81–90 of 319 posts
> Something that’s aligned with your long-term goals.
> Doing. Not consuming.
Those reflect my feeble thoughts running over in my head for the longest time, quite well. A really well written piece
This may not be terribly popular, and its admittedly just conjecture, but I'm of the opinion that its less about the quantity of social media, and more how one interacts with it and even more so consumes it. Some platforms are clearly more toxic than others, though I'm increasingly of the opinion that they are all pretty toxic, just different flavors of "world outlooks" to choose from. I feel that those that actively…
I feel the same way.
Facebook is a great way to keep up with what friends are doing. When I adopted a kitten, it was the perfect place to show pictures to all my friends.
The problem is, "keeping up with your friends" turns into living vicariously through them. This type of social media is just a highlight reel of your friends, and some people have a hard time internalizing that.
Personally, I'm in a great position in my life, so I don't really live through other people's posts.
I don't use Instagram at all. On Twitter, I follow a bunch of people in the InfoSec world and a couple politicians, and I don't read replies to the political posts, half of which are probably bots anyways[0].
I keep my Facebook friends list relatively slim. I deleted and blocked my racist uncle. Everyone one of my friends, I can tell you exactly how I know them. I don't accept random requests. I don't follow political pages. I'm in a few groups, but they're well-moderated.
[0] I wish I could use a regex as a block list. "[A-Za-z]{4,}[0-9]{4,}" would probably block 90% of bots.
Another day, another person telling you how to live your life... Sorry, but even though we know social media has its downsides, it also has advantages: keeping in touch with friends, socializing, a way to stay up to date with your community, new recipe ideas, exercise ideas, time management ideas, maybe even the occasional envy that someone's success triggers more ambition in you to succeed etc. It's a tool, like any…
Correct in theory, but we universally agree that illicit drugs can be damaging to your life. -- even in some cases taking them not seriously enough can cause addiction and serious issues stemming from that.
We just need to figure out if Facebook/Twitter/Youtube are paracetamol, codeine, vicodin, cocaine or heroin.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
We desperately need new companies emerging and taking over FAANGs. It’s been too long. I think about big tech same as what we thought of HP, Oracle and IBM 20 years ago. Time to conquer them and make them obsolete. If we don't, we're guaranteeing absolute stagnation of the society in many insiduous ways. Always watching, always controlling Big Tech dystopia.
Unfortunately this won't happen unless something or someone takes actions. If governments is not going to bother to do the enforcement of the laws, then nothing changed until they do it. If there is a new player in the field, what or who is going to stop FAANGs from buying the competitors (even it violated the antitrust law)? Sure we do have Sherman Antitrust Act for this... but no one bothering to do the enforcement…
There's the crux of it all. We know firsthand that our addiction to companies like Google, Facebook, Apple and Amazon are unhealthy, but the only thing stopping us from keeping them in check is our government. I've been saying this for a while now, but I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if the SEC cuts deals to FAANG companies in exchange for NIST compliance or unwarranted data requests.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I once asked here about how you would start an online business without interacting with Google, and I think that somewhat echoes the problem you've mentioned. While totally possible to do these things without social media, there is a challenge posed by the fact that the big platforms have captured the audiences you might have engaged with if they weren't already occupied. If it weren't for those big platforms, many p…
We desperately need new companies emerging and taking over FAANGs. It’s been too long. I think about big tech same as what we thought of HP, Oracle and IBM 20 years ago. Time to conquer them and make them obsolete. If we don't, we're guaranteeing absolute stagnation of the society in many insiduous ways. Always watching, always controlling Big Tech dystopia.
I don't think we'll do that, but it's what it would take. Replacing the companies won't help, except maybe very briefly.
This piece has the same tone as a recovering alcoholic talking about the dangers of just one drink. It is true that social media can be damaging and should probably be used minimally. It is also true that lots of people get value from social media and then step away because they for whatever reason are better able to balance the situation. My own minimal use of social media has allowed me to keep up with old friends,…
So, one of the things you learn pretty early in recovery is that there is no “normal” when it comes to addiction.
However, there are _patterns_ of denial and implicit social construction around risky behaviors that most people only believe matter for “alcoholics” and other obvious “losers”.
Something can be both toxic (booze, cigarettes, online fake conspiracy echo chambers) and relatively benign in small amounts. That doesn’t mean that foregoing them is bad in absolute terms.
OTOH recognizing that toxicity instead of ignoring it can help to avoid the “only happens to other, weaker people” trap. Said trap lets many people slide much further into self-destructive behavior than they could otherwise with a bit more self-awareness and compassion.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
We desperately need new companies emerging and taking over FAANGs. It’s been too long. I think about big tech same as what we thought of HP, Oracle and IBM 20 years ago. Time to conquer them and make them obsolete. If we don't, we're guaranteeing absolute stagnation of the society in many insiduous ways. Always watching, always controlling Big Tech dystopia.
Unfortunately this won't happen unless something or someone takes actions. If governments is not going to bother to do the enforcement of the laws, then nothing changed until they do it. If there is a new player in the field, what or who is going to stop FAANGs from buying the competitors (even it violated the antitrust law)? Sure we do have Sherman Antitrust Act for this... but no one bothering to do the enforcement…
I am now off popular social media (Facebook, Instagram). The void is now replaced with other forms of social media (Reddit, Hacker News). Reddit, arguably, is more toxic than my version of Facebook - but it is strangers being toxic, and zero FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) which is prevalent on Facebook and Instagram.
I'm of the opinion Reddit is the most toxic and hateful website on the internet. It's also the most influential.
Its funny how the game built on just 2 things. The Like count. And the Follow button. Applied at global scale, can fuck up everything. Cant wait to see what they add next.
Just as everyone had hoped, fame about your outrageous behavior in the last WOW raid, where a n00b acting a fool triggered you bad, will spill over, first into the virtually real world then the really real one, eventually getting you fired and finally, we'll have universal and omnipotent social justice.
So excited. Can't wait.
> A futuristic dystopia. A place where the real world sucks. Where people consider talking to someone a chore. Connection, closeness, ambition are replaced by detachment and dogmatic slumber. Society is satisfied with shallow thoughts and the pursuit of artificially created stimuli in an imaginary world. Beautifully written top-notch orwellian poetry. Seriously inspiring. Also as someone who has only ever used social…
This bit in particular really hit me. I've noticed a rising trend around the Internet (or maybe I was just blind to it before), mostly on Reddit, of people who really do seem to consider any sort of real-life social interaction a chore and an attack.
I forget the exact context, I think the conversation that stood out to me was about someone in a gas station or something, trying to make friendly conversation with another shopper next to them, along the lines of "oh that's a cool hat". And the consensus of the thread was "yeah that's awful, why would you do that, why are you subjecting them to the labor of talking to you" or such.
Guys... we're humans. It isn't a crime to make small talk. It's not a chore to open your mouth. Most of us consider (or used to consider; and I'm not even old) that enjoyable. What happened?