7 ms·

'They're knowingly addicting kids': the attorney challenging social media firms

116 points by sandebert 3y ago

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
noduerme 3y ago
I don't see this as a left- or right-wing issue. Not least because it's manifestly obvious now that relatively illiterate people (and especially children) of all views and walks have become totally warped by "a little knowledge" passed in sugar cubes along with the stick of social ostracizarion if they fail to conform to algorithms that encourage extremism. Social media firms should be held liable for the massive social damage they've inflicted and externalized. The entire paradigm needs to be reduced to dust just as much as Hamas does. It's an internal enemy and a time bomb for our civilization.
- colechristensen 3y ago
  People wouldn’t be any less stupid if you pulled the rug out from under the folks making money off of them. The problem has to be addressed elsewhere. Specially we need advertising out of the news business, to higher the level of education for the kids who choose it, and an alternate path for the kids who for whatever reason have no interest so they’ll get out of the way. In other words, some children need to be left behind so they’ll stop dragging everyone else down. Bring back real expulsion and make real requirements for graduation.
  - noduerme 3y ago
    The thing is that social/religious/ethnic/racial radicalization and extremism which endangered civil order, threatened civil debate, and came from places of willful ignorance, always existed prior to the internet. But it existed it pockets of time and place, and its spread was limited. Moreover, most ordinary uneducated people had no chance to post back to amplify its content, even if that content was spread on radio as in Rwanda or nazi Germany. Therefore the bulk of people whose opinions should never have had purchase had no sense that their opinions mattered. Which was a good thing. Even more to the point, their inane debates (see: Fox News and MSNBC comments sections, Twitter, etc) wouldn't have generated advertising money. Their comments are not something that a sane civilization with a sense of self-preservation would wish to elevate to be seen by other people. The perversion of social media writ large is to make itself a Tribune of the People and compete with malevolent force of riot against protagonists of rhetoric. It is an insurgency in every sense of the word. Many of us who used to relish the idea of anarchist speech have realized that this insurgency is itself manipulated, that no free speech actually exists on these platforms but that they are simply used to whip the proletariat into frenzied riot on behalf of whoever controls them. Not dissimilar to any religious cult that, in trying to attain power, allows its adherents to incite violence while simultaneously denying its own culpability.
- hackernewds 3y ago
  did you just compare Facebook to Hamas?
  - ilkke 3y ago
    Can someone with serious regard for quality of discussion on HN please explain why is this comment being downvoted?
    - noduerme 3y ago
      Which one, mine or the one you're responding to?
  - noduerme 3y ago
    I wouldn't say they're unrelated. If your father is a religious zealot who hates a certain group of people, and your primary social contact is hanging out with your friends drinking coffee, you may end up extremist or not. If your primary social contact is being saturated with hate speech 24/7 on social media, where you're punished for dissent, you will almost certainly turn into a zealot yourself. Yet this isn't even the whole problem, because almost no one you read on social media should even have access to a keyboard, let alone be allowed to bully peers into acquiescing to hate and violence. Facebook is responsible for genocide in Myanmar, and I don't think it's a huge stretch to say that its model (and social media's model in general) is responsible for the enormous wave of terrorist radicalization, school shootings, and violent antipathy toward civilized society that has overwhelmed the world since 2008.
- jraby3 3y ago
  The fact that ~20% of gen Z don’t believe the holocaust happened is directly related to Tim Tok imo, and an absolute cancer for our culture and way of life. Something absolutely needs to be done about social media.
- bryan_w 3y ago
  Kind of an extreme view you're giving on this social media site...
  - 2024throwaway 3y ago
    It's a bit reductive to compare a tech news discussion site with the kind of social media being discussed in the article.
    - latency-guy2 3y ago
      Not reductive at all, just something you personally dislike the comparison of. Very big difference.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - 2024throwaway 3y ago
        The article is titled “They’re knowingly addicting kids”. Please explain how Hacker News is doing that.
        fragmede 3y ago
        To it's credit, HN does have a noprocrast feature, but I can easily see a teenager with poor self control spending every waking moment on this site, dreaming of being an entrepreneur, to the detriment of their studies and social life. I'm an adult and doing that so kids (teenagers) are even more helpless. The very nature of social media is addicting, Facebook didn't have to do anything special to get kids addicted to it.
        noduerme 3y ago
        What you say is true - HN might resemble a false ladder to popularity for a very small subset of teenagers - but content is at least as important as form. It's okay for there to be balkanized subsections of the internet that lead to serious discussion and which might occasionally lead to radical obsessions; take away the internet and that's just society in the streets of France in 1789 or Rome in 49 BC. The major difference is whether they find it or it finds them. Because if you find it, you can walk away from it once you grow up. If it finds you, you lose yourself and fail to develop the structure for independent / critical thought.
san-fran 3y ago
It’s been a long-held opinion that tech companies laugh at the out-of-touch Congresspeople at these hearings. Recall Mark Zuckerberg’s incredulity when members of Congress had to ask him how Facebook makes money. And as if that isn’t enough, tech companies are only loyal to their boards of directors, who are only loyal to quarter-over-quarter growth, and nothing else.
- colechristensen 3y ago
  The problem is there are a whole lot of completely clueless people in Congress who ask profoundly stupid questions demonstrating they know nothing, and we expect them to govern.
  - NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
    Or perhaps it doesn't matter whether a particular Member of Congress knows something, but the important part is to have the responsible person in the room and giving testimony, on the record, under oath.
  - thesz 3y ago
    What one considers a "profoundly stupid question" can be a question that shines a light to a heart of the problem or provides necessary context. For one such example, the question "how Facebook makes money" provides context so that other people would better understand what follows.
    - neilkk 3y ago
      "Will you ban Finsta?" was not an example of such a question. It was a profoundly stupid question from someone who had the resources to educate themselves before asking it.
      - thesz 3y ago
        The question asked not for me (although...) or you, but for wider audience. For one immediate example, I do not know what or who Finsta is. The answer to that question, as well as preceding dialogue, would help me to navigate through Facebook's business, and my path would be skewed to favor viewpoint of the interrogator. This is not discussion of peers, but discussion before a jury.
feverzsj 3y ago
They should focus more on things like affordable housing and minimum wage.
- HeatrayEnjoyer 3y ago
  We can do more than one thing at a time, and this is just as important as anything else.
  - lifestyleguru 3y ago
    If one cannot afford housing, nothing else matters. If you cannot buy or rent anything, even Switzerland will be shit. If you have your own housing, even Ukraine will be good.
    - HeatrayEnjoyer 3y ago
      You missed the point. Read what I said again, and paraphrase what you believe I meant.
- asylteltine 3y ago
  [dead]
reedf1 3y ago
Every time this gets brought up it gets called a moral panic. I'm now convinced "moral panic" is a thought terminating cliche in this case. These systems are basically algorithmically addicting, like gambling. We don't let kids gamble - so let's read the studies, see the outcomes, come up with solutions and boundaries, and legislate accordingly.
- benreesman 3y ago
  You see the de facto as opposed to aspirational rule of law constrain or even non-trivially inconvenience anything with a 1-3T notional value any time recently? Binding, truly binding legislation or regulatory oversight is clearly the desirous end state. How in the hell we take even a single step towards that is the 1-3T dollar question. SBF is in prison, so is Holmes, as was Madoff. But the burden now trivially rests on the person asserting that the public has any say in the matter to show that it ever happens in the modern era. The first rule of Crime Club is don’t steal from other rich people. The second rule of Crime Clib is: there are no rules.
  - skrebbel 3y ago
    > You see the de facto as opposed to aspirational rule of law constrain or even non-trivially inconvenience anything with a 1-3T notional value any time recently? I read this sentence 3 times and I still don’t know what it means.
    - tsunamifury 3y ago
      No will will hold the richest accountable including trillion dollar corporations. The government simply cannot prosecute what it depends on to exist.
      - nonrandomstring 3y ago
        > The government simply cannot prosecute what it depends on to exist. That has never been truer than in the UK at present, with the Fujitsu Horizon scandal at the Post Office. We'd rather throw 3,500 lives under a bus than investigate a serious problem with a govt. preferred supplier.
sublinear 3y ago
"TV will rot your brain"
- oblio 3y ago
  This is much worse. You didn't have a TV in your pocket when you were 10. Everyone else didn't and you weren't pressured by peers to have it. The TV didn't track you and basically try to abuse you secretly.
  - sublinear 3y ago
    > You didn't have a TV in your pocket when you were 10 Actually I did. It was a birthday gift from Radio Shack back in the late 90s. I was totally that nerd kid, but yes it was a literal TV. > Everyone else didn't and you weren't pressured by peers to have it Everyone had gameboys though. I found Pokemon a bit boring so I was often excluded. > The TV didn't track you and basically try to abuse you secretly The adults had cell phones and/or PDAs with abusive bosses on the other end. Soon enough us kids had them too. Helicopter parenting found a new gear and sexting and group text bullying became a thing. That was around 20 years ago.
- nonrandomstring 3y ago
  We laugh at that now. But it turns out it does. In the 60s and 70s there was a lot of research into the effects of television. Likely you've heard of theorist Marshall McLuhan. To this day [1] experimental psychologists are fascinated with the problem that while film/TV is an effective medium for news and education, it basically hypnotises people into a suggestible state. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_McLuhan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_McLuhan [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-39354-4 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-39354-4
gjjgjgjjgj 3y ago
Social media is 21st century cigarettes. Some people stumbled upon something that turned out to be addictive, and after they realized it was they put all their effort into optimizing it to be even more addictive with little or no regard for the detrimental effects it had on their users. I don't know which is more toxic, the product or the people who make it.
- worldsayshi 3y ago
  I don't know I mean I kind of find a lot of things on my phone addictive that I don't expect that intentionally evil people have optimized for it. Like regular news sites, hacker news, indie games and Lemmy. Maybe people don't need to try very hard to make things addictive. Maybe we just "like" being addicted to things. Maybe we have strange reasons for it. (And maybe addiction is mostly a coping mechanism when we can't figure other things out.) I'm not sure we can put all the blame on the creators of social media. At least sometimes I'm not sure they even need to try that hard.
  - tegling 3y ago
    A lot of industry standard design patterns are a consequence of that additction-optimization UX work. So you're probably applying this whether you wish or not. On the surface it makes the app/game engaging--but why? What's the state of mind of the person using the app? I've recently started developing a game for fun and found my self having to put a lot of effort into figuring out whether "is this _actually_ fun and fulfilling?" or "does it only make me compulsively feel like I have to continue, waiting for the fun that's around the corner (but never shows up)?"
    - worldsayshi 3y ago
      Yeah this is probably a good point. But that makes it very hard to put blame on anything in particular (that we might be able to fix). Except maybe the incentive structures we've created.
  - rrrrrrrrrrrryan 3y ago
Sparkyte 3y ago
It's complicated, but the idea of social media isn't bad, it is how it is used that is bad and preying on kids is always bad. The concept of being connected with family through social media to share about things going on responsibly is inherently good. However lets be real people will devolve things into the least responsible use ever.
- nonrandomstring 3y ago
  > idea of social media isn't bad, it is how it is used that is bad I don't think the "idea of social media" is a thing at all. What is that idea? We can't really define it. There are some people even claiming that this hacker forum is "social media" and I definitely don't come here to be "connected with family through social media". A whole bunch of diverse ideas have been shoe-horned into a mass-media neologism "social media" - including; gaming, gambling, advertising, self-promotion, entertainment, collaboration. Some people's full time job is basically "social media". It's become a harmless term that really stands in for talking about a handful of massive companies that run a sectarian Internet. More precise, direct and courageous language is needed to approach problems like this.
  - Sparkyte 3y ago
    It certainly is an umbrella term. Overloaded terms usually do lose meaning. I think it means any form of media that acts or behaves as a social venue to convey personal submissions. YouTube is an example of a Media company that has social media elements but isn't a social media site. But when we look at TikTok at least in its original state it was purely short form media in which a user can socially communicate thoughts and ideas through a short clip. With comments. Those elements and that being the main appeal make it social media.
silisili 3y ago
As a people watcher, I saw my own wife and kid go through this. The best way I can think to describe it is that humans are social creatures, so socialization makes us happy. And we used to do it a few times a day/week/month. Then came social media, and it was pseudo socialization all the time. And at first it's pure ecstasy. But then you get used to it as the new normal, and without it feel empty like you need it. More and more. It sounds like I'm describing a drug, and honestly, for most it seems to behave similarly and should be treated as such. It's hard to regulate or argue because on paper, it's harmless. So I have no idea what the solution could ever possibly be other than intervention or introspection. (in full transparency, I went through this as well, but it's not easy to see when it's happening to yourself.)
- tsunamifury 3y ago
  I think for me the surprising thing is that it’s not like a drug in that there isn’t negative withdrawal. Spend a day hiking or with friends at a party or traveling and I don’t get social media withdrawal and in fact I feel better. That’s a lot different than cigarettes or heroine. Which is good because it means there is hope to break the habit.
  - silisili 3y ago
    You're right, but I think age has something to do with it. When I was young I couldn't stand to be bored. And any second not doing something I was bored. As I got older, I realized I can just stare at the wall for an hour thinking about something and never really feel bored. The wife and I got out of it by doing just as you said, going out everyday walking around for hours. Didn't work on the kid. That was broken with brute force internet control, that she continues to try to find ways around.
    - blackoil 3y ago
      > she continues to try to find ways around. If you are forcing a rule without right alternatives, you'll have to fill that time with something. If you leave them, they'll take easiest option i.e. social media not very diff. from what I am doing on HN. If they are mid-late teens maybe you just need to provide them the right resources but anyone younger, you should find activities to fill that time.
growingkittens 3y ago
We need an equivalent to the FDA for dark patterns - patterns "Generally Recognized As Dangerous". Ban the use of dark patterns.
marcus_holmes 3y ago
I don't think the problem is social media per se. I think the problem is the ad-funded business model. Because the business only gets revenue from attention, it needs to create more attention. So it engages in these really harmful tactics (knowingly) to create addiction and engagement, because that's how it makes money. If everyone had to pay for their social media and it didn't display ads, the problem wouldn't exist. Social media companies would be incentivised to reduce your engagement with their platform. They would pay attention to what their customers wanted (the user, not the advertiser) and probably give more of a shit about our mental health. We see the same with journalism, where the ad-driven business model produces clickbait, outrage porn and the enshittification of the reading experience. The whole internet would work much better if we just banned advertising on it. I know this is impractical, but it's true.
blackoil 3y ago
This doesn't align with general discourse, but Social Media companies aren't alone to blame. Their algo is simple show people what they are watching and engaging with. So, if you are into deeply learning about AI/ML and LLMs you'll get tons of videos on that. On TikTok if you watch Hispanic girls in short skirts, it will show you more of that. It isn't hugely different from other media; Fox will show you right leaning content and some other left. The two main differences are quantity of content/metrics available allowing for individual level personalization and phone/iPad being in every hand 24/7. So, while commonly assumed the solution to force Social Media companies to show diverse and boring content. But most successful will be to simply reduce the time spent on these sites/apps. 5 yo don't need own iPad and 10 yo don't need a smartphone. I don't see why anyone younger than 14-16 need phone/computer in school. Books are cheaper than ever; Parks and Skate parks are still there and so are swimming pools. Cooking pizza/burger with kids should still be fun. If parents are not ready to do parenting, one option is do China have hard limits in devices/accounts on time a child can spend online but that won't work in USA and Western sensibilities.
- 15457345234 3y ago
  > Their algo is simple show people what they are watching and engaging with. Imagine really just going on the internet and saying this. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/30/facebook-sad-manipulating-emotions-socially-responsible-company https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/30/facebo... Please note that article is from _2014_
EasyMark 3y ago
1. First get them panicked 2. Throw around some pseudo facts 3. Gauge the public response 4. "It's tepid at best" 5. Sweep it back under the rug, but now you have your talking points in the next election

116 points by sandebert 3y ago

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

I don't see this as a left- or right-wing issue. Not least because it's manifestly obvious now that relatively illiterate people (and especially children) of all views and walks have become totally warped by "a little knowledge" passed in sugar cubes along with the stick of social ostracizarion if they fail to conform to algorithms that encourage extremism. Social media firms should be held liable for the massive social damage they've inflicted and externalized. The entire paradigm needs to be reduced to dust just as much as Hamas does. It's an internal enemy and a time bomb for our civilization.

colechristensen 3y ago
People wouldn’t be any less stupid if you pulled the rug out from under the folks making money off of them. The problem has to be addressed elsewhere. Specially we need advertising out of the news business, to higher the level of education for the kids who choose it, and an alternate path for the kids who for whatever reason have no interest so they’ll get out of the way. In other words, some children need to be left behind so they’ll stop dragging everyone else down. Bring back real expulsion and make real requirements for graduation.
- noduerme 3y ago
  The thing is that social/religious/ethnic/racial radicalization and extremism which endangered civil order, threatened civil debate, and came from places of willful ignorance, always existed prior to the internet. But it existed it pockets of time and place, and its spread was limited. Moreover, most ordinary uneducated people had no chance to post back to amplify its content, even if that content was spread on radio as in Rwanda or nazi Germany. Therefore the bulk of people whose opinions should never have had purchase had no sense that their opinions mattered. Which was a good thing. Even more to the point, their inane debates (see: Fox News and MSNBC comments sections, Twitter, etc) wouldn't have generated advertising money. Their comments are not something that a sane civilization with a sense of self-preservation would wish to elevate to be seen by other people. The perversion of social media writ large is to make itself a Tribune of the People and compete with malevolent force of riot against protagonists of rhetoric. It is an insurgency in every sense of the word. Many of us who used to relish the idea of anarchist speech have realized that this insurgency is itself manipulated, that no free speech actually exists on these platforms but that they are simply used to whip the proletariat into frenzied riot on behalf of whoever controls them. Not dissimilar to any religious cult that, in trying to attain power, allows its adherents to incite violence while simultaneously denying its own culpability.
hackernewds 3y ago
did you just compare Facebook to Hamas?
- ilkke 3y ago
  Can someone with serious regard for quality of discussion on HN please explain why is this comment being downvoted?
  - noduerme 3y ago
    Which one, mine or the one you're responding to?
- noduerme 3y ago
  I wouldn't say they're unrelated. If your father is a religious zealot who hates a certain group of people, and your primary social contact is hanging out with your friends drinking coffee, you may end up extremist or not. If your primary social contact is being saturated with hate speech 24/7 on social media, where you're punished for dissent, you will almost certainly turn into a zealot yourself. Yet this isn't even the whole problem, because almost no one you read on social media should even have access to a keyboard, let alone be allowed to bully peers into acquiescing to hate and violence. Facebook is responsible for genocide in Myanmar, and I don't think it's a huge stretch to say that its model (and social media's model in general) is responsible for the enormous wave of terrorist radicalization, school shootings, and violent antipathy toward civilized society that has overwhelmed the world since 2008.
jraby3 3y ago
The fact that ~20% of gen Z don’t believe the holocaust happened is directly related to Tim Tok imo, and an absolute cancer for our culture and way of life. Something absolutely needs to be done about social media.
bryan_w 3y ago
Kind of an extreme view you're giving on this social media site...
- 2024throwaway 3y ago
  It's a bit reductive to compare a tech news discussion site with the kind of social media being discussed in the article.
  - latency-guy2 3y ago
    Not reductive at all, just something you personally dislike the comparison of. Very big difference.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - 2024throwaway 3y ago
      The article is titled “They’re knowingly addicting kids”. Please explain how Hacker News is doing that.
      - fragmede 3y ago
        To it's credit, HN does have a noprocrast feature, but I can easily see a teenager with poor self control spending every waking moment on this site, dreaming of being an entrepreneur, to the detriment of their studies and social life. I'm an adult and doing that so kids (teenagers) are even more helpless. The very nature of social media is addicting, Facebook didn't have to do anything special to get kids addicted to it.
        noduerme 3y ago
        What you say is true - HN might resemble a false ladder to popularity for a very small subset of teenagers - but content is at least as important as form. It's okay for there to be balkanized subsections of the internet that lead to serious discussion and which might occasionally lead to radical obsessions; take away the internet and that's just society in the streets of France in 1789 or Rome in 49 BC. The major difference is whether they find it or it finds them. Because if you find it, you can walk away from it once you grow up. If it finds you, you lose yourself and fail to develop the structure for independent / critical thought.

san-fran 3y ago

It’s been a long-held opinion that tech companies laugh at the out-of-touch Congresspeople at these hearings. Recall Mark Zuckerberg’s incredulity when members of Congress had to ask him how Facebook makes money. And as if that isn’t enough, tech companies are only loyal to their boards of directors, who are only loyal to quarter-over-quarter growth, and nothing else.

colechristensen 3y ago
The problem is there are a whole lot of completely clueless people in Congress who ask profoundly stupid questions demonstrating they know nothing, and we expect them to govern.
- NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
  Or perhaps it doesn't matter whether a particular Member of Congress knows something, but the important part is to have the responsible person in the room and giving testimony, on the record, under oath.
- thesz 3y ago
  What one considers a "profoundly stupid question" can be a question that shines a light to a heart of the problem or provides necessary context. For one such example, the question "how Facebook makes money" provides context so that other people would better understand what follows.
  - neilkk 3y ago
    "Will you ban Finsta?" was not an example of such a question. It was a profoundly stupid question from someone who had the resources to educate themselves before asking it.
    - thesz 3y ago
      The question asked not for me (although...) or you, but for wider audience. For one immediate example, I do not know what or who Finsta is. The answer to that question, as well as preceding dialogue, would help me to navigate through Facebook's business, and my path would be skewed to favor viewpoint of the interrogator. This is not discussion of peers, but discussion before a jury.

feverzsj 3y ago

They should focus more on things like affordable housing and minimum wage.

HeatrayEnjoyer 3y ago
We can do more than one thing at a time, and this is just as important as anything else.
- lifestyleguru 3y ago
  If one cannot afford housing, nothing else matters. If you cannot buy or rent anything, even Switzerland will be shit. If you have your own housing, even Ukraine will be good.
  - HeatrayEnjoyer 3y ago
    You missed the point. Read what I said again, and paraphrase what you believe I meant.
asylteltine 3y ago
[dead]

reedf1 3y ago

Every time this gets brought up it gets called a moral panic. I'm now convinced "moral panic" is a thought terminating cliche in this case. These systems are basically algorithmically addicting, like gambling. We don't let kids gamble - so let's read the studies, see the outcomes, come up with solutions and boundaries, and legislate accordingly.

benreesman 3y ago
You see the de facto as opposed to aspirational rule of law constrain or even non-trivially inconvenience anything with a 1-3T notional value any time recently? Binding, truly binding legislation or regulatory oversight is clearly the desirous end state. How in the hell we take even a single step towards that is the 1-3T dollar question. SBF is in prison, so is Holmes, as was Madoff. But the burden now trivially rests on the person asserting that the public has any say in the matter to show that it ever happens in the modern era. The first rule of Crime Club is don’t steal from other rich people. The second rule of Crime Clib is: there are no rules.
- skrebbel 3y ago
  > You see the de facto as opposed to aspirational rule of law constrain or even non-trivially inconvenience anything with a 1-3T notional value any time recently? I read this sentence 3 times and I still don’t know what it means.
  - tsunamifury 3y ago
    No will will hold the richest accountable including trillion dollar corporations. The government simply cannot prosecute what it depends on to exist.
    - nonrandomstring 3y ago
      > The government simply cannot prosecute what it depends on to exist. That has never been truer than in the UK at present, with the Fujitsu Horizon scandal at the Post Office. We'd rather throw 3,500 lives under a bus than investigate a serious problem with a govt. preferred supplier.

sublinear 3y ago

"TV will rot your brain"

oblio 3y ago
This is much worse. You didn't have a TV in your pocket when you were 10. Everyone else didn't and you weren't pressured by peers to have it. The TV didn't track you and basically try to abuse you secretly.
- sublinear 3y ago
  > You didn't have a TV in your pocket when you were 10 Actually I did. It was a birthday gift from Radio Shack back in the late 90s. I was totally that nerd kid, but yes it was a literal TV. > Everyone else didn't and you weren't pressured by peers to have it Everyone had gameboys though. I found Pokemon a bit boring so I was often excluded. > The TV didn't track you and basically try to abuse you secretly The adults had cell phones and/or PDAs with abusive bosses on the other end. Soon enough us kids had them too. Helicopter parenting found a new gear and sexting and group text bullying became a thing. That was around 20 years ago.
nonrandomstring 3y ago
We laugh at that now. But it turns out it does. In the 60s and 70s there was a lot of research into the effects of television. Likely you've heard of theorist Marshall McLuhan. To this day [1] experimental psychologists are fascinated with the problem that while film/TV is an effective medium for news and education, it basically hypnotises people into a suggestible state. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_McLuhan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_McLuhan [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-39354-4 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-39354-4

gjjgjgjjgj 3y ago

Social media is 21st century cigarettes. Some people stumbled upon something that turned out to be addictive, and after they realized it was they put all their effort into optimizing it to be even more addictive with little or no regard for the detrimental effects it had on their users. I don't know which is more toxic, the product or the people who make it.

worldsayshi 3y ago
I don't know I mean I kind of find a lot of things on my phone addictive that I don't expect that intentionally evil people have optimized for it. Like regular news sites, hacker news, indie games and Lemmy. Maybe people don't need to try very hard to make things addictive. Maybe we just "like" being addicted to things. Maybe we have strange reasons for it. (And maybe addiction is mostly a coping mechanism when we can't figure other things out.) I'm not sure we can put all the blame on the creators of social media. At least sometimes I'm not sure they even need to try that hard.
- tegling 3y ago
  A lot of industry standard design patterns are a consequence of that additction-optimization UX work. So you're probably applying this whether you wish or not. On the surface it makes the app/game engaging--but why? What's the state of mind of the person using the app? I've recently started developing a game for fun and found my self having to put a lot of effort into figuring out whether "is this _actually_ fun and fulfilling?" or "does it only make me compulsively feel like I have to continue, waiting for the fun that's around the corner (but never shows up)?"
  - worldsayshi 3y ago
    Yeah this is probably a good point. But that makes it very hard to put blame on anything in particular (that we might be able to fix). Except maybe the incentive structures we've created.
- rrrrrrrrrrrryan 3y ago

Sparkyte 3y ago

It's complicated, but the idea of social media isn't bad, it is how it is used that is bad and preying on kids is always bad. The concept of being connected with family through social media to share about things going on responsibly is inherently good. However lets be real people will devolve things into the least responsible use ever.

nonrandomstring 3y ago
> idea of social media isn't bad, it is how it is used that is bad I don't think the "idea of social media" is a thing at all. What is that idea? We can't really define it. There are some people even claiming that this hacker forum is "social media" and I definitely don't come here to be "connected with family through social media". A whole bunch of diverse ideas have been shoe-horned into a mass-media neologism "social media" - including; gaming, gambling, advertising, self-promotion, entertainment, collaboration. Some people's full time job is basically "social media". It's become a harmless term that really stands in for talking about a handful of massive companies that run a sectarian Internet. More precise, direct and courageous language is needed to approach problems like this.
- Sparkyte 3y ago
  It certainly is an umbrella term. Overloaded terms usually do lose meaning. I think it means any form of media that acts or behaves as a social venue to convey personal submissions. YouTube is an example of a Media company that has social media elements but isn't a social media site. But when we look at TikTok at least in its original state it was purely short form media in which a user can socially communicate thoughts and ideas through a short clip. With comments. Those elements and that being the main appeal make it social media.

silisili 3y ago

As a people watcher, I saw my own wife and kid go through this. The best way I can think to describe it is that humans are social creatures, so socialization makes us happy. And we used to do it a few times a day/week/month. Then came social media, and it was pseudo socialization all the time. And at first it's pure ecstasy. But then you get used to it as the new normal, and without it feel empty like you need it. More and more. It sounds like I'm describing a drug, and honestly, for most it seems to behave similarly and should be treated as such. It's hard to regulate or argue because on paper, it's harmless. So I have no idea what the solution could ever possibly be other than intervention or introspection. (in full transparency, I went through this as well, but it's not easy to see when it's happening to yourself.)

tsunamifury 3y ago
I think for me the surprising thing is that it’s not like a drug in that there isn’t negative withdrawal. Spend a day hiking or with friends at a party or traveling and I don’t get social media withdrawal and in fact I feel better. That’s a lot different than cigarettes or heroine. Which is good because it means there is hope to break the habit.
- silisili 3y ago
  You're right, but I think age has something to do with it. When I was young I couldn't stand to be bored. And any second not doing something I was bored. As I got older, I realized I can just stare at the wall for an hour thinking about something and never really feel bored. The wife and I got out of it by doing just as you said, going out everyday walking around for hours. Didn't work on the kid. That was broken with brute force internet control, that she continues to try to find ways around.
  - blackoil 3y ago
    > she continues to try to find ways around. If you are forcing a rule without right alternatives, you'll have to fill that time with something. If you leave them, they'll take easiest option i.e. social media not very diff. from what I am doing on HN. If they are mid-late teens maybe you just need to provide them the right resources but anyone younger, you should find activities to fill that time.

growingkittens 3y ago

We need an equivalent to the FDA for dark patterns - patterns "Generally Recognized As Dangerous". Ban the use of dark patterns.

marcus_holmes 3y ago

I don't think the problem is social media per se. I think the problem is the ad-funded business model. Because the business only gets revenue from attention, it needs to create more attention. So it engages in these really harmful tactics (knowingly) to create addiction and engagement, because that's how it makes money. If everyone had to pay for their social media and it didn't display ads, the problem wouldn't exist. Social media companies would be incentivised to reduce your engagement with their platform. They would pay attention to what their customers wanted (the user, not the advertiser) and probably give more of a shit about our mental health. We see the same with journalism, where the ad-driven business model produces clickbait, outrage porn and the enshittification of the reading experience. The whole internet would work much better if we just banned advertising on it. I know this is impractical, but it's true.

blackoil 3y ago

This doesn't align with general discourse, but Social Media companies aren't alone to blame. Their algo is simple show people what they are watching and engaging with. So, if you are into deeply learning about AI/ML and LLMs you'll get tons of videos on that. On TikTok if you watch Hispanic girls in short skirts, it will show you more of that. It isn't hugely different from other media; Fox will show you right leaning content and some other left. The two main differences are quantity of content/metrics available allowing for individual level personalization and phone/iPad being in every hand 24/7. So, while commonly assumed the solution to force Social Media companies to show diverse and boring content. But most successful will be to simply reduce the time spent on these sites/apps. 5 yo don't need own iPad and 10 yo don't need a smartphone. I don't see why anyone younger than 14-16 need phone/computer in school. Books are cheaper than ever; Parks and Skate parks are still there and so are swimming pools. Cooking pizza/burger with kids should still be fun. If parents are not ready to do parenting, one option is do China have hard limits in devices/accounts on time a child can spend online but that won't work in USA and Western sensibilities.

15457345234 3y ago
> Their algo is simple show people what they are watching and engaging with. Imagine really just going on the internet and saying this. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/30/facebook-sad-manipulating-emotions-socially-responsible-company https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/30/facebo... Please note that article is from _2014_

EasyMark 3y ago

1. First get them panicked 2. Throw around some pseudo facts 3. Gauge the public response 4. "It's tepid at best" 5. Sweep it back under the rug, but now you have your talking points in the next election