see. And we're seeing in other ways not related to Light Phone teachers, schools or different clubs, you know, kind of banning smartphones or finding collective ways to detach, whether it's with the Light Phone or not, and so I think we are seeing this movement grow.

Kasia: 52:20

Was it a private school or a public school? I'm curious like, how did that it?

Joe Hollier: 52:23

was a private school, yeah, so I think that definitely makes it possible. There's financial resources available to do it as well. As you know, the scale made it possible and it was a boarding school too. So you know, all of these kids were there, and I think the power in it is that it wasn't 10 kids without smartphones and 60 kids with smartphones, but that everyone was forced to be at the dining hall without their phones and talk to each other, and I think that was actually. You know, obviously there's productivity in classroom and focus in like school. That's a great metric. But the things we kept hearing about were like the meeting hall, the game room. You know, people were alive and talking. It wasn't just six kids on their smartphones sitting on the couch together separately, you know.

Kasia: 53:11

Oh my gosh, and just I mean we don't really dive into this enough, but even you were talking about how they were able to eat without their phones and their hands. Like, if you think about it, like there's so much research that backs up, if you are eating when you're stressed, the effect that has on your digestion, and like emotional eating, and like there are all these like ripple effects that we don't even really think about. But just like using food as like just one another example of like if you're eating while watching the news on your phone and you're getting stressed out, like what effect does that have on your digestion and the amount that you're eating and your food choices? Like it's all connected. So yeah, I love that. I love that case study. That's such a good example.

Joe Hollier: 53:53

So that's always been really exciting and I think to some degree we're still excited by the possibilities of the Internet.

Joe Hollier: 54:00

To some degree we're still excited by the possibilities of the internet.

Joe Hollier: 54:02

Obviously, it's kind of in a weird place right now where there's a couple of conglomerates that have really taken over the quality of news and journalism has had to compete with social media and get a little bit more click-baiting in its nature.

Joe Hollier: 54:13

But I think there's still fundamentally this power to bring people together and niche forums to, you know, explore their obscure curiosities together camera nerds and other forums I've been on where I've learned so much uh over the years by these people, and I think even to the point of crowdfunding, like the light phone wouldn't exist if something like that weren't possible. You know, kai and I weren't able to get our funding the traditional way. We had to use this platform to reach thousands of people that we would have never been able to without that platform and then to prove that, hey, people actually want this thing. And now here, 10, almost years later, we're a company with a real product and I think that's kind of a beautiful thing that new things can come. That wouldn't have been possible if it was just up to the big players, nokia or Apple, or otherwise there wouldn't be a light phone.

Kasia: 55:08

Yes, and thank gosh that you guys stayed like stuck to your guns on this one too, because it definitely wasn't an easy journey and I'm glad that you mentioned you know I mean, yeah, it took 10 years which is wild to think journey, and I'm glad that you mentioned you know, I mean, yeah, it took 10 years, which is wild to think.

Kasia: 55:23

And then now you can hear about the uh, the groups of Gen Zers that are like choosing to go light or yeah, I mean that's amazing, Like it took 10 years to get there, and I hopefully that's also like inspiring for people who are out there trying to do something different. One last question, if I may what are your thoughts on how social media may evolve? Like there's this obvious desire to connect and I think you just even started speaking to it. Where do you think this is going to go, Especially as we see, like Gen Zers, maybe some of them are choosing to go light, like bringing more awareness, to the detrimental effect that the way that we are connecting with people, the detrimental effect that that has on our mental health. What do you see happening there?

Joe Hollier: 56:05

Yeah, I mean I'm not sure if this is actually going to pan out, but I think what might really help would be a shift in the business model that currently supports social media, because I think, as it stands, if social media, you know, in the name of growth that all companies must adhere to, has to be ever more aggressive with their you know fight for our time and attention, then it will never align with our quality of life. And so, as long as we expect these things to be free, I think that's the trade-off that we're going to have. And you know, in very small ways, there's one company I quite like called Arena A-R-E dot N-A. It's kind of like a they're going to hate that. I call it this like a much better Pinterest for a very specific kind of like artist design world focus, like for creating mood boards and sharing things that you find across the internet. But you know they've never taken funding. It's a pretty niche community, but people get a real value and joy out of it and most, I mean there is a free option, but most of us pay for it and we pay to support the small team. They have a lot of financial transparency and we get a lot of value through the features that they keep building, and they don't have to build features for advertisers to give them data or have ways to sell us ads.

Joe Hollier: 57:24

We are the customer and I would love to see that shift. I mean, I don't know how that would ever scale to something like Instagram or Snapchat or TikTok, but maybe social media doesn't need to be that big. Maybe there is know, it's there is more photography focused or travel focused or, you know, niche focused things, and it's not a one app that does absolutely everything for everyone, from my mom to my little brother, which is currently what, you know, every app and phone tries to do. But getting people to pay for things and changing that, I mean I'm not as optimistic that will happen, but I I'm pretty confident that changing the business model would be a really great first step in, you know, changing how it serves us and probably pointing us to IRL more often than not. I mean, there are social media platforms that are intended not to keep you on them but to meet people and go meet them in real life, and I mean I personally would just love to see more of that happening too.

Kasia: 58:25

I love it. I love it. Well, I hope your predictions are right. I also would love a list of your favorite kind of other products out there. I have heard of Arena, kind of in passing, but I bet you have some others on your list that we can maybe hyperlink for people below, because I think you have good taste. Dare I say, this was so amazing, joe. Thank you so much for hopping on and chatting with me today and, yeah, I'm so excited to continue to spread the word of Light Phone and thank you for your time.

Joe Hollier: 58:53

My absolute pleasure. Thank you so much.

Kasia: 58:56

Thanks everyone for listening. Thank you so much for tuning into the Other Way. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a five-star review. It really helps the podcast grow and I'm ever so grateful. If you want to stay connected, you can find information on how in our show notes. And finally, if you're curious about inflow and want free resources around cyclical living or moon cycles, check out inflowplanner. com. And, of course, for all my listeners, you can use the code podcast10, and that's all lowercase podcast10, for 10% off any purchase. All right, that's all for today. See you next time.