Right, both platforms that algorithmically isolate people into echo chambers, only showing people content that offends them in ways that polarises them further, so as to keep them doom-scrolling forever.
My point is that this isn’t conducive with a social platform that unites people and builds consensus, but one that extract’s money at the cost of inflaming divisions even further.
social platform that unites people and builds consensus, but one that extract’s money (…)
I mean, thats the point and to pretend that any social media was ever anything but that is to either be a historical revisionist or delusional.
Reddit may have had a different point when Swartz was around, but anything that takes venture capitol money is eventually beholden to their moral prerogative. And that is the extraction of all possible wealth in the shortest possible timeline, even at the cost of the platform itsself. That final bit is key. and its a bummer that Reddit didn’t go public before all this fucking around, because we could be making good money off their demise.
Wanting the world to be better is not “delusional”.
Identifying something that exacerbates the problems in human society and arguing against it, is not “revisionist”.
Just because humans tend to be tribal, doesn’t mean the only way to benefit from being a facilitator of communication, is to cynically feed that trait.
If anything, that puts you in an even greater position of responsibility to design the system to do good. Give a system all that humanity creates, and you can make it make you feel whatever you want.
That we are choosing “whatever makes me money” again and again does not mean “whatever will make us grow as a species” isn’t also an option.
Pretending that social media was ever meant for anything other than profiting is “revisionist”, and you are being delusional if you think otherwise.}
There might be better ways, sure. But that was never the point. The point was always to make as much money as possible.
And to be clear “we” aren’t “choosing” anything. You aren’t reddit, or twitter, or facebook. You have no agency in this relationship other than to not participate.
Why are you acting as if meaningless defeatist comebacks are somehow successful one-ups?
I’m not pretending to believe anything, I’m fully aware of how current reality works, and has worked. You mistaking my optimism for what might be possible to mean I think that’s how the world does work, is on your antagonistic starting point.
If you think profit is the only reason people set out to run companies, then you’re the one who is delusional.
And any one of us might alone not amount to much, but even this discussion between you and me will sway at least two minds one way or the other. Scale that up a thousand times, and the direction we take a species is determined by the ideas exchanged between people, exactly as we are doing now, averaged out among us all.
If all you have to say is nihilistic bullshit about how we should just curl up and die because we can’t really ever do enough, then you can fuck off.
If you think profit is the only reason people set out to run companies, then you’re the one who is delusional.
If you take VC money, you play by their rules. Its not nihilistic to be realistic about the context of things.
And I appreciate your optimism, even if I consider it to be delusional. But to me that kind of ‘inactive hope’ is equivalent to what you accused me of doing (‘curl up and die’).
Proceeding through this world on hopes and prayers that a system set up to do anything but exploit and destroy will do anything but that is deeply problematic and contributes significantly to the issues. Its a kind of toxic positivity that gives people the illusion that they are doing something when they aren’t. I don’t have time for that.
Works for tictoc and instagram. afaik.
Right, both platforms that algorithmically isolate people into echo chambers, only showing people content that offends them in ways that polarises them further, so as to keep them doom-scrolling forever.
My point is that this isn’t conducive with a social platform that unites people and builds consensus, but one that extract’s money at the cost of inflaming divisions even further.
I mean, thats the point and to pretend that any social media was ever anything but that is to either be a historical revisionist or delusional.
Reddit may have had a different point when Swartz was around, but anything that takes venture capitol money is eventually beholden to their moral prerogative. And that is the extraction of all possible wealth in the shortest possible timeline, even at the cost of the platform itsself. That final bit is key. and its a bummer that Reddit didn’t go public before all this fucking around, because we could be making good money off their demise.
Wanting the world to be better is not “delusional”.
Identifying something that exacerbates the problems in human society and arguing against it, is not “revisionist”.
Just because humans tend to be tribal, doesn’t mean the only way to benefit from being a facilitator of communication, is to cynically feed that trait.
If anything, that puts you in an even greater position of responsibility to design the system to do good. Give a system all that humanity creates, and you can make it make you feel whatever you want.
That we are choosing “whatever makes me money” again and again does not mean “whatever will make us grow as a species” isn’t also an option.
Pretending that social media was ever meant for anything other than profiting is “revisionist”, and you are being delusional if you think otherwise.}
There might be better ways, sure. But that was never the point. The point was always to make as much money as possible.
And to be clear “we” aren’t “choosing” anything. You aren’t reddit, or twitter, or facebook. You have no agency in this relationship other than to not participate.
Why are you acting as if meaningless defeatist comebacks are somehow successful one-ups?
I’m not pretending to believe anything, I’m fully aware of how current reality works, and has worked. You mistaking my optimism for what might be possible to mean I think that’s how the world does work, is on your antagonistic starting point.
If you think profit is the only reason people set out to run companies, then you’re the one who is delusional.
And any one of us might alone not amount to much, but even this discussion between you and me will sway at least two minds one way or the other. Scale that up a thousand times, and the direction we take a species is determined by the ideas exchanged between people, exactly as we are doing now, averaged out among us all.
If all you have to say is nihilistic bullshit about how we should just curl up and die because we can’t really ever do enough, then you can fuck off.
If you take VC money, you play by their rules. Its not nihilistic to be realistic about the context of things.
And I appreciate your optimism, even if I consider it to be delusional. But to me that kind of ‘inactive hope’ is equivalent to what you accused me of doing (‘curl up and die’).
Proceeding through this world on hopes and prayers that a system set up to do anything but exploit and destroy will do anything but that is deeply problematic and contributes significantly to the issues. Its a kind of toxic positivity that gives people the illusion that they are doing something when they aren’t. I don’t have time for that.