8 ms·

This seems interesting - clearly the friction in sharing everything with everyone is far lower online than before. Before, you had to consume finite resources (

by g_p 6y ago

This seems interesting - clearly the friction in sharing everything with everyone is far lower online than before. Before, you had to consume finite resources (time, energy, postage stamps, etc.) to tell someone else about something. This gave a natural rate limit. As a thought experiment, what if the degrees of separation were less rigidly enforced, but people's "power of voice" decays the further it goes from those who directly follow them, resulting in a similar result? Then for every user, there's a probability they'll see or not see a given post (significantly reducing as the degree of separation increases). Clearly this isn't ideal and there's compounding factors (if you have 3 friends share it, should that probability be additive?) Share rate limits in WhatsApp led to people imploring others to copy paste fake news to share it to others, so clearly this isn't as simple as limiting normal shares.

throwaway201103 6y ago
Any governmental rules restricting who can talk to whom or to how many others will run into first amendment issues, at least in the USA.
- g_p 6y ago
  Not disagreeing, but I do wonder how the first amendment sits with regards to no guaranteed audience - you can likely be free to say something, while still having others free not to amplify it indefinitely. To an extent I think the big digital platforms already do this, just in a non transparent way, to try to curate the most engaging and click-worthy content, rather than the most thought provoking.
nathanyz 6y ago
Friction is exactly what I believe the end answer is for social media, fake news, viral video, etc. Prior to the Internet, all communication included substantially larger amounts of friction. Broadcasting your opinion required acquiring TV, Radio, or Newspaper time/space. Sure there were low cost alternatives like standing in the public square and shouting your beliefs, but that is a far cry from tweeting out something hateful from the comfort of your couch while you eat pizza and watch unlimited streaming video content. The friction was both a drag on productivity AND a safety mechanism to prevent mass spread of inaccurate or low quality content. I feel like the Internet removed all of that friction which is great in many cases, but particularly bad for accuracy of information. It's like the gossip that used to spread through towns by word of mouth, can now become truth within days just by going viral. And once enough people hear the same thing, isn't it now true? Perception is reality. Just look to the divisions in the world. Each side when talking amongst themselves has one truth while the opposing side has a completely different one. Doesn't matter which truth is accurate when both sides are unified in their belief that it is their side's story that is correct. Friction is necessary, to at least slow the contagion of inaccurate information. Right now the incentives are misaligned. Viral content that makes the consumer feel good provides the most economic return for companies like Google and Facebook. While the system is setup to reward this, how could you expect a profit seeking business to do anything else but optimize for it?
- chopin 6y ago
  > The friction was both a drag on productivity AND a safety mechanism to prevent mass spread of inaccurate or low quality content. I don't think this is correct. I remember a bunch of outlets from the seventies and eighties which had all of: far reach, inaccurate and low quality content. It was just restricted to few influential people with enough money. I think this is the reason why social media are fought that hard: these people lose their influence (not that I am fond of social media). The past was not that rose as we like to paint it.
  - nathanyz 6y ago
    I agree that it wasn't perfect, no doubt about that. It definitely restricted the ability to mass communicate into fewer hands. In general, the reduction in communication friction is THE big advance brought about by the Internet. Instant, effortless, and basically free communication for everyone everywhere. Businesses like Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are economically incentivized to push as hard as possible to get you to consume and create more so that they can show more ads. That means that when a video catches the attention of 50 people long enough to show an ad, then they can quickly encourage the spread of that video very rapidly to maximize that attention grabbing clip. Nowhere in that equation is there an evaluation of the benefit/harm of that content to the end user. The evaluation is solely on whether it grabs attention. Because the product now being sold is human attention and its being bought by advertisers. The humans being influenced have no say and don't actually reap any gains from the transaction. Car wrecks are attention grabbing and slow down traffic even the other side of the highway as people gawk. But of course they are not great for anyone....UNLESS you somehow have a business model that makes more money when there are more car wrecks. What happens then?
    - chopin 6y ago
      Good points but all of this holds true for traditional media either. Just recently the Spiegel (a somewhat reputable weekly journal in Germany) had a series of completely or partial made up stories. The maker was able to place them because they fit so well into Spiegel's narrative. Such that (almost) nobody asked questions. We are lied to from all sides.

by g_p 6y ago

throwaway201103 6y ago

Any governmental rules restricting who can talk to whom or to how many others will run into first amendment issues, at least in the USA.

g_p 6y ago
Not disagreeing, but I do wonder how the first amendment sits with regards to no guaranteed audience - you can likely be free to say something, while still having others free not to amplify it indefinitely. To an extent I think the big digital platforms already do this, just in a non transparent way, to try to curate the most engaging and click-worthy content, rather than the most thought provoking.

nathanyz 6y ago

Friction is exactly what I believe the end answer is for social media, fake news, viral video, etc. Prior to the Internet, all communication included substantially larger amounts of friction. Broadcasting your opinion required acquiring TV, Radio, or Newspaper time/space. Sure there were low cost alternatives like standing in the public square and shouting your beliefs, but that is a far cry from tweeting out something hateful from the comfort of your couch while you eat pizza and watch unlimited streaming video content. The friction was both a drag on productivity AND a safety mechanism to prevent mass spread of inaccurate or low quality content. I feel like the Internet removed all of that friction which is great in many cases, but particularly bad for accuracy of information. It's like the gossip that used to spread through towns by word of mouth, can now become truth within days just by going viral. And once enough people hear the same thing, isn't it now true? Perception is reality. Just look to the divisions in the world. Each side when talking amongst themselves has one truth while the opposing side has a completely different one. Doesn't matter which truth is accurate when both sides are unified in their belief that it is their side's story that is correct. Friction is necessary, to at least slow the contagion of inaccurate information. Right now the incentives are misaligned. Viral content that makes the consumer feel good provides the most economic return for companies like Google and Facebook. While the system is setup to reward this, how could you expect a profit seeking business to do anything else but optimize for it?

chopin 6y ago
> The friction was both a drag on productivity AND a safety mechanism to prevent mass spread of inaccurate or low quality content. I don't think this is correct. I remember a bunch of outlets from the seventies and eighties which had all of: far reach, inaccurate and low quality content. It was just restricted to few influential people with enough money. I think this is the reason why social media are fought that hard: these people lose their influence (not that I am fond of social media). The past was not that rose as we like to paint it.
- nathanyz 6y ago
  I agree that it wasn't perfect, no doubt about that. It definitely restricted the ability to mass communicate into fewer hands. In general, the reduction in communication friction is THE big advance brought about by the Internet. Instant, effortless, and basically free communication for everyone everywhere. Businesses like Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are economically incentivized to push as hard as possible to get you to consume and create more so that they can show more ads. That means that when a video catches the attention of 50 people long enough to show an ad, then they can quickly encourage the spread of that video very rapidly to maximize that attention grabbing clip. Nowhere in that equation is there an evaluation of the benefit/harm of that content to the end user. The evaluation is solely on whether it grabs attention. Because the product now being sold is human attention and its being bought by advertisers. The humans being influenced have no say and don't actually reap any gains from the transaction. Car wrecks are attention grabbing and slow down traffic even the other side of the highway as people gawk. But of course they are not great for anyone....UNLESS you somehow have a business model that makes more money when there are more car wrecks. What happens then?
  - chopin 6y ago
    Good points but all of this holds true for traditional media either. Just recently the Spiegel (a somewhat reputable weekly journal in Germany) had a series of completely or partial made up stories. The maker was able to place them because they fit so well into Spiegel's narrative. Such that (almost) nobody asked questions. We are lied to from all sides.