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Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

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Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#31

Post by Stubb »

Lordarminius wrote: post #15
aboutruby wrote: post #11

I think he puts Twitter there because he doesn't use it. If you follow the right people it actually promotes intelligent discourse.

Same with Instagram. I don't use it but I concede that it is useful to some people as a platform for promoting businesses. FB on the other hand, deserves to die in a fire.

I've all but dropped off Facebook but made an Instagram account earlier this year and am enjoying it. The photo-centric nature seems to eliminate 99% of the toxicity of Facebook. I've subscribed to the accounts of friends, architecture/design centers, Archillect, and accounts that post pictures of owls and otters. None of this promotes deep thinking or meaningful discussion, but it's a nice five-minute addition to my day. Plus it gives me a place to post my own photography where friends and others will see it.

That said, I'm hardly a Facebook/Zuckerberg fan and will jump ship the moment another platform becomes viable.

Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#33

Post by skilled »

BFLpL0QNek wrote: post #18
trpc wrote: post #7

Social media ruined the internet forever, even less than a decade ago there were websites, forums of all sorts and for all kinds of interests, now the internet for most people is just these social websites/apps which intentionally lock users inside their services as long as possible to make more money from advertising and promoted posts. Unfortunately unless something big happens to fix this issue, the internet is lo…

I really miss forums. Google did a really good job of indexing forums, they where a great place to find honest reviews, share information etc. Now they are dying with users spread across various services which are not publicly indexed making it hard to find interesting information, that and forum posts look to be now down ranked in Google in favor retail sites. A few of the communities I am interested in such as outd…

Yeah, man! Nothing will ever come close to modded phpBB forums with the light on dark themes. A well-moderated forum encouraged so much discussion and productivity.

And I have to say, the modern versions of forums -- like Facebook Groups -- just don't replicate that same feeling to me.

Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#34

Post by ghaff »

mc32 wrote: post #2

He’s right. The problem is the incentive for “popularity” running amok. If Linus’s angry emails are on a distribution list, the exposure is minimal and the damage is contained. His same excess in social media is reproduced and exploited for various reasons, positive and negative and overflows into unrelated circles where unrelated people have input into something containment would prevent them from being exposed. Thi…

>If Linus’s angry emails are on a distribution list, the exposure is minimal and the damage is contained.

Perhaps. Another way to say the same thing however is something along the lines of the following. If you behave... poorly within a relatively narrow community, given sufficient authority you can just get away with it. Maybe you drive people away but it's all pretty invisible to the broader world and those that remain just put up with it because that's the way things are.

Perhaps that's deemed acceptable.Perhaps not. But just because things happen behind relatively closed doors doesn't make them right.

Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#35

Post by mikorym »

smt88 wrote: post #14
trpc wrote: post #7

Social media ruined the internet forever, even less than a decade ago there were websites, forums of all sorts and for all kinds of interests, now the internet for most people is just these social websites/apps which intentionally lock users inside their services as long as possible to make more money from advertising and promoted posts. Unfortunately unless something big happens to fix this issue, the internet is lo…

Those forums exist and are more widely-used than ever. They're just mostly hosted on reddit now.

I also wanted to point this out, but I guess Reddit does pose a risk that they make some system-wide decision and in the process all those subreddits either vanish or die a slow death.

As of March 2019 Reddit seems still quirky and interesting though...

Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#36

Post by checkyoursudo »

BFLpL0QNek wrote: post #18
trpc wrote: post #7

Social media ruined the internet forever, even less than a decade ago there were websites, forums of all sorts and for all kinds of interests, now the internet for most people is just these social websites/apps which intentionally lock users inside their services as long as possible to make more money from advertising and promoted posts. Unfortunately unless something big happens to fix this issue, the internet is lo…

I really miss forums. Google did a really good job of indexing forums, they where a great place to find honest reviews, share information etc. Now they are dying with users spread across various services which are not publicly indexed making it hard to find interesting information, that and forum posts look to be now down ranked in Google in favor retail sites. A few of the communities I am interested in such as outd…

My '90s video gaming group had our own little forum for years and years and years. In the mid-2000s, most of the members of the group jumped over to Facebook, our forum died, and our group collapsed.

Using other social media is definitely not like using those old forums.

Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#37

Post by HNthrow22 »

bovermyer wrote: post #8

I feel like he's right, but there's much more to understand here. The broadcast of oversimplified messages through a human network that reacts strongly to those messages, and thus boosts the signal of those messages further, is something that bears careful consideration.

Agreed, beyond conditioning a generation of addictive consumers the narrative has never been more muddied and easily manipulated. Facts no longer matter and that's terrifying.

The world needs to figure out how to “put into place very strict requirements with appropriate consequences that make it unthinkable to violate them.”

“Everyone agrees we shouldn’t be doing this yet,”

These quotes are from a Bloomberg article* about the Chinese scientist who edited the twins DNA as embryos, found interesting that society is able to recognize the incredible dangers and implications of DNA modifications yet have a huge blind spot for tech, perhaps because it's so useful in our day to day lives. User-engagement, optimizing for addiction and driving individuals into echo chambers and the welcoming arms of extremists looking to recruit, worth it for free email I guess?

* https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-13/top-genet...

Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#38

Post by mikorym »

onlydeadheroes wrote: post #25

Oh Linus, after sacrificing your reputation and life's work to appease your daughter's politics, now you go and say something that will displease her. You are not great at brown-nosing, bless you man.

What are you saying?

Re: Linus Torvalds Says Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram Are 'A Disease'

#39

Post by Juliate »

skilled wrote: post #20

The problem is actually far deeper than just social media being mindless. The Internet as such has become a Big Bank, where anyone (and anywhere!) can put in time investment and withdraw money. Well, you could argue that people work on the Internet. It's not a bad argument, but the problem is much deeper than this. Every single major social network is now being used as a storefront where you can promote and advertise…

> and over the years, many have completely annihilated any emotional connection with their audience and instead run their pages as an established brand.

This, so much this.

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