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I deleted my social media accounts

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Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#471
post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cool idea, but it’s based on my own experience in life, from a girlfriend and various people in college. And even a newspaper article I read literally this morning. Vegan folks who I knew and talked to every day. That said I could have used airplane pilots for the same example (also based on personal experience).

Right, that’s the toupée fallacy. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Toupee_fallacy You only know about the people who let you know. You have no idea how many vegans or airplane pilots you encounter regularly who never tell you. A small sample is driving the reputation of the whole. For people with whom you talk every day, it’s no surprise that you know. It’s bound to come up but I doubt it happened on your first conversa…

Very interesting thought. I didn’t know the toupée itself neither the fallacy. Looks like a cousin of the famous survivor bias and both are children of a "observational bias" category. This is only my humble layman guess.

The video was interesting too, I’ll have a look at that channel. Thanks for sharing.

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#472

Browsing social media while working is easily solved by not logging in on these services on your work machine or browser. I have social media logged in on another instance of my browser, so I actively have to switch profiles to browse social media. This added step makes it hard enough to not mindlessly browse it.

Staying in that theme, remove social media apps from your homepage. It's an extra step to have to look for it through your apps

I don’t even have them on my phone, hah.

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#473
post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cool idea, but it’s based on my own experience in life, from a girlfriend and various people in college. And even a newspaper article I read literally this morning. Vegan folks who I knew and talked to every day. That said I could have used airplane pilots for the same example (also based on personal experience).

Right, that’s the toupée fallacy. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Toupee_fallacy You only know about the people who let you know. You have no idea how many vegans or airplane pilots you encounter regularly who never tell you. A small sample is driving the reputation of the whole. For people with whom you talk every day, it’s no surprise that you know. It’s bound to come up but I doubt it happened on your first conversa…

I never called any vegans assholes. Personality quirks are not wrong, they actually make life fun.

I guess the thing I’m getting from you is I shouldn’t comment on my own observations because of toupee bias, and I shouldn’t comment on other people’s common observations because they are just memes an not real. Is there an acceptable threshold for situational humor short of a scientific study? If so, what is it?

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You write like somehow there would be something to miss out on by not valuing keeping up with people who are far away... Yes, absolutely. The paths our lives take can lead us to have more in common with someone we knew in the past then when we first knew them. And there's a lot of value in having a history with someone, compared to getting to know someone new from scratch. Maintaining loose contact takes virtually…

Yes, I have a few very good remote friends which I meet only rarely, but when it's one of the best kind of things. However most of my "Facebook friends" were shallow faint contacts, where paths may have been close for a while but went apart as each went on with their lives. No more scrolling through which bar they visited, how their kids are doing, or which TV show they were watching didn't take anything from my life…

I think I would add that: if I would be posting stuff and then someone who was an acquaintance only - would hit up a conversation about my wedding photos from 5 years ago how he remembers all were great, or would go with conversation about tv show I just added on my profile.

I would not feel comfortable, to say the least, I would feel creeped out. I would start thinking what kind of MLM he joined or if he looks to borrow money as last resort as no one closer would lend him any.

If that would be my close friend that would be OK.

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#475
post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You write like somehow there would be something to miss out on by not valuing keeping up with people who are far away and most likely have no place in our lives.(by far away I mean you don’t actually get to talk or meet with them or even chat by messanger or so, even if they could live in the same city - I have friends who live far away but we actually meet at least once a year and chat once a week we are far in dist…

> You write like somehow there would be something to miss out on by not valuing keeping up with people who are far away... Yes, absolutely. The paths our lives take can lead us to have more in common with someone we knew in the past then when we first knew them. And there's a lot of value in having a history with someone, compared to getting to know someone new from scratch. Maintaining loose contact takes virtually…

I think my main argument is having history with someone is not checking his profile.

If I run today into someone from primary school we probably will connect over that.

If that someone will start talking how he have seen photos of my trips or my life events or how he totally loves band I added to my profile half a year ago - without ever sending me even happy new years message - I will be creeped out - and totally not “aw cool you follow my posts”.

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#476
I recently joined social media again. Turns out the group that shared my interest in my region was here. So I made a new account and joined.

And the thing is, I am interested still. But I do miss a lot, because the group is chaotic and really important announcements are mixed in with memes and chatter, so it was a chore to waddle through that everyday, only to discover that nothing important was announced.

They kinda have to do it, I guess, because engagement metrics are no joke, and if you don't have them, then why are you here. But it really opened my eyes to how to social media completely failed on its premise when it decided that time spent on app would be a good metric.

Sometimes people just have nothing important to say other to announce, and them it should be okay to keep silent for a while, without being downranked.

And seeing how those, who always chatter even when they having nothing to say, will ultimately rise to the top on any platform that values time wasted, I left social media again.

People in comments say how it's better to have a few close friends then shallow connections, but social networks did allow us to meet someone that shared our more specific interests. My best friend I have met on a forum: our interests aligned and we spend hours talking about things we couldn't discuss with real friends before meeting up. There is value in shallow connections when they are based on shared interests. This value is lost on most social networks today.

IMO mastodon and blue sky are "good social networks" for people who want to connect over specific topics.

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#477
post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, that’s the toupée fallacy. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Toupee_fallacy You only know about the people who let you know. You have no idea how many vegans or airplane pilots you encounter regularly who never tell you. A small sample is driving the reputation of the whole. For people with whom you talk every day, it’s no surprise that you know. It’s bound to come up but I doubt it happened on your first conversa…

I never called any vegans assholes. Personality quirks are not wrong, they actually make life fun. I guess the thing I’m getting from you is I shouldn’t comment on my own observations because of toupee bias, and I shouldn’t comment on other people’s common observations because they are just memes an not real. Is there an acceptable threshold for situational humor short of a scientific study? If so, what is it?

> I never called any vegans assholes.

I know, I didn’t say you did. In my first reply I said:

> Some people are assholes and brag about anything

And it’s that narrow definition I’ve been using throughout.

> I guess the thing I’m getting from you is I shouldn’t comment on my own observations

No, of course that’s not it. We can all comment on our own observations, but it’s also important to differentiate from what we each observe as individuals and what we believe the world to be. We shouldn’t let our limited view of the world cloud our understanding of how it is.

> Is there an acceptable threshold for situational humor short of a scientific study?

Were you doing situational humour? I reread your comments and can’t find the joke¹. Judging from the grey colour in the original comment, it doesn’t look like I was the only one to miss it if that was the intention.

Though I will say unambiguously that I don’t think you’re arguing in bad faith. From my perspective, this has been a cordial chat.

¹ I guess the newspaper comment was a joke, but calling that situational seems like a stretch.

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree that HN usually gathers much interesting content, I don't understand why getting more karma on HN matters anyway. Chasing points anywhere isn't healthy by the way. Say something interesting because it is interesting and sparks a conversation and not for the sake of saying something.

The desire for upvotes is largely what makes HN and Reddit approach groupthink so quickly. Folks with an opinion that they know will be popular will hyperbolize their opinion knowing that it will appeal to the dominant opinion of the community and get upvotes. People who feel really strongly about an issue then go into a thread and upvote everything they like and downvote the things they don't. They are often also th…

Otoh, no-score sites mostly become either *chans or slow forums with lots of ceremony and zero feedback on anything. It turns out if you get rid of groupthink, you get rid of either group or think as well.

I really admire HN dynamics in this regard, as it has a few less obvious tricks in its sleeves, but let’s keep these observations to it.

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#479
post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, that’s the toupée fallacy. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Toupee_fallacy You only know about the people who let you know. You have no idea how many vegans or airplane pilots you encounter regularly who never tell you. A small sample is driving the reputation of the whole. For people with whom you talk every day, it’s no surprise that you know. It’s bound to come up but I doubt it happened on your first conversa…

Very interesting thought. I didn’t know the toupée itself neither the fallacy. Looks like a cousin of the famous survivor bias and both are children of a "observational bias" category. This is only my humble layman guess. The video was interesting too, I’ll have a look at that channel. Thanks for sharing.

That video is part of a larger series on Gamergate. If you liked that one, it’s worth it to see everything.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJA_jUddXvY62dhVThbee...

I also recommend these two earlier videos, on unrelated matters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmTUW-owa2w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4N6y6LEwsKc

Re: I deleted my social media accounts

#480
post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The desire for upvotes is largely what makes HN and Reddit approach groupthink so quickly. Folks with an opinion that they know will be popular will hyperbolize their opinion knowing that it will appeal to the dominant opinion of the community and get upvotes. People who feel really strongly about an issue then go into a thread and upvote everything they like and downvote the things they don't. They are often also th…

Otoh, no-score sites mostly become either *chans or slow forums with lots of ceremony and zero feedback on anything. It turns out if you get rid of groupthink, you get rid of either group or think as well. I really admire HN dynamics in this regard, as it has a few less obvious tricks in its sleeves, but let’s keep these observations to it.

Yeah you're not wrong. I mean if you look at the bottom of most Reddit and HN threads, you just see pure spam or garbage. Upvotes let communities scale with fewer mods. But they come at the cost of groupthink.
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