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Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

theatlantic.com

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Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#101

Post by dylan604 »

segasaturn wrote: post #4

Maybe that's a good thing? I remember a few years ago when journalists were outsourcing their reporting to Twitter and we had headlines like "The Internet is Freaking Out About X" when it was really a dozen nobodies on Twitter. The death of Twitter and the re-fragmentation of the internet sounds like a breath of fresh air compared to the purple haze of the last decade's centralized web.

I can't decide if I dislike these more than the articles that just list items on Amazon where they just quote the reviews like they interviewed them. I assume they generate enough money through the link click throughs that make these articles worth while? I find these more repugnant than listicles. But twitter quotes, amazon review summaries, and listicles have to be the top 3 least favorite for me.

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#102

Post by mcphage »

cbozeman wrote: post #44
segasaturn wrote: post #4

Maybe that's a good thing? I remember a few years ago when journalists were outsourcing their reporting to Twitter and we had headlines like "The Internet is Freaking Out About X" when it was really a dozen nobodies on Twitter. The death of Twitter and the re-fragmentation of the internet sounds like a breath of fresh air compared to the purple haze of the last decade's centralized web.

X isn't dead, nor is it dying. Elon Musk took away a bunch of people's status, people who thought they were important somebodies because some nerds in an office met them in person and/or they paid some money to get a verification mark. That's what happened. It's the election of Donald Trump all over again. One of the few people who actually understood what happened in the 2016 election - and was able to articulate it…

> a lot of the people I followed on X no longer post there. Their loss, not mine. Nothing changed except everyone is allowed to use the megaphone now.

That's a weird take. The people whose posts you wanted to read no longer post on X, but also nothing has changed? It would seem you're describing a personally significant change right there.

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#103

Post by daveslash »

I'm going to get this quote wrong, but there was an author (Clarke, Bradbury, Asimov? one of those folks) who said something along the lines of "We were lucky to be the last generation to be able to read all science fiction that was published. But considering that 80% of what is written is garbage, perhaps we weren't so lucky"

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#104

Post by chankstein38 »

cbozeman wrote: post #44
segasaturn wrote: post #4

Maybe that's a good thing? I remember a few years ago when journalists were outsourcing their reporting to Twitter and we had headlines like "The Internet is Freaking Out About X" when it was really a dozen nobodies on Twitter. The death of Twitter and the re-fragmentation of the internet sounds like a breath of fresh air compared to the purple haze of the last decade's centralized web.

X isn't dead, nor is it dying. Elon Musk took away a bunch of people's status, people who thought they were important somebodies because some nerds in an office met them in person and/or they paid some money to get a verification mark. That's what happened. It's the election of Donald Trump all over again. One of the few people who actually understood what happened in the 2016 election - and was able to articulate it…

I only have a few anecdotal pieces of evidence but I know of two people, who didn't give a damn about checkmarks, who have stopped using twitter because it's unusable now. They were die-hard twitter users who were on it every day but now they don't even open it. They were also the only two twitter-obsessed folks I know and now both of them have no interest.

Again, just anecdotes but I feel like that's more evidence than you're sharing in this comment.

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#105

Post by chankstein38 »

gpspake wrote: post #64
cbozeman wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

X isn't dead, nor is it dying. Elon Musk took away a bunch of people's status, people who thought they were important somebodies because some nerds in an office met them in person and/or they paid some money to get a verification mark. That's what happened. It's the election of Donald Trump all over again. One of the few people who actually understood what happened in the 2016 election - and was able to articulate it…

Who are the nebulous "elites" and are you suggesting that Musk and Trump don't belong in that number? It seems like the argument is that the sheep got one over on the _maybe_ wolves by... rallying behind a couple of _definitely_ wolves who threw on some crummy sheep costumes?

Don't you love when people do that? lol "Trump and Musk aren't like the elites!" like oh I didn't realize your normal, everyday, average Joe could just leverage their assets and spend $44bn to buy a platform just to ~destroy it~ sorry, make it better by making sure no one posts there.

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#106

Post by listenallyall »

jpalawaga wrote: post #70
cbozeman wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

X isn't dead, nor is it dying. Elon Musk took away a bunch of people's status, people who thought they were important somebodies because some nerds in an office met them in person and/or they paid some money to get a verification mark. That's what happened. It's the election of Donald Trump all over again. One of the few people who actually understood what happened in the 2016 election - and was able to articulate it…

I’m not sure I agree that this is close to reality. The reality is much more benign. Musk isn’t the savior of free speech, he inserts rules against it constantly, like throttling nyt or saying they’ll comply with authoritarian states. He’s complains about spam and bots (despite claiming it’s an easy problem to solve) then changes verification in a way the makes it difficult know who is actually who. Separately, you s…

How is throttling the New York Times on X anti-free speech? NYT is its own media platform, among the most powerful in the world, why should it expect a separate outlet to promote it? Further, as a powerful media outlet, the Times itself "throttles" all kinds of voices and opinions with which its editorial board and majority of its employees and readers don't agree.

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#107

Post by bobsmooth »

Pxtl wrote: post #28

The paywall on the article is ironic since the collapse of free reputable news is likely another aspect of that. I keep hoping the Fediverse will win. After what's happened to Twitter and Reddit and Facebook, it seems self-evident that our main means of public discourse needs to be something decentralized. But the Fediverse is struggling. UX is a disaster, every instance admin is holding on by their fingernails to st…

You can either have free or you can have reputable. Real journalism costs money. You know people used to buy the newspaper for a few bucks everyday right? Now people can't be bothered to spend the same amount for a whole month's worth of news.

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#108

Post by 1970-01-01 »

Lamad1234 wrote: post #68
1970-01-01 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm coming around to just ignoring the Atlantic. Their opinions have a rambling and stream of consciousness flow because they attempt to make something big out of something very small. Amplification of problems can be important, however when it's done in this style, you still have lots of disconnected problems and overall garbage as output.

I don't know. I think it's a really good article. The most watched Netflix show that nobody's heard of is such an thought-provoking thing to bring up.

>The most watched Netflix show that nobody's heard of

The oxymoronic style of this sentence reflects why I now ignore reading the Atlantic. Clearly it cannot be true, yet they claim it is to continue their narrative. Their next sentence, a citation of "one person posted" is also unpalatable.

Re: Nobody knows what's happening online anymore

#109

Post by makeitdouble »

steveBK123 wrote: post #11
segasaturn wrote: post #4

Maybe that's a good thing? I remember a few years ago when journalists were outsourcing their reporting to Twitter and we had headlines like "The Internet is Freaking Out About X" when it was really a dozen nobodies on Twitter. The death of Twitter and the re-fragmentation of the internet sounds like a breath of fresh air compared to the purple haze of the last decade's centralized web.

Would agree. Some old school journalists from NYT wrote about that phenomenon. Colleagues doing a lot of stories that were basically the groupthink of their friend group or what they saw on Twitter. Part of it is economics/incentives leading journalists to have to churn out a lot of content. Part of it is laziness as it's a lot easier than going out into the field and actually talking to people.

That sounds a lot like how "news" were sourced before that, with random interviews at street corners near the newspaper's office, stuff they heard at parties and from friends.

I don't believe there has been a fundamental shift on how much people are willing to put work into their pieces.

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