Making a distinction between social networking and social media is important. We lost this distinction due to the advertising business model. In the social space a company that focuses on the social networking aspect - connecting people, tools to stay in touch, get together in real life, etc - may actually avoid the corrosive nature of the social space by avoiding the 'media' part.
Is this the end of social networking?
291–300 of 503 posts
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#292Earlier quoted context omitted.
I suspect that that what really ate up personal social networking was very simple: private group messaging finally got good enough. 15 years ago, we’d lost touch with old friends and acquaintances because there are a ton of people in our lives that mean something to us but that don’t warrant much 1-to-1 contact through phone calls or messaging. Myspace and early Facebook reinvigorated those relationships with relaxed…
I completely agree. In my view group chats on apps like WhatsApp much more accurately mirror how humans actually communicate in real life. That is to say it's more like a spontaneous conversation rather than social media which is more like a narcissistic advertising board for your life.
I don’t remember my extended family sharing jokes and memes non-stop in real life…
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#293Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If we're lucky, that means a federated, open, mostly-ad-and-suggestion-free open source social media experience can fill the power vacuum for intimate, interpersonal, high-latency communication over the internet. I don't have as much hope for such a thing. To me, this trend is also a reflection of perhaps the societal devaluing of IRL social connections. In a world where encountering "new people" was novel, and typ…
Personally I've just stopped using social media because there's no reason to have the type of reach it gives you unless you're, well, advertising (whether that's yourself and/or personal brand, a product, a political position, etc.). However, even though rare, every once in a few years I really do need to reach out to someone I don't regularly talk to digitally or get in touch with someone I was much more connected t…
This is probably the reason I was trying to limit my friend count to the very minimal figure (a little over 100), as I wanted to share my story to those who cared to listen to it. Though since Facebook started to deploy Discovery Engine, I have decided to stop using it (Deactivate the main account, leave Messenger available for contacts). I wanted to be more "connected", not having them scattered.
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#294Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, it seems like people are doubling down on a losing strategy. The real solution is usually involves going outside your front door and meet people. The same is true with dating.
And meeting people unlike yourself in at least some ways - social media is designed to help you find identical clones of yourself.
I don't think most people actually get to know like minded individuals on social media. They just flock together on specific topics and don't associate where they disagree. When you meet people in the real world, chances are you are unlike in some ways by default. People just don't express their differences in superficial context. You don't find the differences unless you ask and listen. At least that's been my experience meeting people.
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#295In a sense, it's interesting that we (social network users) once found the activities of our friends and acquaintances "interesting", but that's largely been subjugated to simply "interesting things are interesting".
Friendster was interesting, myspace was weird, but facebook just became a boring manicured lawn. Eventually it turned to astroturf; fake green to make it look beautiful.
Perhaps snapchat is the evolution of the social network; a closer "social" live snapshot of people we are close to.
Or perhaps its something else.
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#296I want to see more niche social networks that are only for one thing. I actually really like Strava which is for workouts only. There’s no way to share pictures of inspirational text. I’ve never seen anyone abuse the platform by sharing a run that is actually 0.1 miles plus a rant about Fox News or anything like that. If I were independently wealthy I’d spend my time building a newsfeed for musicians to share music t…
Agreed. What I love about Strava is it leverages some of the same darker parts of the human psyche that traditional social media does (desire for social status by showing off etc), but in doing so it encourages its users to actually do something extremely positive. It makes me think of how I'd like to see a really well made addictive VR based MMORPG that encouraged its users to exercise in some way to progress.
Not VR, but I’ve been wanting one of these too. Pokémon Go flirted with it with steps and egg hatching but I want a classic fantasy MMORPG where my workout is the grind and then the play part is all fun
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#297Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chat has not been around since the 90s, not in the form that is used today.
Now that I think about it, this is correct on at least one front: I can recall chat systems that existed in the 80s . What's the feature of today's chat systems makes them qualitatively different from those that are 30+ years old?
The ability to fit them comfortably into a pocket.
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#298Earlier quoted context omitted.
Bubbles don't need to be harmful. HN is a bubble. There are ideas that are not allowed here. There are other ideas that are explicitly promoted. This is the value proposition of HN. You are free to go elsewhere to get other perspectives or interactions. This is as it should be.
> There are ideas that are not allowed here. It would be more accurate to say that some ideas require more work here. The reasons why are open to debate.
Here's an HN bubble aspect.
You can't use any title you want, for example, they will regularly edit the title and thus effectively change the general meaning of the submission as read by most folks who just skim titles. Which has the knock on effect of making the post less (or more) desirable for users to read/upvote.
For example titles starting with "How I ..." are auto stripped to "I ..." there are quite a few other similar auto editorial changes.
There is no way round this that I know of, so those parts of an idea are non-negotiable and not re-workable.
I have seen instances where this practice completely ruins an otherwise excellent submission that would have been #1 on HN in days of old.
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#299Aren't forums and websites like HN and Reddit also social media?
Re: Is this the end of social networking?
#300Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unless they wrote it in Rust, in which case it would be received with great praise
Very funny... But have you considered the countless lives that were lost due to bugs from memory-unsafe languages over the past ~70 years? A murder-for-hire app in Rust would still cost us less lives overall, if it increases the popularity and adoption of memory-safe languages elsewhere. It's a just cause, one could say. I, for one, am very happy with how the assassination story of Rust is coming along!
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