Ask HN: What are we doing about Facebook, Google, and the closed internet?

If this is inevitable, and this is best for "WE"/"OUR" needs - then does it just make more sense to accept it and strive to be in charge of the process instead?

Is it now OK, to just accept that people will be manipulated by those who know the method to do so? And apply to those firms?

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Yes - If people turn out to be harder to model, it may be harder to corral people and ideas. The model and assumptions in the larger discussion being held in this topic will be logged as hyerbole and we will move on.

Yet - its clear that people DO have some obvious levers, essentially the human hind brain is an easy target to throw emotionally laden messages at. The brains react and then oppose whatever target they are provided.

Yeah, but what if you post it on your personal wall, and get banned for that? You won't be able to access your page, it doesn't matter you kept it clean.

I've been watching emotional manipulation in India and around the world for decades now. Its always been among my top concerns, and its definitively become worse. I'd argue its a lot worse on all axes, but if you want a singular reasons - targeting has now all encompassing. Its on all the time, it knows where you are, who you know, what you like, in a dramatic way.

Also - you have a third confounding variable in your data. Parents in India from that era were not as educated as counterparts in the west.

The west went through its periods of darkness, where the average person was not educated, and when religious institutions dominated the scene.

They had decades to over come this, generally following the Enlightenment.

India too will hopefully struggle with these same issues. But the new medium for ideas is more dangerous than the one which came before - for ideas themselves.

In a slower news cycle there is also time to reflect. The lack of being always connected, meant that the transfer of memetic force was always broken up.

Emotion is the lever by which most of the world is moved. Whatsapp forwards come at any time, can contain any content and will be accepted by the receiver often without reflection.

The world has iterated, and for the worse.

You miss the critical purpose served by more emotional hind brain thinking - its easier to repeat and get predictable responses to.

Think of this as much older hackers using new tools to do better at their subject - their subject being the hacking of human brains.

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A simple way to test the effectiveness of your proposal is to see how forums perform. The more complex a topic, the fewer participants and the fewer posts.

People don't want to engage in complex topics, unless they fulfill certain selection criteria.

You can't make people consume more complex information - unless you remove all other mental food options from the table in the first place.

It is very much like making children eat broccoli. Except the children are grown adults, and are being bombarded by companies selling them thought sugar because it generates click revenue.

There is no market solution to this - there may not even be a regulatory solution to this.

The best I can expect is a legal challenge, but who would the injured parties be, and what would be the injury?