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Myths about Social Media

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Re: Myths about Social Media

#81

Post by 6510 »

Barrin92 wrote: post #19
version_five wrote: post #13

I think the echo chamber one misses the point (or maybe the analogy of an echo chamber is bad). It's true that people are exposed to other views, but there is still the echo effect of what their bubble thinks of those other views. Two people discussing their differences is not the same as two (or N) bubbles hurling outrage at one another, which I think is closer to most of twitter - the echo chamber still applies wit…

I think that stretches the definition of 'echo chamber'. That's simply what a community is, a group of like-minded people with shared views. There's nothing automatically wrong with this. People can have shared criticisms of others if there is some meaningful difference between the groups that justifies that disagreement. I think people mistake 'hurling outrage' with simply two (or more) groups being fundamentally in…

"echo chamber" completely misses the point: exposure to outrageous posts is the goal.

If you want constructive dialog that builds towards an actionable plan a dedicated forum and a wiki would be the right tools.

Its just dumb to use a platform that exposes your imagination to people who think the exact opposite - and does so on purpose!

Band aid solutions where these fools get to have their precious walled garden internet empire and eat it too are just never going to work.

You post a picture of your dinner on facebook and some are going to think it looks disgusting. One vegetarian is going to take time out of their busy day (30 seconds) to write a couple of sentences describing your plate full of boiled corpses. Your bestie says it is mean to say that. RE: It is mean to eat animals. You have a hard time deleting your besies comment while they summon the cohords to deal with this vegitarian picking on you. 6 months later and you are still talking about it.

Re: Myths about Social Media

#82

Post by renewiltord »

mgraczyk wrote: post #72
madrox wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm willing to concede this, but I find it incredible that this is true and yet users have very little control over how their timeline is filtered.

If you're talking about Facebook or Instagram, users actually have a lot of control! You can snooze or completely remove other users, groups, and pages. You can ask for "less content like this" and FB used ML to show you less of similar things. You can add keyword filters to the comments sections under your posts. You can block users from commenting or from posting in your group. You can even do all of these things w…

Instagram used to be the perfect social network. You only saw what you followed and there were clear anti-addiction mechanisms: “you’re all finished” and then historical posts if you were at the end; stories being not lit up if you view them; stuff like that.

Now at the bottom of my feed is random high engagement stuff. Yeah, dude, I looove photos of space and shit. But I also scroll loop on them. That’s why I trusted Instagram.

Now I’ve noticed my behavior is so weird. I go on Instagram and I have a resistance to scroll down because I know there’s scroll bait down there.

Don’t even mind ads. Just scroll bait. I think we both know that was an intentional choice to add that at the end.

Re: Myths about Social Media

#83

Post by WaxProlix »

ckastner wrote: post #27
royalroad wrote: post #5

Maybe it would be worth repeating the 'myths' he lists in the tweets: Myth 1: A lot of misinfo on social media No, research suggests there is little, shared by few & having small effects. Those sharing misinfo are not dumb. But they have intense political animus, which motivates to share what fits their worldview, true or false. Myth 2: Social media makes people hateful No, research suggests that online hate reflects…

> Myth 2: Social media makes people hateful > No, research suggests that online hate reflects offline frustrations that make them hateful both online & offline. That's just a sleight of hand. Sure, people may have been hateful before, but social media amplifies that hate exponentially. Social media thrives on outrage, being addictive, and uses algorithmic ranking to feed it as much as possible. > The hateful are few…

Are people talking about Jan 6 hateful? I don't get what you're saying.

Re: Myths about Social Media

#84

Post by stickfigure »

nomendos wrote: post #47
fullshark wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vast majority of people's exposure to other views are just the dumbest iterations of said views, for the express purpose of "dunking" on them to further calcify their previously held positions also. At least on twitter the goal is to find morons on the other side of the ideological divide and mock them.

I am not talking about obvious (and easily labeled morons), but instead there are many educated and real scientists that raise questions and there is no dialogue, but instead only defunct-fact checkers totalitarian response. Science is always open to listen, discuss and stand open to be corrected and in no time in history there was "attack on me is attack on science" attitudes that ended up be right or productive. It…

What kind of reasoned, introspective dialogue do you think you're going to have 140 characters at a time?

Re: Myths about Social Media

#85

Post by freebuju »

nomendos wrote: post #47
fullshark wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vast majority of people's exposure to other views are just the dumbest iterations of said views, for the express purpose of "dunking" on them to further calcify their previously held positions also. At least on twitter the goal is to find morons on the other side of the ideological divide and mock them.

I am not talking about obvious (and easily labeled morons), but instead there are many educated and real scientists that raise questions and there is no dialogue, but instead only defunct-fact checkers totalitarian response. Science is always open to listen, discuss and stand open to be corrected and in no time in history there was "attack on me is attack on science" attitudes that ended up be right or productive. It…

Kind of reminds me when one of the foremost mRNA researchers, Dr. Robert Malone was temporarily banned on LinkedIn regarding his views on the vaccine. While speaking at a JRE interview, he says later on after the ban, LinkedIn (probably after public backlash) sent him an apology letter, quoting they could not assemble a team (or they themselves were not) qualified enough to fact-check him. Let that sink in for a moment...

When did we turn to social media spaces to get our health facts from. Fact checking from big tech is the silliest thing normal people have embraced on the Internet. Kind of loony when you think of the historical context of the internet.

Re: Myths about Social Media

#86

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0 »

I will admit that it is impressive to compress this message into several tweets. That said, I have a fundamental problem with the message presented. Biggest one of all is buying into 'hate' speech primarily due to how loosely it is being defined and how eagerly various governments jump on it to curb remnants of free speech. The fact that this is presented to the public and law makers suggests to me that:

1. Author knows his audience and wants to present issues in the language they understand 2. Author believes it

Both could easily be true.

Re: Myths about Social Media

#87

Post by Aunche »

>No, research shows that, for most, social media breaks the bubble. We are more connected to "the others" on social media than in our offline lives.

That just means that social media exposes people to more ideas. Not that it's not an echo chamber. On social media, no matter how dumb your idea is, you can always find someone who agrees with you. It doesn't matter if even more people disagree with you because you found the validation you were hoping for.

Re: Myths about Social Media

#88

Post by nathias »

It's incredibly weird to me that people are ok with demonizing feelings and tone. Who cares if people are 'hateful'? One man's hate is another slight aggresion, and american toxic positivity makes haters of us all even if we speak with the best of intentions.

Re: Myths about Social Media

#89

Post by dang »

16012022 wrote: post #32

Quoted post unavailable.

I appreciate your desire to point to the research. Many if not most of the comments in this thread are rejecting it out of hand without even looking at it. That's disappointing and, given the topic, ironic.

However, breaking the HN guidelines against shallow dismissals, snark, and sneering is definitely not a good way to make this point. Besides adding poison to the ecosystem, posts like this have no persuasive power—in fact they have negative persuasive power: they reinforce the very thing you're complaining about.

A better way would be to take a look at the actual research and bring in some interesting information that you find there. If you don't want to do that or don't have time to do it, that's fine, but please don't make empty spiteful posts.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

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