Social Tabloids

1/3/2018

Social media is effectively designed like a tabloid. The most controversial and outspoken content always rises to the top and continues the cycle. Overall, it’s an attempt to make money from human interaction, to whatever degree and method, again, like a tabloid. Berating someone for being evil will only make them more powerful in the social economy.

I do have my reasons to keep social media interactions limited in a smaller circle while at the same time making use of whatever antitrackers and adblocks I can. I’d stick to the initial idea of how social media was designed, to be social and locate possible friends, diverting attempts for the company to try to profit from me and my unusual tastes in things that could defy demographics, all the while not oversharing. Advertising is also a form of mind control, where lately it’s been used to its extreme. There’s a science to subconscious cues as well as blatant ones.

There’s also the case of the “let’s post some content and every one or two posts it’s just going to be clickbait ad garbage” accounts. That effectively denies the initial purpose of that account, unless it was to make money from garbage somehow. I really don’t see how sites like Taboola count as “acceptable ads”. Sure, they don’t play loud noises or download 15 GB of video but they’re still pretty obnoxious and attempt to pass themselves off as useful information with weird stock photos they probably stole anyway.

I don’t really believe in Facebook. Having a Facebook page is not the same as having a website. Anything that Facebook touches I’m immediately wary of. And for a lot of things it’s been things I don’t really use anyway, like Instagram or the Oculus Rift. I also don’t like when a Facebook login is the only login option, not even offering the chance to enter a random e-mail. I’d rather not associate my limited Facebook usage with something that will probably just spam whoever it is I know on there.

There’s also YouTube. I don’t like YouTube. They’re threatening a monopoly of video content hosting which caters to the worst with the worst content to profit the most. I’ve talked about them before. I suggest uploading to alternate services and preferring those services to view content where possible, and combining adblock with direct creator support otherwise.

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