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The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

stephendiehl.com

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Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#41

Post by alightsoul »

Biologist123 wrote: post #24

> People increasingly behave like addicts because addiction is the business model. I sense my internet addiction got a lot worse in recent years. I don’t use social media, but I consume news, blogs and newsletters - and comment threads - voraciously. I think the addiction began as soon as I started to work at a desk behind a computer which had internet access - 20+ years ago. Like putting an alcoholic to work behind…

And even worse, if you're addicted to soda, it is cheaper than bottled water, what if you don't have tap water?

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#42

Post by teekert »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #34
teekert wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the opposite. The vast majority of kind and gently people are suddenly observing a small but ultra loud obnoxious minority take the stage and burn resources like nothing else to get maximum attention. Attention wins and you don’t get it by being gentle, balanced, kind and most importantly, don’t care about maximum attention.

Thank you

Yeah, I just came back from traveling a couple of weeks, and I have had such wonderful experiences with people. There were times where I just wanted to hug a taxi cab driver (ie when a Grab driver was holding an umbrella over my vomiting daughter [car sickness] and me, with his car stopped by at the side of a highway... etc.)

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#43

Post by daoboy »

We're evolutionarily programmed to stop everything and focus on anything that elicits fear in our environment. Enormous amounts of money has been invested to design algorithms that capture our attention with fear because they need your attention to sell advertising. Everything's optimized to make you enraged and afraid because it works. They're really good at it too.

I know they got my number. I've had to delete every social media site I used to be engaged in (I suppose except this one) for the sake of my mental health.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#44

Post by grumbel »

shuwix wrote: post #25

Internet didn't change, it's population did. It's 8 billion potential victims and all bit more sophisticated thieves under one roof. Can't blame Internet. People which were scammed "offline" are now scammed online.

Internet deserves some blame too, when you have 8 billion people, but only 4 billion addresses, you are naturally going to end up with a lot of centralized services to work around those limits.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#46

Post by speak_plainly »

This also seems to be spilling into the real world. Because of this internet addiction, it’s almost guaranteed that everyone has a relatively expensive computer in their pocket. This has turned into an increasing number of real-world scams, as well as supporting trafficking networks for stealing phones. The scams range from old school pickpocketers to sympathy schemes to full out phone-related accusations – anything to get you to take your phone out of your pocket, potentially unlock it, and have someone swipe it.

If it’s unlocked, they may do some further scams from what’s available on the device, but either way, within days, your phone is somewhere in Asia, disassembled, and sold for scrap and parts.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#47

Post by karmakurtisaani »

After reddit prevented browsing old.reddit.com without signing in, I got a lot more active on lemmy. There's some amount of old internet feeling there, you don't get exhausted by the amount of material and it's not overrun by corporations. So far it's been nice.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#49

Post by dexwiz »

Biologist123 wrote: post #24

> People increasingly behave like addicts because addiction is the business model. I sense my internet addiction got a lot worse in recent years. I don’t use social media, but I consume news, blogs and newsletters - and comment threads - voraciously. I think the addiction began as soon as I started to work at a desk behind a computer which had internet access - 20+ years ago. Like putting an alcoholic to work behind…

Pandemic really ramped it up. Also screen addiction has gone mainstream. In front of a screen 12+ hours a day 20 years ago? Total nerd. Now? Standard behavior.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#50

Post by bakugo »

teekert wrote: post #29
operatingthetan wrote: post #9

My feeling is that the current state of the internet is just exposing how humans behave normally, the guardrails have just fallen away. Everyone is immune to shame, the threat of consequences etc. You see this in real life on the streets too.

I think the opposite. The vast majority of kind and gently people are suddenly observing a small but ultra loud obnoxious minority take the stage and burn resources like nothing else to get maximum attention. Attention wins and you don’t get it by being gentle, balanced, kind and most importantly, don’t care about maximum attention.

This is the right takeaway. Before the internet went mainstream, these ultra loud and obnoxious minorities were restricted to being obnoxious within their local communities, and their speech was restricted to what they were willing to say to others face-to-face.

Now, both of those restrictions have been lifted: they can now act obnoxious in front of a global audience that will be forced to listen to them, and they no longer have to worry about the potential consequences of being obnoxious in person.

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