We 'want to encourage other people in our generation to be the types of people who do not even want to have an AI friend': Appstinence founder on the fight to help people step back from tech and reconnect with real life

Gabriela Nguyen is both like many in her generation and also unlike any Gen Z I've met before. She grew up in Silicon Valley and had access to social media via her trusty iPod Touch when she was just 10. What followed was years of social media and technology use across a range of devices, including iPhones, and like many of her cohort, she met her first boyfriend on Tinder.

Now, at 24, she's off all social media and major platforms, no longer uses a smartphone, and is the founder of Appstinence, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping people quit addictive technology.

Nguyen, whom I spoke to over Zoom (withhold the irony, please), described how these technologies became "the point of contact for the many domains of my life where it was finding out the news, things I enjoyed, things I disliked, romance, talking ...