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I miss the world as it was before pervasive social media. Compared to back then, we are now utterly consumed by the opinions of people we don't know and will ne

I miss the world as it was before pervasive social media. Compared to back then, we are now utterly consumed by the opinions of people we don't know and will never meet. We spend time worrying unreasonably about what a disembodied hive mind thinks or how it might harm us if our opinions don't conform. We have research which shows that social media has added to the depression and anxiety in the world and contributed to a mental health crisis. This has nothing to do with my childhood or my middle or high school years, I was well out of college before Facebook was created.

musicale 1y ago
Social media seems to be engineered to push people to extremes, and civil discourse seems almost impossible in many instances. Facebook's original feed was kind of OK when it was just a chronological list of posts from your friends (though that still has some issues). But of course that doesn't make as much money as an algorithmic feed that pushes advertisements and outrage-driven "engagement". Yellow journalism has been around forever, but now we have outrage media that is optimized for each person with an addictive feedback loop. Somehow I don't think AI is going to improve the situation.