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they have found via reliable experimentation by numerous social scientists that the most effective way is to keep users in a near-constant state of some combina

by em-bee 3y ago

they have found via reliable experimentation by numerous social scientists that the most effective way is to keep users in a near-constant state of some combination of rage, indignation or disgust this is only true for social media that promotes particular content, which means it is not true for signal, telegram, whatsapp, wechat and many others that just share messages as the users intended.

polygamous_bat 3y ago
I've never used WeChat, but are signal/telegram/Whatsapp considered "social media" now? I thought they belonged to a separate category of "messaging apps", which consist of people messaging others that they already possibly know from a different channel.
- em-bee 3y ago
  fair point. this is a matter of definition. i agree with the distinction, but this is not shared by everyone. see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media so i find it useful to point it out. case in point, in this wikipedia article wechat is clearly categorized as social media, even though it's messaging component is no different than whatsapp, telegram or signal, which are "maybe" social media. in summary, some people call them social media, and some don't.
- grotorea 3y ago
  This is not the only use of those apps. There are plenty of large channels that are either broadcasting from a central source of a sort of forum sorted by new of people who don't know each other but share some type of interest, specially in countries and regions where those apps are dominant (which I believe is not the case of the US).
ToucanLoucan 3y ago
As the other commenter said, I think most people would call those more messaging apps than social media (though wechat blurs the line even further being a sort of everything app but I digress). That said it's also worth considering that few users of any of these products use only one; therefore, the network effects of say, Facebook steering people into more extreme content, will reflect back when they join more extreme Telegram channels, with it being at least decently plausible that further interaction on Telegram will steer them into yet further Facebook Groups or into the influence of content creators elsewhere still. Enough of these utilities engage in this attention-grabbing funnel tactic that the effects of their algorithms far exceed the boundaries of their own products, and reinforce each other as well.
- em-bee 3y ago
  network effects of say, Facebook steering people into more extreme content, will reflect back when they join more extreme Telegram channels, with it being at least decently plausible that further interaction on Telegram will steer them into yet further Facebook Groups or into the influence of content creators elsewhere still. the distinction is where the steering comes from. on facebook the steering is affected by the algorithm, which decided what messages you see, while on telegram it is not. on facebook, twitter, youtube etc, i can be confronted with extreme content that i didn't ask for. on telegram, whatsapp, wechat, etc, i only get content that i explicitly asked for.
  - ToucanLoucan 3y ago
    Oh yeah, 100% agree and they're much less toxic for it. But messaging apps like telegram because of the lack of reach of their groups, also makes them more difficult to moderate which is worth noting too. The people who believe whatever extremism is on offer are not likely to report those channels, and even if they were, Telegram could just remove the reporting user, say "we'll take care of it" and do nothing because the likelihood of followup is basically nil.
    - em-bee 3y ago
      why would groups have to be moderated from the outside? if their content is not public because you can't find it unless you explicitly join the group does it matter if the conversation is happening on telegram or in a room somewhere in the city or in a private forum somewhere else?
      - ToucanLoucan 3y ago
        I mean, yes? A non-exhaustive list of things found to be happening in private telegram channels we probably want to stop would include: coordination of harassment campaigns, a plot to kidnap a sitting United States governor, a large part of the January 6th event in the United States, a shit ton of hate speech, doxxing, confidence scams, distribution of material to facilitate genocide...

by em-bee 3y ago

polygamous_bat 3y ago

I've never used WeChat, but are signal/telegram/Whatsapp considered "social media" now? I thought they belonged to a separate category of "messaging apps", which consist of people messaging others that they already possibly know from a different channel.

em-bee 3y ago
fair point. this is a matter of definition. i agree with the distinction, but this is not shared by everyone. see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media so i find it useful to point it out. case in point, in this wikipedia article wechat is clearly categorized as social media, even though it's messaging component is no different than whatsapp, telegram or signal, which are "maybe" social media. in summary, some people call them social media, and some don't.
grotorea 3y ago
This is not the only use of those apps. There are plenty of large channels that are either broadcasting from a central source of a sort of forum sorted by new of people who don't know each other but share some type of interest, specially in countries and regions where those apps are dominant (which I believe is not the case of the US).

ToucanLoucan 3y ago

As the other commenter said, I think most people would call those more messaging apps than social media (though wechat blurs the line even further being a sort of everything app but I digress). That said it's also worth considering that few users of any of these products use only one; therefore, the network effects of say, Facebook steering people into more extreme content, will reflect back when they join more extreme Telegram channels, with it being at least decently plausible that further interaction on Telegram will steer them into yet further Facebook Groups or into the influence of content creators elsewhere still. Enough of these utilities engage in this attention-grabbing funnel tactic that the effects of their algorithms far exceed the boundaries of their own products, and reinforce each other as well.

em-bee 3y ago
network effects of say, Facebook steering people into more extreme content, will reflect back when they join more extreme Telegram channels, with it being at least decently plausible that further interaction on Telegram will steer them into yet further Facebook Groups or into the influence of content creators elsewhere still. the distinction is where the steering comes from. on facebook the steering is affected by the algorithm, which decided what messages you see, while on telegram it is not. on facebook, twitter, youtube etc, i can be confronted with extreme content that i didn't ask for. on telegram, whatsapp, wechat, etc, i only get content that i explicitly asked for.
- ToucanLoucan 3y ago
  Oh yeah, 100% agree and they're much less toxic for it. But messaging apps like telegram because of the lack of reach of their groups, also makes them more difficult to moderate which is worth noting too. The people who believe whatever extremism is on offer are not likely to report those channels, and even if they were, Telegram could just remove the reporting user, say "we'll take care of it" and do nothing because the likelihood of followup is basically nil.
  - em-bee 3y ago
    why would groups have to be moderated from the outside? if their content is not public because you can't find it unless you explicitly join the group does it matter if the conversation is happening on telegram or in a room somewhere in the city or in a private forum somewhere else?
    - ToucanLoucan 3y ago
      I mean, yes? A non-exhaustive list of things found to be happening in private telegram channels we probably want to stop would include: coordination of harassment campaigns, a plot to kidnap a sitting United States governor, a large part of the January 6th event in the United States, a shit ton of hate speech, doxxing, confidence scams, distribution of material to facilitate genocide...