For all the good they give us, our personal tech has also become a major time suck. We lose hours of our waking lives to online experiences, especially in the past year, when our worlds became almost as tiny as the screens in our hands. Between work from home and doom-scrolling through social media, are we wasting time, or is this the "new normal" for spending it? And if we are going to be spending this much time online, can we improve online public spaces with better design?

In her new book, Time Smart, behavioral scientist Ashley Whillans argues that if you improve your "time affluence," you'll lead a happier life. She offers some practical tips on how we can use the pandemic disruption to improve our relationship with time. Deb Roy, Executive Director of the MIT Media Lab and the MIT Laboratory for Social Machines, discusses how we can improve existing digital spaces. And Spark Senior Producer Michelle Parise shares her experience with what she calls "Nightly Doomscroll Avoidance."