Social media promised connection, but it has delivered exhaustion

Post by Gormo » Mon, Sep 15, 2025, 2:53 PM UTC

II2II wrote: post #121

skydhash wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social media existed before social media. We had forums for permanent collaboration (lecture hall style), and we had IRC for quicker ephemeral discussions (bar style). What we didn’t have was the focus on individuals. To have a brand means you were working on something useful for a group. Today’s social media heavily focus on the individual, not the group, which is ironic. It’s a lot of people clamoring for attention…

The over generalization of the term social media drives me bonkers. In the olden days we had things like message boards , forums , and chat rooms . Then came social networks . All of those terms reflect some sort of connection between people. When I see the term social media , I associate it with one way relationships. It is about connecting businesses to customers, not the other way around. It is about connecting se…

Post by glial » Thu, Sep 18, 2025, 12:54 AM UTC

lukan wrote: post #43

Popeyes wrote: post #33

The problem is that people are addicted to tension, by raising tension it fills a need, but the release of that tension is also addictive. Social media is just uppers and downers churned over and over. In one moment you can see some guy assassinated and then a box full of puppies rolling around and being cute. But that tension is only present at the extremes. The point where social media failed was when the governmen…

"The point where social media failed" was rather when most agreed to pretend that the services are for free and our attention may be hijacked by advertisement companies who have the goal of maximizing your engagement, meaning making you addicted.