Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

stephendiehl.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 334 posts

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#71

Post by teekert »

gilleain wrote: post #55
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.

There is the saying "the empty vessel makes the loudest noise". This was part of the reason I eventually left Reddit, as I was getting sucked in to the habit of making empty meme-like responses to posts. Some of the worst places for comments I've seen are on youtube - just the lowest effort ("who is listening to this in 2026?!") or the most obnoxious, or just misunderstood. Partly this is because of voting systems co…

I watched the announcement on the detection on gravitational waves on YT. The comments scrolling by were like from another world, I even made some screenshots, insane, obnoxious. Could be bots I suppose, I hear from political commentators here who advocate for thoughtful commentary "from the middle", that their social media posts are always very quickly flooded by the same kind of polarizing low-level comments that drown out any intellectual and thoughtful debate. It's probably partly bots, partly a small minority of people that get sucked into it by the bots. I have no problem believing this is Russia, or NK, undermining our democracy in a fully automated fashion.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#72

Post by Shuang1 »

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 actually think the opposite, the hatred on the internet seems artificial to me.

In the current day when AI is so prevalent, it always makes me wonder how many posts are made by agents instructed to maximize engagement by making people angry.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#73

Post by TFNA »

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…

Internet addiction in the early millennium wasn't so destructive, because so much internet content was somehow related to quality interaction with other people. You could meet cool new people (even occasionally IRL friends) from forums and blogs, and they were a hub for discussion for real-life communities like music-band fandom or travel subcultures.

Besides the deleterious nature of engagement-maximizing social media today, I think another aspect of the problem is that there is less connection to real-life socializing simply because that has collapsed in so many countries.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#74

Post by KellyCriterion »

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…

Im with you! The most times Im late for "some things on a project" at work is, because, I wasted time reading through dozens of feeds/news/comments on "too many" days so I got somehow a "delay" ;-)

Esp. comments: Actually, I ready mostly those because usually they have more information or context etc.than the article itself. (BTW: thats the reason why Im here on HN :-)

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#76

Post by Glyptodon »

aktenlage wrote: post #16

This so exaggerated. If you think some of the people you know are assholes, that's fine. If you think all of them are assholes, you are either choosing the wrong places to be, or (more likely) the problem is with you.

I don't think everyone is an asshole exactly but something is wrong with more and more people and you see it everything from how people drive to the degree to which so many things seem more adversarial or feel like part time jobs.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#77

Post by api »

stillpointlab wrote: post #31

One thing people go through as they age is an elevation of cynicism and general misanthropy. After decades of being disappointed when naive idealism and speculative optimism fail, one can just get down on it all. It is really hard not to succumb to this. It requires active effort and sometimes even a willful ignorance. "turn a blind eye" is the idiom here. Monty Python's "Always look on the bright side of life" kind…

If you can’t help, it’s okay to look away.

People sometimes get mad at this, like it’s callous or privileged, but what’s the difference between focusing on problems you can’t help and slowing down to stare at a car wreck?

If you don’t slow down are you being insensitive?

Obviously if you can help it’s different.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#78

Post by dzink »

Part 1: Everything was turned into social User Generated Content to reduce editorial costs. Part 2: Predatory third parties ranging from nation states to SEO agencies started mass filling UGC with anxiety inducing brain rot. Part 3: the brainrot generation is automated by AI and it silences any real people or voices. Part 4: People go outside to touch grass and Part 5: That leaves opportunities for platforms for real people with good culture

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#79

Post by EA-3167 »

tristanj wrote: post #19

Well duh, was this not expected? The Internet userbase has transitioned dramatically over the past several decades. It moved from an outpost for computer nerds in the early 1990s, to a middle-class product in the 2000s, then everybody got access in the 2010s with the spread of the smartphone. The demographics of the internet look nothing like they did when it was created.

That’s why you’re seeing stratification reemerge imo. Paywalls are probably the most obvious feature of this, where information worth accessing these days tends to be paywalled. By contrast high volume, low quality slop supported by ads is generally free.

Re: The internet is kind of a predatory cesspit now

#80

Post by CommenterPerson »

Sadly, one of the contributors to this are the "Little" Tech Bros. They have drunk the kool aid at work. A bit libertarian or right wing in nature, they salivate at the latest Full Self Driving (supervised) lie, or AI hype, or crypto when it first came out. Some intricate new feature or language puts them into paroxysms of joy. In their view, any attempt to regulate or draw boundaries around "tech" equates to communism, marxism, and attempts to curtail so called freedom of speech. Don't use it if you don't like it, they say.

By Little Tech Bros i mean developers with lots of technical skills, but who haven't been lucky enough to be in the right spot at the right time with an IPO. They keep evangelizing hoping megabucks lightning will hit them the next time. It won't. More likely, a layoff notice. Because Big Tech Bro figured out how to grab all the money from their excess productivity.

Post reply on HN