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Against Facebook

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81–90 of 93 posts

Re: Against Facebook

#81
post #55
post #45

> This process of commodification has turned us all into tastemakers, reviewers, likers, retweeters and brand ambassadors. The platform takes our real authentic friendships and first commodifies them, reifies them, and then sells them back to us as an “image of friendship”, but one that is bankrupt of any genuine social value. This is the money quote. The article raises a lot of points and is a provocating read. One…

See, 'microwork' is flawed. Facebook doesn't really benefit from the endless stream of likes and comments and sharing. Facebook couldn't care less what you like or what you actually think about current events or what your mood is or who your friends are or whether you're single. The "work" you're doing by telling Facebook this is not for Facebook's benefit. The "content" is not the point. Facebook can monetize the da…

> anarchy / anarchic

You Keep Using That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means

Re: Against Facebook

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very well written but it's only if you are still within the matrix that Facebook even matters to your life. I see teenagers checking their little phones every minute on Instagram or Facebook and I think it's sad, but they will learn from it. Currently human kind is learning what it feels like to require random likes from strangers in order to feel happy. At the same time a lot of people feel nervous in real life beca…

As someone not in the prison, it feels wonderful to not have to deal with this whole class of problems that come with being on these platforms. How many times I’ve obsessed over taking the perfect selfie: ZERO How many times I’ve posted a status update and worried about how many “likes” I got: ZERO How many times I’ve felt anxiety over who to friend or unfriend: ZERO It is great to actually have time to live my life…

how many times have you obsessed about the perfect HN comment though?

Re: Against Facebook

#83
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I agree it is more a part of our civilization as an expected norm of operation. Where I differ from the author is the fact that the majority of us our very capable of controlling our behavior although we may not initially realize our pattern or be self-reflecting on how it may be detrimental.

Curious if you use ad-blocking software/extensions? Most people don't AFAIK. Curious if you let yourself be influenced by ads or not. Not a judgement call on ads, some people like being exposed to ads especially if they're targeted.

I don't. I usually scroll/resize the window so I don't see them. I honestly don't care if they are tracking me one way or the other. If you know what the government already does, we're already screwed so its more of a statement than useful to ad block. I think if you go to the trouble of being on a TOR network then you're good but otherwise, you're fooling yourself.

Re: Against Facebook

#84
post #5

This article makes it sound like people are forced to be social addicts. Maybe some of us our outliers here so it may be odd for me to say this but I honestly have spent more time coding social networks than actually using them. So no, I don't get how people are forced to use them.

Most addicts of any type are not forced to become so, but that shouldn't make us less sympathetic to their situations, should it? Not many people are forced to use drugs or tobacco or alcohol or coffee etc, but they still get addicted. I don't use fb or the other attention-mongering social media sites, so I feel you in not understanding how they are so addictive. But I am pretty sure they are in fact addictive to a l…

I think anything that is good or feels good has that potential of affecting behavior towards it. Using the word "addict" is a cop out to take away personal responsibility. There are true addicts so it should not be used so lightly. Mark Zuckerburg is a trail blazer, creating industries which did not exist and which no one could predict the negative outcomes. Overall, I'm sure Facebook has done much more good than bad to connect people in a positive way. If it is a net gain, then it is worth fixing, even if that fix means to completely change the technology approach using some blockchain value proposition for example for social cred that is universal and lives outside the social networks themselves.

Re: Against Facebook

#85
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone not in the prison, it feels wonderful to not have to deal with this whole class of problems that come with being on these platforms. How many times I’ve obsessed over taking the perfect selfie: ZERO How many times I’ve posted a status update and worried about how many “likes” I got: ZERO How many times I’ve felt anxiety over who to friend or unfriend: ZERO It is great to actually have time to live my life…

how many times have you obsessed about the perfect HN comment though?

Pretty much never. I've edited spelling errors though. Comments get up and down voted pretty much randomly here, but who cares? They're fake internet points!

Re: Against Facebook

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

can you explain how the logic is not flawed? If you are consuming 50% SNR news, it will be 50% regardless of whether you read once a day or once an hour

The argument is NOT that news is 50% SNR, the argument is that BOOKS are 50% SNR. Effectively, an edited collection of the news over the course of a year has a low SNR compared to that of following the constant stream of instant-news. The point was expressed badly, but it's about the way that the average quality of new-stuff is a lot lower than the average quality of a curated set of high-quality stuff from a time pe…

My comment was about the logic. And in any case books are not news. It's apples to oranges. Sure they have great information, but it's useless if it's way past its actionable date.

Re: Against Facebook

#87
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sometimes use the share as message feature. Now I rarely share something on my timeine, and my timeline is becoming space as time goes on.

> my timeline is becoming space as time goes on Is this a typo, or extremely poetic and I'm just failing to parse it?

oops :) meant to be sparse

Re: Against Facebook

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

okay, but could you give some example to back up your judgment? I don't want to read huge long things like this that are bad nor to let "it's bad" comments be enough to sabotage my potential reading of something.

> media-driven neuroticism—a love of change for its own sake, or neomania, a love of new things. Ultimately, neomania together with the media has a negative effect on our moods, which isn’t surprising considering most of what makes the daily news is negative. This leaves us feeling powerless, like the world is falling apart. So we turn to social media to witness the (seemingly) beautiful lives of celebrities, and the…

> it's plain falacious bullshit.

fallacious

Re: Against Facebook

#89
post #55
post #45

> This process of commodification has turned us all into tastemakers, reviewers, likers, retweeters and brand ambassadors. The platform takes our real authentic friendships and first commodifies them, reifies them, and then sells them back to us as an “image of friendship”, but one that is bankrupt of any genuine social value. This is the money quote. The article raises a lot of points and is a provocating read. One…

See, 'microwork' is flawed. Facebook doesn't really benefit from the endless stream of likes and comments and sharing. Facebook couldn't care less what you like or what you actually think about current events or what your mood is or who your friends are or whether you're single. The "work" you're doing by telling Facebook this is not for Facebook's benefit. The "content" is not the point. Facebook can monetize the da…

"Facebook doesn't really benefit from the endless stream of likes and comments and sharing."

I am pretty sure it does. It can sell targeted ads based on what you like. My previous company was implementing an "advocates program" where people could get rewards for sharing stuff on facebok (about the company).

Re: Against Facebook

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most addicts of any type are not forced to become so, but that shouldn't make us less sympathetic to their situations, should it? Not many people are forced to use drugs or tobacco or alcohol or coffee etc, but they still get addicted. I don't use fb or the other attention-mongering social media sites, so I feel you in not understanding how they are so addictive. But I am pretty sure they are in fact addictive to a l…

I think anything that is good or feels good has that potential of affecting behavior towards it. Using the word "addict" is a cop out to take away personal responsibility. There are true addicts so it should not be used so lightly. Mark Zuckerburg is a trail blazer, creating industries which did not exist and which no one could predict the negative outcomes. Overall, I'm sure Facebook has done much more good than bad…

> Using the word "addict" is a cop out to take away personal responsibility.

It's not a cop out. It's a fact. Social media can fit the exact definition of "addiction" for some people. Personal responsibility is present if you're abusing a drug or social media.

From your comments, it appears you aren't affected. Great. Similar to how you probably can't relate to a heroin addict means you can't relate to a social media addict.

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