Not sure this is likely to be a successful angle but I understand the motivation behind it
The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
521–530 of 979 posts
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#522I hope this goes through. Trillion dollar companies are waging a war on our attention, using everything at their disposal to make these apps addictive. It isn't a fair fight and the existence of infinite feeds is bad both for people and democracy. Regulating consumer products that cause harm to millions is nothing new.
As a person working at social media I support this as well. I'm a hypocrite. I admit, but the pay is too good to find alternative. Terms like "DAU" or "engagement" is common in our field and the primary objective is how to make users spend more time on our platform. We don't take safety or mental health seriously internally but only externally for PR reasons. CEOs won't change that because the more time user spends o…
> . I'm a hypocrite. I admit
Great, admission is the first step.
> but the pay is too good to find alternative.
Yet then you immediately undo it!
Try "I'm too greedy". You're the actor with the free will here. The subject of the sentencd shouldn't be "the pay". That is just an amount, a sum, that exists - neither too high nor too low. That is all in the eye of the beholder.
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#523Earlier quoted context omitted.
>"well what specific laws would I write to combat addictive design?" Hear me out: banning advertising on the Internet. It's the only way. It's the primordial domino tile. You knock that one over, every other tile follows suit. It's the mother of chain reactions. There would be no social media, no Internet as we know it. Imagine having TikTok, YouTube or X trying to survive on subscriptions alone in their current iter…
I have said for years - Micropayents, something like the traffic settlement system for termination charges in the NANPA PSTN, and when I say micropayments I mean 1000ths of a cent. Then the content that does cost money (news, social media, whatever can be monetized and the users are paying for consumption.
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Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#524Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think we have a right to a business model. Either you figure one out for your particular site (selling access to the website, donations, etc) or you don't and stop and either is ok.
Tell this your local sports club that needs a new set of shirts.
I support government funding for things that keep the population exercising. It literally saves taxpayers money by driving down healthcare costs.
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#525Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ostensibly not, if it is outlawed.
But under what principle would you allow advertising, in general, online? That seems like an arbitrary penalty. What harm is being prevented by banning advertising, in general?
All human laws are arbitrary in the sense that they have no natural precedents. We made them up because they make society better when we have them. Sometimes they end up not doing that so we change them as needed. In this case, a lot of people think society would be improved if we created this one.
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#526Earlier quoted context omitted.
Infrastructure costs money. There's no way around it. I'm all up for banning ads. But there should be another viable business model to replace it.
I think that's revisionism. Social media existed before online advertising. Usenet was quite massive and vibrant, countless IRC servers were maintained by volunteers, web-based forums covered pretty much the same ground as Reddit does today. All supported by the goodwill of individuals, non-profits, and businesses such as ISPs that actively wanted the internet to be interesting because they were making money by selli…
> All supported by the goodwill of individuals, non-profits, and businesses ...
That goodwill seems to be in short supply since... hmmm the mid 2000's (rough guess). And goodwill like that seems to be honestly not even understood by the generation(s)* since then.
* Saying "generations" (plural) there because we've had quite a few people go through their formative years during this time and not just a single clearly defined generation.
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#527Earlier quoted context omitted.
Obvious examples of negative consequences of the first amendment include the profusion of false and misleading advertising, the scourge of political campaign spending, and the disastrous firehouse of misinformation being pushed out in various online forums. The idea that an abstract carte blanche for free speech outweighs those real and present ills is misguided. At the same time, we see that the limitation to only p…
I think you would find that the cure is far, far worse than the disease. We speak of rights, and those are important, but there's also a very important practical reason why we have freedom of speech: because you cannot trust that future government officials will stick to banning speech that is justly banned. Once you open that door, sooner or later someone is going to start abusing the power. How would you like it if…
The thing is that that same argument can be used to justify just about anything. If the scum of the earth is in power, they will ignore whatever rights you thought you had put into the constitution anyway. We are seeing that now. And I am already cursing the day that we decided on the restrictions we currently have. The Trump administration is declaring with complete legality that Trump won the 2020 election and is punishing people who believe that. Right now they're not taking the direct route, but it's abundantly clear that government power is being used to punish people who say things that Trump doesn't like.
There is no way of listing rights on paper that can protect you if truly evil people get into power. But there are ways of listing rights on paper that can allow good people who believe in those rights to defend them in ways that involve preventing evil people from getting into power. Free speech is not a magic bullet in either direction.
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#528Earlier quoted context omitted.
Of course they have. Off the top of my head examples include: Grants in the form of tax dollars (e.g. arxiv). To benefit the authors reputation (e.g. numerous scientists, developers, etc personal sites. zacklabe.com as a useful example). As a hobby (I think aiarena.net falls into this category). To collect data for research purposes (e.g. the original chatgpt release, and early recaptcha)...
What could possible go wrong with the government funding media? It’s not like they would take away funding for media that they don’t agree with.
Why would a government elected in a democracy be less trustworthy than a few private individuals? Do heads of large corporations not have an interest in controlling information?
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#529Here's the actual statement from the European Comission: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_26_... It's important to note they aren't creating laws against infinite scrolling , but are ruling against addictive design and pointing to infinite scrolling as an example of it. The wording here is fascinating, mainly because they're effectively acting as arbiters of "vibes". They point to certain feat…
>"well what specific laws would I write to combat addictive design?" Hear me out: banning advertising on the Internet. It's the only way. It's the primordial domino tile. You knock that one over, every other tile follows suit. It's the mother of chain reactions. There would be no social media, no Internet as we know it. Imagine having TikTok, YouTube or X trying to survive on subscriptions alone in their current iter…
I’ll probably be crucified for this but I think the free w/advertising model is not fundamentally evil, and gives poor people access to lots of shit that they otherwise wouldn’t have, keeps the rest of us from death by 1,000 monthly subscriptions.
Re: The EU moves to kill infinite scrolling
#530It's interesting how there may be an implicit assumption that imposing more rules on tech will lead to positive outcomes. From my perspective, technology is like reality itself: very difficult to control, with countless ways to achieve the desired result while circumventing the rules. And what's the actual result? Just look at the market capitalization of European companies compared to US companies... Or maybe it jus…
Instead of market capitalization, have you looked at comparisons for happiness?