4 ms·

Is it avoidable though? Social media might be accelerating the development of echo chambers, but the underlying reason why it works is because people seem to en

Is it avoidable though? Social media might be accelerating the development of echo chambers, but the underlying reason why it works is because people seem to enjoy tribalism. I'm not sure that connecting people globally could end up in any other way. Most people are not capable of being part of a large community of like minded people and still keep objectiveness and perspective. This is something I've been thinking about a lot, and it seems rather hopeless. I'd love to have my mind changed.

intended 6y ago
I wont change your mind, but maybe we can share more nuanced reasons for the modern issue - I'll argue, strongly everything regarding Social Media/ misinformation / content security is an epiphenomena of : the shape, rate and self forming nature of modern human communication networks. The pace of interaction and information has simply overwhelmed the ability of human one on one interaction. Most of our actions are with a mobile phone near us, meaning that the social sphere is directly with us and only a twitter/FB/Reddit/HN glance away. Doesn't help that the sites need to be competitively addictive to be financially viable. So no matter how much you interact on a 1 on 1 basis, a few seconds after they return to their phone they are part of the new outrage cycle. Do note that the whole thing above is doable with cable television news as well. So you can, for a little bit, look at the network structure and pace, while looking at humans as connected processing hubs that are getting compromised. ------ Heres an actual paper showing that Misinformation based communication travels differently than "Fact" based information https://www.pnas.org/content/113/3/554.full https://www.pnas.org/content/113/3/554.full.
- mekkkkkk 6y ago
  I completely agree with everything you've said. My main point is that I suspect this is a natural development even with all economic incentives and Algorithms set aside. Facebook et. al. are capitalizing on social psychology that would be there even if they weren't. You can see the same sort of echo chambers taking shape in other fora such as 4chan, Reddit and Mastodon. These do not incorporate the Algorithms that are often solely blamed for the outrage cycle. If people both A) Enjoy to be part of communities of like minded people B) Cannot stay objective and keep perspective once immersed in one then the current situation (and worse) seem to be inevitable. Regardless of actions taken against (or complete elimination of) the big commercial players.
  - intended 6y ago
    I agree! You can even go back to the cable news era and see the same issues. It seems quaint but the Fox News effect and the Fox News bubbles were things that were already driving those forces. The evidence suggests to me that our ideals on free speech do not take into account human wetware bandwidth when it’s being influenced by modern telecommunications and Internet enabled conversations.

intended 6y ago

I wont change your mind, but maybe we can share more nuanced reasons for the modern issue - I'll argue, strongly everything regarding Social Media/ misinformation / content security is an epiphenomena of : the shape, rate and self forming nature of modern human communication networks. The pace of interaction and information has simply overwhelmed the ability of human one on one interaction. Most of our actions are with a mobile phone near us, meaning that the social sphere is directly with us and only a twitter/FB/Reddit/HN glance away. Doesn't help that the sites need to be competitively addictive to be financially viable. So no matter how much you interact on a 1 on 1 basis, a few seconds after they return to their phone they are part of the new outrage cycle. Do note that the whole thing above is doable with cable television news as well. So you can, for a little bit, look at the network structure and pace, while looking at humans as connected processing hubs that are getting compromised. ------ Heres an actual paper showing that Misinformation based communication travels differently than "Fact" based information https://www.pnas.org/content/113/3/554.full https://www.pnas.org/content/113/3/554.full.

mekkkkkk 6y ago
I completely agree with everything you've said. My main point is that I suspect this is a natural development even with all economic incentives and Algorithms set aside. Facebook et. al. are capitalizing on social psychology that would be there even if they weren't. You can see the same sort of echo chambers taking shape in other fora such as 4chan, Reddit and Mastodon. These do not incorporate the Algorithms that are often solely blamed for the outrage cycle. If people both A) Enjoy to be part of communities of like minded people B) Cannot stay objective and keep perspective once immersed in one then the current situation (and worse) seem to be inevitable. Regardless of actions taken against (or complete elimination of) the big commercial players.
- intended 6y ago
  I agree! You can even go back to the cable news era and see the same issues. It seems quaint but the Fox News effect and the Fox News bubbles were things that were already driving those forces. The evidence suggests to me that our ideals on free speech do not take into account human wetware bandwidth when it’s being influenced by modern telecommunications and Internet enabled conversations.