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> most importantly in the net of today, puts them in the targets of hyper-optimized manipulation and advertisement campaigns, and websites and services designed
by 0xcde4c3db 9y ago
> most importantly in the net of today, puts them in the targets of hyper-optimized manipulation and advertisement campaigns, and websites and services designed to manipulate your psyche no matter the side effects (e.g. depression from using social media), in order to get you to buy more stuff
I think this is the bulk of the problem. There's nothing in the technology to say that that a website or game must bend over backwards with "engagement" bullshit and microtransaction teases instead of just being a good reading/playing experience. It's a socioeconomic and cultural problem, and blaming the technology isn't going to solve any of it.
- jsonne 9y agoThe problem is that internet advertising as a model for 99% of companies (Facebook, Google, and a handful of others making it work being the exceptions) is fundamentally broken. When you're a media company you fundamentally trade on people's attention and advertisers pay you to get a piece. You can do that with great content, or with dark patterns and manipulation. Usually its some combination of both. Regardless the vast majority of the web needs a new business model, but I'm not sure what the answer is.
- andrepd 9y agoIt's capitalist incentives. If the name of the game is maximizing profits, and this is the way to do it, then everything else be damned. The current state of the internet is a direct consequence of the current system of economic incentives.