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Quit Social Media (2016)

calnewport.com

171–180 of 281 posts

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#171
Social media is not problematic if you engage with intent and use alternative sources to check claims. People unfortunate to never have been trained in Defense Against The Dark Arts of Propaganda and Manipulation are at risk but that's always been true, even when all media was of the printed sort. Basic critical analysis skills are vital to survival and mental health in this world.

By 'engage with intent' I just mean not being a passive absorber of the stream of content that's being promoted at whatever site, but instead always have some focus on a particular topic that interests you. Incidentally I notice many of the 'quit social media' stories are published in outlets like the NYTimes which would instead like you to be a passive, well-conditioned absorber of their content, and hence off their advertising stream.

The corporation is run for profit, it doesn't care about the collateral damage it may cause as long as it doesn't impact the bottom line.

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's sickening, honestly. IA is a tool to help you access websites that literally can't be accessed ever again otherwise. It's a noble and beautiful project. Some people use it just to get free stuff, to commit piracy, to infringe upon copyright. It's a perversion of what it was meant for.

Piracy is a service problem. A paywall literally says “you might like this but pay me first to see what it is.” Substack has a “let me read it first” button and I’ve never seen an archive link to that even though there are plenty of private articles. The concept of gift links exists, but these websites footaxe themselves by limiting their most viral content —- ostensibly the best and cheapest marketing they could get…

It doesn't matter how you rationalize your acts, the fact you're abusing IA's infrastructure doesn't change.

To me, you burned a hospital bed to send a message that capitalism is bad. I don't care what your opinion is. You burned the bed.

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#174

I've completely quit social media except for LinkedIn, which I need for my work, and Reddit, which I selectively use for product recommendations and advice on my career and relationships. And also Twitter, through which I receive the latest research in my domain. And Instagram, which my girlfriend uses to send me memes and videos. Occasionally Facebook for event invitations. And this website. But other than that I've…

What makes Hacker News a social media website?

It's an infinite feed of content with comments and ranking based on upvotes (aka likes)

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#175

I've completely quit social media except for LinkedIn, which I need for my work, and Reddit, which I selectively use for product recommendations and advice on my career and relationships. And also Twitter, through which I receive the latest research in my domain. And Instagram, which my girlfriend uses to send me memes and videos. Occasionally Facebook for event invitations. And this website. But other than that I've…

What makes Hacker News a social media website?

I would argue the defining factor of social media which separates it from blogs/forums/etc. is the ubiquitous feedback metrics, in the form of likes/downvotes/retweets/etc.

Imagine attending party where whenever you finished a sentence, everyone who was listening immediately responded with a silent thumbs up / thumbs down in response. Pretty dystopian. The Onion did a sketch illustrating the problem a few years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFpK_r-jEXg

By this definition, HN is halfway to being social media. There are metrics, but they aren't displayed publicly.

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#176

> “I decided, after 15 years, to live in reality.” This is the crux of the matter. Social media isn’t real; it’s a type of video game for adults. The unreality fosters the growth of so many other things which are even less concerned with truth: fake news, engagement bait, daily outrages, chasing followers in a vain attempt to “build a personal brand.” The vacuousness of influencer culture has only accelerated these t…

Unfortunately, it can be worth it. Having a social media audience can be very valuable to entrepreneurs. Someone who lives online with a personal brand can replace tens of thousands of dollars in ad spend with a single tweet. As someone who hasn't had a social media presence for most of my adult life, and happy about that, I'm now seeing the downsides. I don't have Ivy League connections like some of my peers. Social…

I feel this. However I also remind myself that social media connections are never as strong as those we've made in real life, and that there have been former influencers who've hung up their hat and lamented that their residual social connections regress to something close to a mean a lot quicker than they would've liked.

Ultimately, the act of winning at social media seems a bit too subordinate to me.

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#177

> “I decided, after 15 years, to live in reality.” This is the crux of the matter. Social media isn’t real; it’s a type of video game for adults. The unreality fosters the growth of so many other things which are even less concerned with truth: fake news, engagement bait, daily outrages, chasing followers in a vain attempt to “build a personal brand.” The vacuousness of influencer culture has only accelerated these t…

I think you make valid points about the downsides of "influencer culture" and usage patterns of some forms of social media. BUT. I'm think the term "social media" is too broad to be useful in this kind of critique. This conversation we're having is a bit meta, but it's also "real", to me. We both considered Cal Newport's stance, Matt Green shared some thoughts about it, and Chris Weekly responded to it. Those are rea…

I think there's a lot of value, both social and emotional, to social media. That doesn't change the fact that social media products as they exist are not only not creating that value, they are outwardly, openly hostile to it. HN being a notable exception and why I spend a lot of time here. The discussions are thoughtful and the topics are (usually) at least somewhat relevant to my career and life. That said, the more mainstream social medias are not relevant to me, they are not stimulating or thoughtful, and they are not valuable.

I have Instagram and TikTok installed because both of my partners send me things from them that made them think of me, and in this way, and only this way, they are relevant and nurturing to my existence. That said, I never engage with them outside of that context, because it's just an endless barrage of vacuous bullshit, as are the rest, with TikTok personally, I think, being the largest firehose of stupid, worthless, intellectually bankrupt, pointless shit ever constructed by mankind. Holy fuck. Like they're all bad, but TikTok... it's just the modern social media apparatus refined and polished to a mirror shine. Takes absolutely no effort to engage with, and if you're sufficiently numb to outside stimulus, you will scroll it for literal hours. If social media is a drug, TikTok is black-tar heroin.

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#178

> “I decided, after 15 years, to live in reality.” This is the crux of the matter. Social media isn’t real; it’s a type of video game for adults. The unreality fosters the growth of so many other things which are even less concerned with truth: fake news, engagement bait, daily outrages, chasing followers in a vain attempt to “build a personal brand.” The vacuousness of influencer culture has only accelerated these t…

I think you make valid points about the downsides of "influencer culture" and usage patterns of some forms of social media. BUT. I'm think the term "social media" is too broad to be useful in this kind of critique. This conversation we're having is a bit meta, but it's also "real", to me. We both considered Cal Newport's stance, Matt Green shared some thoughts about it, and Chris Weekly responded to it. Those are rea…

The danger of the point I'm making is that the less-realness that I'm arguing justifies poor behavior online. It does not. Many posters become seduced by the less-realness of online contact that they disconnect their own notions of what decent behavior is.

> Those are real people interacting in a potentially useful way. Being "addicted" to ideas and conversations is not necessarily unhealthy.

Agree! Addiction is compulsive use and the need to continually engage. My HN use is subject to a max of 15m a day with a browser extension that enforces it. I can at least try to curb it from blossoming into something more disruptive.

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#179

I've completely quit social media except for LinkedIn, which I need for my work, and Reddit, which I selectively use for product recommendations and advice on my career and relationships. And also Twitter, through which I receive the latest research in my domain. And Instagram, which my girlfriend uses to send me memes and videos. Occasionally Facebook for event invitations. And this website. But other than that I've…

What makes Hacker News a social media website?

Not much since it’s moderated to the point of being a boring headline aggregator, with a heavily biased, toxic community of vain Americans ignoring anything outside the HN RDF

May as well disable comments and treat it like a user updated RSS feed, discuss links elsewhere.

Re: Quit Social Media (2016)

#180

I've completely quit social media except for LinkedIn, which I need for my work, and Reddit, which I selectively use for product recommendations and advice on my career and relationships. And also Twitter, through which I receive the latest research in my domain. And Instagram, which my girlfriend uses to send me memes and videos. Occasionally Facebook for event invitations. And this website. But other than that I've…

What makes Hacker News a social media website?

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