[HN Gopher] Iran's blogfather: Facebook, Instagram and Twitter a...
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Iran's blogfather: Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are killing the
web
Author : jameslk
Score : 111 points
Date : 2021-01-31 17:43 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theguardian.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theguardian.com)
| zoobab wrote:
| Twitter and Facebook have been filtering the content they don't
| like, like the Assange trial reports:
|
| https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2020/10/people-need-...
|
| We need a way to end this TOS feudalism.
| mro_name wrote:
| indieweb.org/POSSE for the masses?
| Kye wrote:
| (2015)
| bartart wrote:
| I wonder how many of his original blog's visitors were just bots.
| Also social networks have really lowered the barrier to entry for
| posting your thoughts online. The marketplace of ideas is much
| more crowded.
| asciident wrote:
| That seems a bit unfair to jump to thinking about bots, as he
| noted he had a lot of engaged visitors that commented and sent
| him emails.
|
| While the marketplace is more crowded, the number of markets
| has shrink. To continue your analogy, each marketplace vender
| used to be its own market, so you had a lot of options. Now
| there were really only 2-4 giant marketplaces, and vendors with
| a good location have made it really difficult to set up shop.
| tomComb wrote:
| In a different vein, Twitter is actually pretty good in that it
| really embraces the web (links), whereas Facebook tries to
| replace the web and keep you in is proprietary platform.
|
| Maybe that's why Facebook makes so much more money.
| Bakary wrote:
| His blogging golden age was in reality a time where there were
| simply far fewer users in general, and they were far more likely
| to be the type to seek out this sort of content and the activist
| relationship with the online world that he describes.
|
| Most people aren't really interested in that sort of discourse,
| or in changing the world, or in intellectual biodiversity and
| alternate views. The web wasn't killed by companies, it selected
| the companies that catered most to what most people actually want
| out of the web.
|
| He confuses his loss of status as a sign of the web's destruction
| but it is more a case of failing to capture the interest of
| changing demographics.
| emilsedgh wrote:
| This is absolutely the correct read into this. Kudos for seeing
| this matter so clearly.
| tomaszs wrote:
| It is tempting to discuss demographics, however it is still
| true there is a group of people, that still enjoys reading, and
| this part is left behind by social media.
|
| Since you can not link from insta and tiktok, you can not share
| longer meaningful articles. And even if you do, external links
| are ranked lower by social media platforms.
|
| Maybe, authors should create videos, however it seems people
| who have important things to say shy from video form. The
| question is if really video is the right choice for valuable
| content, or is not.
|
| Personally I think it is not a right medium for valuable
| content, therefore social media lacking features supporting
| text are just forcing not only enthusiastic readers, but also
| new demographics to consume brain fast-food.
|
| And it really is sad considering how much value has the
| Internet. I am thus glad that this place still exists.
| graeme wrote:
| Pretty much everyone I followed as a blogger circa 2006-08 is
| still writing. Generally they've moved on to greater
| prominence. A substantial chunk of them are on substack now.
|
| You don't have blogrolls anymore nor a blogosphere, but the
| writers are all there. It's just those of us who follow that
| are now a tiny fraction of users. But the rewards to that
| kind of writing have actually increased.
| nicbou wrote:
| There are still places to share those links, places that
| didn't exist before, and that reach a larger demographic.
|
| Blogging is getting a smaller share of a much larger pie, but
| in absolute terms, it's not going anywhere.
| sidpatil wrote:
| (2015)
| notsureaboutpg wrote:
| Eh, if you read the article, seems like he just wasn't as popular
| after his release from prison (understandably there are others
| who probably provide the content his audience seeks).
|
| Facebook, Twitter, etc. are still viable ways to market a blog in
| this day and age. I see a lot of people doing it well.
|
| It's also worth noting that when he was imprisoned there was more
| appetite for Iranian dissident posts in the West than there is
| now. Now after Persepolis, green movement, departure of
| Ahmedinejad, JCPOA, and Trump the appetite for that kind of
| content has died down a lot.
| aminozuur wrote:
| I too am Persian. But I don't think we can blame Facebook for
| making a consistent user experience, where people can get
| whatever information/memes they want, sorted algorithmically to
| the users' taste.
| codetrotter wrote:
| > sorted algorithmically to the users' taste
|
| But Facebook isn't even doing that. They are optimizing for
| "engagement", and for keeping people on the site so they can
| serve more ads to them.
|
| Just because they are highly effective at this does not mean
| they serve what we really would like to see.
|
| This is why I stopped browsing Facebook a long time ago. The
| only reason I have an account still is for people that talk to
| me on Messenger, and for occasionally checking on upcoming
| events. Now in the Corona pandemic I haven't even had a reason
| to check on upcoming events so I haven't almost gone onto
| Facebook at all.
|
| Instagram, which is also owned by Facebook, is doing a better
| job however, at providing me with content that I am interested
| in. So even though I dislike Facebook as a company I am
| actively using Instagram almost daily still.
| Nasrudith wrote:
| Who the hell /doesn't/ optimize for engagement with a popular
| publication? Nobody. The metrics for engagement vary by
| publication and may be more base or positive but they all do
| it by definition. I thought we already learned that from
| Yellow Journalism and all of the stupid moral panics like
| Rainbow Parties, Satanic Ritual Abuse, and Y2K fearmongering
| that didn't remotely make any sense even if every computer
| affected bricked itself.
| aminozuur wrote:
| "They are optimizing for "engagement""
|
| How else would they know which pages, friends, posts, you
| want to see the most?
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Those most likely to lead to likes, and most likely to
| generate long comments.
| contrral wrote:
| Counterpoints:
|
| - People will write long, impassioned screeds in response
| to the things they despise most.
|
| - People don't just view posts that are about things they
| hate/fear, they "like" and share them because they feel
| the need to approve of and disseminate every "expose" of
| the "bad guys". Even though most of it is vacuous FUD or
| twisted misinformation that accomplishes no such "noble"
| goal.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| I don't think it's a bad thing that things that people
| don't agree with are presented to them.
|
| As for the rest, I never argued for valuing sharing, and
| while those might generate likes they won't generate long
| comments unless they are at least slightly constructive.
| egypturnash wrote:
| They could just show you the stuff you've said to want to
| see, in chronological order? Nah. Too simple. Far too
| simple.
| polynomial wrote:
| You can choose to that as your preferred sort order in
| settings, but it will always revert back in a few days,
| so it's a constant cat and mouse game to switch it back.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Christ, what a user-hostile platform FB is.
| StavrosK wrote:
| Can you blame tobacco companies for making something so
| addictive and harmful? It seems like we can and do.
| polynomial wrote:
| That's the beauty of it. Harm from smoking is considered (by
| most accounts) objectively, medically, measurably bad. Harm
| from social media addiction isn't quantified in terms of
| cancer and death.
|
| "No one ever died from browsing Facebook" is likely false,
| but would be generally accepted as arguably true. "No one
| ever died because of Facebook" should be understood to be
| obviously untrue to a well-informed person.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Honestly, I feel millions of us (billions?) have died a
| little inside with the rise of Facebook and the like.
|
| But I'm speaking metaphorically, of course.
| Nasrudith wrote:
| We have met the enemy and he is us is the real issue. It
| isn't easy to accept it but by all remotely reasonable
| standards a large chunk of the population are horrible
| people. Just look at the approval towards the National
| Guard's actions at Kent State. Strip away the status and
| "supports using the military to shoot unarmed and non-
| violentn students on campus" is not something a non-
| horrible person supports.
|
| But people find scapegoats so much easier. Facebook is
| vapid trash because vapid trash is highly popular.
| anoncow wrote:
| So true. Endless distractions taking up countless man-hours.
| sn_master wrote:
| And only accepted speech is allowed. No longer your own private
| blog space to say whatever you wanted..
| tomjakubowski wrote:
| Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter have had content moderation
| from the beginning. They're just like web forums. They were
| never "private blog spaces to say whatever you wanted".
| There's been a "Report" button on all these sites for years.
|
| Even Myspace routinely banned users and groups over content
| issues. Here's one from 2008. https://web.archive.org/web/201
| 11011112224/http://www.secula...
| dionian wrote:
| Its nothing like it was today. It wasn't part and parcel of
| politics and elections like it is today. People weren't
| being ruined by woke mobs
| zoobab wrote:
| Even Hackernews has censored entire threads.
| throwaway3699 wrote:
| The scale really changes things though...
| marcinzm wrote:
| So? You can argue that this form of distraction doesn't bring
| net-happiness but what is wrong with pointless distractions
| that make people happy? Before this we had TV and before that
| Radio and before that Books and so on and so on.
| [deleted]
| DoingIsLearning wrote:
| I genuinely dislike Apple but their CEO has just shared some
| insights that very much go against your premise of social
| networks as just another harmless entertainment industry.
|
| "At a moment of rampant disinformation and conspiracy
| theories juiced by algorithms, we can no longer turn a blind
| eye to a theory of technology that says all engagement is
| good engagement -- the longer the better -- and all with the
| goal of collecting as much data as possible"
|
| "What are the consequences of seeing thousands of users join
| extremist groups, and then perpetuating an algorithm that
| recommends even more?"
|
| "Will the future belong to the innovations that make our
| lives better, more fulfilled and more human? Or will it
| belong to those tools that prize our attention to the
| exclusion of everything else, compounding our fears and
| aggregating extremism, to serve ever-more-invasively-targeted
| ads over all other ambitions?"
| dionian wrote:
| and of course, we all know who gets to define 'extremism'
| TeaDrunk wrote:
| Could you clarify? I don't understand the implication
| here. The above language can apply equally to any number
| of large, sometimes violent, protests that are primarily
| built on and disseminate information via a social media
| platform.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| I thought extremism pretty much defined itself. Any
| political position that is void of any factual evidence
| to back it up, that acknowledges no nuance....
|
| Just off the top of my head, but I think we all know
| extremism when we see/hear it.
| JohnJamesRambo wrote:
| Those things weren't proven over and over again to lead to
| massive depression and mental health issues.
|
| TV ok somewhat bad but not all bad. It made us all on the
| same page, believing the same facts and entertained. Radio
| had to be pretty much all good. A kid listening to old radio
| shows laying in front of the console was in pure heaven.
| Facebook, etc. is purely detrimental to humanity like
| cigarettes or meth.
|
| I'd post the references but there are simply too many. I've
| never seen a study that didn't find Facebook, Twitter, etc.
| detrimental to mental health.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Radio, books and TV often bring a lot more intellectual
| development and perspective than engagement-optimized
| content.
| TeaDrunk wrote:
| I don't know if this is true. The most popular and widely
| watched TV is reality TV drivel that is IMO no more
| intellectually stimulating than, say, 'Professional
| craftsmaker REACTS to viral TikTok videos!'.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Only if you walk away from the experience thinking about
| it, processing it, perhaps thinking differently yourself.
|
| Few television shows did that for me -- "Connections" is a
| HN favorite and changed my way of thinking.
|
| Several books by Kurt Vonnegut (and Dune as well, FWIW)
| also changed how I think about the world.
|
| Content is important is my point.
| foxhop wrote:
| If you run a blog and are considering adding comments to allow
| for discourse outside of social media, checkout out my software
| and service called https://www.remarkbox.com/ I made it pay-what-
| you-can today. works anywhere that supports HTML.
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(page generated 2021-01-31 23:01 UTC)