> OK, fine, now we need to define social media. Here's my definition of the elements of "toxic social media": 1) the automated surfacing of messages from rand

> OK, fine, now we need to define social media. Here's my definition of the elements of "toxic social media": 1) the automated surfacing of messages from random people because they are "popular" (i.e. highly engaged) mixed in with personal messages. This is the amplifying effect that makes things hot. 2) the immediacy - a message can be spread insanely rapidly, faster than any individual humans can understand or respond to it. This is the fuel. It's the fact that it happens at an inhuman scale that I think is the biggest part. Email at a human-to-human level is like letter writing. Information can travel through it, but it can't amplify by bypassing the human connections in the way that Twitter trending topics can. Likewise 1:1 or limited-sized groups on Whatsapp. I'd even put Facebook groups into that bucket, so long as they're full of humans who know each other. It's once you get to groups with millions of people who don't know each other directly that things get out of hand.