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Anecdotally this is what I've been seeing over the years. Most of my friends and acquaintances seem to have left Facebook behind and moved to Insta. The people

Anecdotally this is what I've been seeing over the years. Most of my friends and acquaintances seem to have left Facebook behind and moved to Insta. The people that stayed on FB are mostly those who like to express strong opinions and engage in pointless discussions.

akira2501 5y ago
> engage in pointless discussions. Pointless to some, I'm sure, but if they're that engaged it's meaningful to them. Viewed through that lens, then attempting to externally manipulate and cajole their conversations was never going to have a positive outcome or even impact on the rest of the userbase.
- native_samples 5y ago
  It feels like this is a core point that's somehow got lost here. There's a lot of assumptions in these discussions that connections and sharing are only good and useful if the results look a certain way. People sharing dog photos: good. Sharing approved mainstream news stories: good. People posting personal politics: bad. People disagreeing with each other: also bad. Etc. But it's a purely subjective take. Maybe our society needs to talk about politics way more than it does. Historically, instead of talking there's often just been fighting, and everyone agrees that talking is far healthier. Facebook's original working assumption was that connecting people and letting them communicate and share is inherently a valuable thing. Is that actually wrong? Clearly, there is enormous demand to discuss politics that was unleashed by the internet, whereas before then only a small number of people had the access to present their opinions to those around them via opt-in channels like TV, the press, etc. Other people had to make do with phone calls. Something once restricted to a very small group is now available to all. Unsurprisingly, the sort of people who feel ill when they see the results are those whose views are the same as those who previously had a monopoly on group communication of various kinds. The ones most engaged are the ones who feel the media ignore their worldviews. It's pretty dangerous to just say, well, if people are arguing about stuff that the establishment wouldn't let them argue about before, then it's "toxic". It's certainly risky to blame social media as the cause rather than merely a symptom of disagreements that would be there anyway. Far better to have "toxic" social media than a revolution!
  - romwell 5y ago
    The problem I see on FB is less with what people argue about, but how. It feels like people are just saying things at each other trying to "win" an argument. Of course, that's a problem with education, not FB. And I think it's a good thing that it's surfaced on FB. FB can act as toxic behavior multiplier, though.
    - nitrogen 5y ago
      FB can act as toxic behavior multiplier, though. Indeed, the medium can alter the message. For example, supposedly any extra lag in voice communication makes participants think the other person is angry. We also see groups that never had close proximity now interacting directly and finding that they disagree pretty strongly on fundamentals. So there may be ways to facilitate the same discussions, but more productively and humanely. And it simply might not be possible for people with diametrically opposed beliefs to do this -- there may need to be a game of a few layers of telephone, or at least an active moderator as in a formal debate, to help translate meaning and intent across the epistemological divide.
    - native_samples 5y ago
      I don't know if it's a problem with education but more likely, deeply held implicit assumptions that aren't being articulated. Most political disagreements fall into this category. E.g. arguments about COVID stuff are usually rooted in differences in assumptions about things like the trustworthiness of the establishment, the corrupting strength of profit, whether events are best explained as conspiracy or cockup, etc. Because they're sort of all-encompassing and vague people don't or can't easily spell them out, leading to the "talking at" not "talking with" problem. But that isn't to do with Facebook. It's inherent to humanity.
seattle_spring 5y ago
Sadly, some of my friends now use Insta to propagate the same level of political vitriol as they did on FB. They just leverage text overlays to accomplish their goal.
- stadium 5y ago
  I see the same on WhatsApp too. Family members blindly forwarding whatever outrage meme of the moment lands in their message queue. Especially for family outside the US who use WhatsApp as their primary way to communicate with groups.
- asdff 5y ago
  At this point the exact posts are just shared around platforms. Tweets posted on HN. Tweets posted to reddit. Facebook memes on instagram. Ticktock posts to instagram and reddit. Doesn't matter what platform you go on, the same fodder ends up everywhere.
marttt 5y ago
Living in a country of 1.5 million people, it often feels devastating how big a part of political/intellectual discussion in our (tiny) language actually takes place in Facebook. I have worked in journalism, so maybe it's sour grapes in a way, but: most of the great writers are there. All the politicians are there. Our prime minister first announces crucial things on her FB wall, etc. In short, if you want to participate in the public sphere of our tiny society that yet speaks its own tiny language, you'd better have a FB account. The account provided by an American Megacorp, that is. This actually feels really strange. I've been more or less off FB for 5-6 years, occasionally feeling lonely and intellectually isolated. I would love to see things like the Fediverse/Mastodon or tilde.town take off for speakers of our language, but I'm having doubts whether this could ever happen. For the lingua francas, there will always be a considerable chunk of alternative culture and great, bright discussion outside dominant platforms (howdy, HN!). For smaller cultures, this relationship status is surely complicated. FB is just so damn big.
- olivermarks 5y ago
  I feel you can apply the maxim 'in politics nothing happens by accident' to Facebook despite their earnest attempts to claim unintended consequences. They are a highly important component of our divide and rule political era on multiple levels and sadly are doing an excellent job.
  - marttt 5y ago
    True. In the early 2010s, I used to ponder whether journalism is actually dying -- meaning, now that we have social media, traditional gatekeeper-journalism [1] is simply not needed any more. During the passed decade, it has become obvious that as long as a social network is also a megacorporation, this idea won't work. We still need the better parts of traditional journalism to check what's going on behind the curtains of profit-driven social networks. Really messy, but also truly interesting times for journalism for sure. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatekeeping_(communication) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatekeeping_(communication)
    - 5y ago

akira2501 5y ago

> engage in pointless discussions. Pointless to some, I'm sure, but if they're that engaged it's meaningful to them. Viewed through that lens, then attempting to externally manipulate and cajole their conversations was never going to have a positive outcome or even impact on the rest of the userbase.

native_samples 5y ago
It feels like this is a core point that's somehow got lost here. There's a lot of assumptions in these discussions that connections and sharing are only good and useful if the results look a certain way. People sharing dog photos: good. Sharing approved mainstream news stories: good. People posting personal politics: bad. People disagreeing with each other: also bad. Etc. But it's a purely subjective take. Maybe our society needs to talk about politics way more than it does. Historically, instead of talking there's often just been fighting, and everyone agrees that talking is far healthier. Facebook's original working assumption was that connecting people and letting them communicate and share is inherently a valuable thing. Is that actually wrong? Clearly, there is enormous demand to discuss politics that was unleashed by the internet, whereas before then only a small number of people had the access to present their opinions to those around them via opt-in channels like TV, the press, etc. Other people had to make do with phone calls. Something once restricted to a very small group is now available to all. Unsurprisingly, the sort of people who feel ill when they see the results are those whose views are the same as those who previously had a monopoly on group communication of various kinds. The ones most engaged are the ones who feel the media ignore their worldviews. It's pretty dangerous to just say, well, if people are arguing about stuff that the establishment wouldn't let them argue about before, then it's "toxic". It's certainly risky to blame social media as the cause rather than merely a symptom of disagreements that would be there anyway. Far better to have "toxic" social media than a revolution!
- romwell 5y ago
  The problem I see on FB is less with what people argue about, but how. It feels like people are just saying things at each other trying to "win" an argument. Of course, that's a problem with education, not FB. And I think it's a good thing that it's surfaced on FB. FB can act as toxic behavior multiplier, though.
  - nitrogen 5y ago
    FB can act as toxic behavior multiplier, though. Indeed, the medium can alter the message. For example, supposedly any extra lag in voice communication makes participants think the other person is angry. We also see groups that never had close proximity now interacting directly and finding that they disagree pretty strongly on fundamentals. So there may be ways to facilitate the same discussions, but more productively and humanely. And it simply might not be possible for people with diametrically opposed beliefs to do this -- there may need to be a game of a few layers of telephone, or at least an active moderator as in a formal debate, to help translate meaning and intent across the epistemological divide.
  - native_samples 5y ago
    I don't know if it's a problem with education but more likely, deeply held implicit assumptions that aren't being articulated. Most political disagreements fall into this category. E.g. arguments about COVID stuff are usually rooted in differences in assumptions about things like the trustworthiness of the establishment, the corrupting strength of profit, whether events are best explained as conspiracy or cockup, etc. Because they're sort of all-encompassing and vague people don't or can't easily spell them out, leading to the "talking at" not "talking with" problem. But that isn't to do with Facebook. It's inherent to humanity.

seattle_spring 5y ago

Sadly, some of my friends now use Insta to propagate the same level of political vitriol as they did on FB. They just leverage text overlays to accomplish their goal.

stadium 5y ago
I see the same on WhatsApp too. Family members blindly forwarding whatever outrage meme of the moment lands in their message queue. Especially for family outside the US who use WhatsApp as their primary way to communicate with groups.
asdff 5y ago
At this point the exact posts are just shared around platforms. Tweets posted on HN. Tweets posted to reddit. Facebook memes on instagram. Ticktock posts to instagram and reddit. Doesn't matter what platform you go on, the same fodder ends up everywhere.

marttt 5y ago

Living in a country of 1.5 million people, it often feels devastating how big a part of political/intellectual discussion in our (tiny) language actually takes place in Facebook. I have worked in journalism, so maybe it's sour grapes in a way, but: most of the great writers are there. All the politicians are there. Our prime minister first announces crucial things on her FB wall, etc. In short, if you want to participate in the public sphere of our tiny society that yet speaks its own tiny language, you'd better have a FB account. The account provided by an American Megacorp, that is. This actually feels really strange. I've been more or less off FB for 5-6 years, occasionally feeling lonely and intellectually isolated. I would love to see things like the Fediverse/Mastodon or tilde.town take off for speakers of our language, but I'm having doubts whether this could ever happen. For the lingua francas, there will always be a considerable chunk of alternative culture and great, bright discussion outside dominant platforms (howdy, HN!). For smaller cultures, this relationship status is surely complicated. FB is just so damn big.

olivermarks 5y ago
I feel you can apply the maxim 'in politics nothing happens by accident' to Facebook despite their earnest attempts to claim unintended consequences. They are a highly important component of our divide and rule political era on multiple levels and sadly are doing an excellent job.
- marttt 5y ago
  True. In the early 2010s, I used to ponder whether journalism is actually dying -- meaning, now that we have social media, traditional gatekeeper-journalism [1] is simply not needed any more. During the passed decade, it has become obvious that as long as a social network is also a megacorporation, this idea won't work. We still need the better parts of traditional journalism to check what's going on behind the curtains of profit-driven social networks. Really messy, but also truly interesting times for journalism for sure. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatekeeping_(communication) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatekeeping_(communication)
  - 5y ago