As always, well put Devansh. the nature of social media is something I think about a lot and I've written about before. It's refreshing when someone is honest on social media. Isn't that sad?
I find that most of my essays are poking at these meta themes to find the truth. And sadly growth is much slower than if I just regurgitated derivative content.
Devansh - Nice and thoughtful post. Here are some questions “chew on”:
It sounds a bit like you’re implying that social media, and “the algorithm”, are driven by agency. Of course, they are not. The inputs and outputs of the social media ecosystem are under no one’s control. The critical paths of social media are random as regards their impact on society - social media are therefore insensitive to their consequences, much like GPTs.
In order to improve the impacts of social media on our social health, one therefore must “follow the money”: What is the most profitable automated set of procedures / processes that shape either or both of the two “halves” of social media? Those halves are, by the way, “form” (container type or channel / medium), and “content” (subject matter, such as the “meme of the day” or what’s trending). Usually, it’s driven by the profits from resale of personal data. Sometimes it’s subscription revenues. There are too many avenues to profit from social media to count.
So how do we trace into both content and changing form to identify a chicken, an egg, and which is which?
I think the relationship between social media and profitability is murky and kind of emergent. It’s all reality hard to parse.
"The inputs and outputs of the social media ecosystem are under no one’s control"- that is untrue. Companies have rules to demonetize certain topics and content, and those form strong nudges. Similarly, you can put a lot of money to influence the algorithms and social media. You might not have complete control, but for what I've described you don't need it.
What I've described is not a social media profit issue but about people being susceptible to overconsumption and mental fatigue. It can be improved by improving our robustness against it. There's no way to prevent systemic exploits against it by institutions but we can do our best to protect against it
A good point on your part, but we'll have to agree to disagree.
I do agree that "you might not have complete control", but I maintain that the amount of control that can be exerted is much less than what you believe.
Finally, I also agree that people are susceptible to overconsumption and mental fatigue. However, people can also make choices to self-regulate their exposure to social media. That people seem unable to do so is perhaps not their fault (because they grew up in a time when if you weren't driven by FOMA or social pressures of today, they may not be aware of what they would benefitting from changing about their choices. But as soon as one becomes aware that social media exposure - excess or otherwise - is unhealthy, they I believe they have an obligation to make better choices.
" But as soon as one becomes aware that social media exposure - excess or otherwise - is unhealthy, they I believe they have an obligation to make better choices."- That's the whole point of the post.
"but I maintain that the amount of control that can be exerted is much less than what you believe." I share 4 examples of the system being manipulated extremely successfully in this very post. For other cases, look at hustle culture, mass-overconsumption, and the gradual shifting towards individual responsibility over systemic fixes to fix major issues. Do I think that algorithms can be precisely changed. No (unless we're hardcoding, which is a different point of discussion). This doesn't mean that the system itself can't be changed. Spend a billion, buy into every important influence point (influencer, news source, publication), and you will see extremely good results in inducing mass action.
As always, well put Devansh. the nature of social media is something I think about a lot and I've written about before. It's refreshing when someone is honest on social media. Isn't that sad?
It really is. Everything became about branding and not being
That's very well put.
I find that most of my essays are poking at these meta themes to find the truth. And sadly growth is much slower than if I just regurgitated derivative content.
It's weird how people love repetitive content. I guess it feeds the ego
Devansh - Nice and thoughtful post. Here are some questions “chew on”:
It sounds a bit like you’re implying that social media, and “the algorithm”, are driven by agency. Of course, they are not. The inputs and outputs of the social media ecosystem are under no one’s control. The critical paths of social media are random as regards their impact on society - social media are therefore insensitive to their consequences, much like GPTs.
In order to improve the impacts of social media on our social health, one therefore must “follow the money”: What is the most profitable automated set of procedures / processes that shape either or both of the two “halves” of social media? Those halves are, by the way, “form” (container type or channel / medium), and “content” (subject matter, such as the “meme of the day” or what’s trending). Usually, it’s driven by the profits from resale of personal data. Sometimes it’s subscription revenues. There are too many avenues to profit from social media to count.
So how do we trace into both content and changing form to identify a chicken, an egg, and which is which?
I think the relationship between social media and profitability is murky and kind of emergent. It’s all reality hard to parse.
Your thoughts?
"The inputs and outputs of the social media ecosystem are under no one’s control"- that is untrue. Companies have rules to demonetize certain topics and content, and those form strong nudges. Similarly, you can put a lot of money to influence the algorithms and social media. You might not have complete control, but for what I've described you don't need it.
What I've described is not a social media profit issue but about people being susceptible to overconsumption and mental fatigue. It can be improved by improving our robustness against it. There's no way to prevent systemic exploits against it by institutions but we can do our best to protect against it
A good point on your part, but we'll have to agree to disagree.
I do agree that "you might not have complete control", but I maintain that the amount of control that can be exerted is much less than what you believe.
Finally, I also agree that people are susceptible to overconsumption and mental fatigue. However, people can also make choices to self-regulate their exposure to social media. That people seem unable to do so is perhaps not their fault (because they grew up in a time when if you weren't driven by FOMA or social pressures of today, they may not be aware of what they would benefitting from changing about their choices. But as soon as one becomes aware that social media exposure - excess or otherwise - is unhealthy, they I believe they have an obligation to make better choices.
" But as soon as one becomes aware that social media exposure - excess or otherwise - is unhealthy, they I believe they have an obligation to make better choices."- That's the whole point of the post.
"but I maintain that the amount of control that can be exerted is much less than what you believe." I share 4 examples of the system being manipulated extremely successfully in this very post. For other cases, look at hustle culture, mass-overconsumption, and the gradual shifting towards individual responsibility over systemic fixes to fix major issues. Do I think that algorithms can be precisely changed. No (unless we're hardcoding, which is a different point of discussion). This doesn't mean that the system itself can't be changed. Spend a billion, buy into every important influence point (influencer, news source, publication), and you will see extremely good results in inducing mass action.