4 ms·

I suspect the OP understands this. Since few of those on HN (I am assuming) no longer have a FB presence, the question is why hasn't everyone arrived at this sa

I suspect the OP understands this. Since few of those on HN (I am assuming) no longer have a FB presence, the question is why hasn't everyone arrived at this same conclusion and walked away from that addiction? Meta should really have gone the way of MySpace a long, long time ago.

jasonjayr 2mo ago
Breaking any type of addiction is hard. For some people it requires intentional and deliberate help from others.
- SoftTalker 2mo ago
  Social media is a habit more than an addiction. It's easy to stop if you engage in other social activities. The trouble for many people who grew up online is that they don't have much experience doing that.
  - fsflover 2mo ago
    Facebook is intentionally designed to be as addictive as possible. It's not "a habit more than an addiction", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24579498 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24579498
Bluestein 2mo ago
And/or MySpace should have gone the way of F'book :) Though I hear it might make a comeback.- PS. To your point, I am guessing: For one thing it takes the ability to thus conclude, to begin with. THAT, in turn takes intellect and time AND evidence such as has been accruing. AND third, probably, because addictions are by definition hard to quit. ALSO: I think few times in the history of addictive behaviours has the enabling agent had such a low low low entry threshold, such presumptive innocuousness, and such assumed and granted "utility". It began by hijacking human communication, "socialization". It is devious.-
mrguyorama 2mo ago
People educated in math and probability are actually still prone to gambling addiction and things. It doesn't matter what your high level brain knows, there is a structure and organization of your brain that only changes on geologic timescales, and that structure has serious, easily attackable flaws.
- Bluestein 2mo ago
  I like your use of "attackable" (and of flaws, obviously).- PS. F'book commoditized social interaction to their ends while abusing these attackable surfaces. Kalshi and that ilk have now done away with the whole pretense of communication itself and are abusing the same addiction mechanisms to commoditize OPINION to their ends. Opinions: Everybody has one.- PS. At some point somebody is going to commoditize mere bodily movement wrapped into such an addictive mechanism and we will get people with "weird" performative "palsies" walking about.-
  - Henchman21 2mo ago
    Nobody expects… the Ministry of Silly Walks?
jolmg 2mo ago
People may believe they need facebook to maintain their relationships.
arjie 2mo ago
People always say this and so I decided to go look at my Facebook feed and it’s entirely people with their families posting completely innocuous photographs. The one exception is that Sadiq Khan the mayor of London is inexplicably on my feed eating at the restaurant Darjeeling Express. Did I follow him accidentally? Who knows. In any case, the reason I haven’t bothered is that the Facebook feed is entirely harmless. I wish I could show you guys. Is this entire phenomenon one of those things that people believe is happening to others and not them? Having scrolled that feed, I am confident that an unfiltered HN read would have more outrage porn than that.
- rightbyte 2mo ago
  It is different for different users and different at different times. It is probably especially bad with few contacts that write on FB or if you log in like twice a year. Similar confusion on HN comments about SaaS UX arise when there is AB testing and some are victims and some are not.
  - deleted 2mo ago
    [deleted]
- 8note 2mo ago
  this sounds like you have some form of adblock installed that is removing half or more of the posts? the fundamental issue is that the user has no actual control over what ends up on the feed, and everyone's experience is based on what facebook decides you should see. i manipulated mine to show only leatherwork, but it'll never ever show me stuff from my friends. instead of showing me what my friends are up to - deletig any likes and telling it to never show me suggested junk - it shows an error for "add more friends" rather than show content from my friends which they definitely do have. i get the sense that facebook has marked my friends as not worth having their posts seen, so it cant add their stuff to my feed even when i dont have anything else on my feed.
  - arjie 2mo ago
    That's a fair complaint. I use the chronological feed on Twitter/X as well because the algo feed is kind of meaningless. I just want to know what people I follow are saying.

jasonjayr 2mo ago

Breaking any type of addiction is hard. For some people it requires intentional and deliberate help from others.

SoftTalker 2mo ago
Social media is a habit more than an addiction. It's easy to stop if you engage in other social activities. The trouble for many people who grew up online is that they don't have much experience doing that.
- fsflover 2mo ago
  Facebook is intentionally designed to be as addictive as possible. It's not "a habit more than an addiction", https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24579498 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24579498

Bluestein 2mo ago

And/or MySpace should have gone the way of F'book :) Though I hear it might make a comeback.- PS. To your point, I am guessing: For one thing it takes the ability to thus conclude, to begin with. THAT, in turn takes intellect and time AND evidence such as has been accruing. AND third, probably, because addictions are by definition hard to quit. ALSO: I think few times in the history of addictive behaviours has the enabling agent had such a low low low entry threshold, such presumptive innocuousness, and such assumed and granted "utility". It began by hijacking human communication, "socialization". It is devious.-

mrguyorama 2mo ago

People educated in math and probability are actually still prone to gambling addiction and things. It doesn't matter what your high level brain knows, there is a structure and organization of your brain that only changes on geologic timescales, and that structure has serious, easily attackable flaws.

Bluestein 2mo ago
I like your use of "attackable" (and of flaws, obviously).- PS. F'book commoditized social interaction to their ends while abusing these attackable surfaces. Kalshi and that ilk have now done away with the whole pretense of communication itself and are abusing the same addiction mechanisms to commoditize OPINION to their ends. Opinions: Everybody has one.- PS. At some point somebody is going to commoditize mere bodily movement wrapped into such an addictive mechanism and we will get people with "weird" performative "palsies" walking about.-
- Henchman21 2mo ago
  Nobody expects… the Ministry of Silly Walks?

jolmg 2mo ago

People may believe they need facebook to maintain their relationships.

arjie 2mo ago

People always say this and so I decided to go look at my Facebook feed and it’s entirely people with their families posting completely innocuous photographs. The one exception is that Sadiq Khan the mayor of London is inexplicably on my feed eating at the restaurant Darjeeling Express. Did I follow him accidentally? Who knows. In any case, the reason I haven’t bothered is that the Facebook feed is entirely harmless. I wish I could show you guys. Is this entire phenomenon one of those things that people believe is happening to others and not them? Having scrolled that feed, I am confident that an unfiltered HN read would have more outrage porn than that.

rightbyte 2mo ago
It is different for different users and different at different times. It is probably especially bad with few contacts that write on FB or if you log in like twice a year. Similar confusion on HN comments about SaaS UX arise when there is AB testing and some are victims and some are not.
- deleted 2mo ago
  [deleted]
8note 2mo ago
this sounds like you have some form of adblock installed that is removing half or more of the posts? the fundamental issue is that the user has no actual control over what ends up on the feed, and everyone's experience is based on what facebook decides you should see. i manipulated mine to show only leatherwork, but it'll never ever show me stuff from my friends. instead of showing me what my friends are up to - deletig any likes and telling it to never show me suggested junk - it shows an error for "add more friends" rather than show content from my friends which they definitely do have. i get the sense that facebook has marked my friends as not worth having their posts seen, so it cant add their stuff to my feed even when i dont have anything else on my feed.
- arjie 2mo ago
  That's a fair complaint. I use the chronological feed on Twitter/X as well because the algo feed is kind of meaningless. I just want to know what people I follow are saying.