Social media is no longer meant for connecting with friends. It's designed almost entirely to facilitate the following of brands and the monetizing of personalities
I keep saying to all of my friends that social media is just one big ad now. It's just more insidious because it's often "real" people advertising a lifestyle or aesthetic vs a specific product like a traditional ad
I notice when I use reels or fast paced algorithmic systems, I can't think straight and do work. Whenever I restrict it I feel so much better, I'm more patient and my focus improves. Everything is too quick for my brain these days. In the middle of watching them it feels like my brain is frying, but its so addictive that I keep watching.
I deleted Instagram a few weeks ago for that reason. I spent so much time watching random people I didn't even know, just forever scrolling. I now click the "show less shorts" button Everytime UA-cam recommends one too. I only allow myself to watch long form content, and only 1 video per sitting.
That’s what cocomelon does to kids. It’s intentionally too quick and bright for their little brains, so they get overstimulated and experience anxiety when the show goes off
I've noticed my boyfriend seems to be addicted. The other day I watched him pick up his phone, open social media, close it seconds later, set his phone down & then do it all again. 3x in about 5 minutes like it was some kind of mindless tick.
It's funny to think that not so long ago, you could legitimately run out of new social media posts to see. You could fully catch up with your feed and be done with it.
9:09 It feels like everyone is so burnt out. It’s difficult to escape and decompress because everything demands your attention. Social media has become another one of those things. I don’t think human beings were meant to be this aware of so many things, or this intellectually active, because the burnout is hard to shake and hits like a ton of bricks.
You really hit the nail on the head, I've been feeling this unnatural burnout for years now, because rather than just withdrawing from busywork, just finding something or somewhere to withdraw without a constant barrage of spam and ragebait has essentially started to feel like a project that takes work and energy in itself.
This in combination with this wacky economy makes it so there is barely time to recuperate from any burnout. You have to consistently work and you have to consistently post to keep your engagement so you can use social media for money. But like you said, so everly draining.
The ‘burnout’ is because on every social media platform the feed is an array of vastly different topic related videos and chats and everyone is consuming far too much needless content and absorbing information that at the end of the day straight up IRRELEVANT TO OUR REAL LIVES. I was trying to tell ppl 10+ years ago THE INTERNET ISNT REAL SO STOP REGARDING IT AS SUCH.
Our algorithms become an 'echo chamber' of things most engaging to us... including ragebait and drama which is why i think we've argued so much the last few years.☹️
I don't actually think we argued so much, that could actually be beneficial. Instead most people I tried to argue with where just so stuck in their echo chambers that constructive arguing was basically impossible. It get's pretty nasty when you have to explain, or rather convince people of basic facts and reasons for morality before you can bring up your actual argument.
Can't really blame the algorithms for an influx of people bandwagoning their way onto two or three platforms, full of people they obviously won't get on with, and giving corporations carte blanche to do what they want with their captive audiences.
I stopped using social media in 2018. Now I only use UA-cam to watch specific creators, and discord to keep up with my friends online. I think a lot of people that say they're busy should give up on social media for a week. Completely give it up and see how busy you are. Because dropping social media has freed up a lot of my physical time and my brain space. Regarding where we can find curated information, in the past those were found in magazines. You could look through the magazine and the magazine would eventually end lol but you had to pay for it, and nowadays people just expect everything to be free. Now if everything is free, the product becomes you!
magazines sucked ass too when they sell you "top 10 sponsored gadgets I bought!". Focusing solely on the money is the problem. Bring good content and people will pay.
Legit I left social media last year and I could FEEL the gears in my brain creeking to get going again - the brain rot was so severe that it physically hurt to learn how to be an active consumer again Plus the way it freed up my time like you said. Literally learned how to play guitar, become more active in my exercise, etc
I’ve been thinking about taking a break from social media again because there’s SO MANY ADS! I hop on there to see what’s going on with my friends but my friends don’t post much and I don’t blame them because neither do I and then it’s all just ads and mindless stuff and sometimes it doesn’t hook me in and other times I feel like so much time has been wasted because I’m hooked. I think the last day of 2024 is a good time to start my break.
dude I tried to have an Insta account last year for the first time since 2018, and I was shocked that it was all ads and sponsored content and NOTHING from my friends. I deleted it after about a month I think. I still like youtube (especially the comment section - I think it's really interesting to see how the other internet people are thinking and feeling), but if I couldn't use my ad blocker, I wouldn't. I think taking a social media break is always a great idea!
@ Right!? It wasn’t like that before and then suddenly BOOM! ADS! And FB is exactly the same and now you even get notifications about sponsored stuff, it’s insane! I posted a happy new year post on Insta and FB and have removed both of them from my phone so I won’t be using them for a long period of time because they’re honestly exhausting with how much they try to cram in your face. I also like YT, I won’t be leaving here. I need Sims content in my life and content like in this video 😅
I'm so disappointed with the state of social media, the good thing is I spend less and less time online because it has become so empty that it's just wasting my time, but I miss the inspiration and fun I used to have in the beginning. I hate that it's all marketing now. Love your content! ❤
My phones charging port busted, so I can’t use my phone when it’s charging on a wireless charger and it’s made my life SO MUCH BETTER to not be able to scroll when I get home bc I’ve found other ways to pass my time 🙏🏻 I learned embroidery, how to use a drill, and I’ve started reading and working out again. I feel like I know who I am again 🥳
this video is making me wonder if that's why i've pivoted toward using reddit a lotttt more in the past year or so. because that way, if i am endlessly scrolling, it's at least about topics i know i want to see, and it feels like i'm in community with the other people in the subreddit.
I did that, then also got rid of Reddit. You said it yourself, "it feels like" you are in a community. I have decided to be in real F2F communities with friends and family, I'm too tired of the digital world.
Yeah! This is why I will never leave amino, even though it's becoming increasingly more broken and is slowly dying, but the handful of communities I'm in there feel like my internet home full of genuine people being excited about things we love. There's no algorithm or endless scroll, it's just genuine posts made by real people excited to share their love with people who love the same things.
@@tinygreenleaf oh interesting, i’ve never heard of this platform! there really are so many great online communities out there. having a shared interest can do a lot to bring people together
i do genuinely feel like i stop using social media the more and more i see ads and none of my friends' stuff, and then i just text them directly and hang out irl also small note, its pronounced mina "lay"!
Worse than "the internet" is every search browser. I miss the old google that would give you 100 pages of possible hits to your query that actually have the phrase on the page.
Pinterest used to be the place where I’d explore some great ideas that I could actually implement. Now a quarter of it is just wonky AI images. It’s weirdly upsetting
The art is all AI, the outfit ideas are just ads, and everything else is either overly marketed or political. I think the recipes are the only thing that somewhat survived on there...
@glassbirds Clothing and art are definitely goners, but I've still had some luck in finding activities for kids, recipies (like you mentioned), party themes, and niche crafting ideas.
i miss the pre-algorithm internet so much. it was all about seeing posts from your friends and people you follow. now it's all strangers and ads and undisclosed ads
This is not an algorithm problem, but a technology problem. Even as far back as the 1920s, technology has been used to break down the diversity of culture to mold it into a homogeneous whole for the convenience of advertisers and business. If any of you want prof I recommend "Propaganda" by E. Bernay's from 1928, there are free PDFs online.
We should have never allowed people to link personal content and monetarisation. What was unique about social media was that people shared their uncorrupted views on there because there was no compensation. Now I get the ick when I see what people are doing for money on social media, like people posting their kids in vulnerable situations and everybody desperately wanting to look like the mainstream because it has been proven to be successful. We are chasing the money and selling our individuality, normal humans have become corrupt and I’d argue that it’s not really valued anymore to create real art, that could potentionally disturbing and human because people are scared it’s not gonna please the algorithm.
One other thing I have noticed is that so many Gen Z & A produced videos have absolutely no pauses between statements. It is all one run on sentence, there's no time to really taken what is said in. It reminds me of the old days of radio when Dead Air was a cardinal sin.
The last couple months I’ve strictly limited my social media intake, and it’s been great for my brain. I took Facebook and TikTok off my phone, and put Instagram (which I do enjoy and have to use a bit for my job) on a daily timed limit. I was very much hooked and the thing I’ve mostly noticed is I don’t get mad/annoyed as easily lately. Also, everybody should read more! Not only are books physical things that you actually own, but they’re the only medium left where you won’t be interrupted with ads.
I also think that there’s seriously a PUBLIC aspect of online, such as there being absolutely no barrier between people of different ages. Thus, there are 30 year olds making content alongside 55 year olds alongside 8 year olds. This has never happened before. EVER.
I dunno, I was on the internet as a child from the late 90s to the early 2000s, and I chatted with adults on gaiaonline, chanboards, and deviantart. What's actually happening is that normal people never used to use things like deviantart and chanboards. Now the entire internet is like deviantart and chanboards, participation-wise. Any non-branded content is being made by people with the most free time, hence, weird people and kids. (Like on deviantart and chanboards back in the day.) Normal people are the consumers more often than creators, because normal people are busy.
One of the saddest things I witness and personally deal with is AI "artists" saying things like "I don't want to pay an artist to make something that's not as good as what the AI can make" and this is literally so devastating because humans should not have to compete with computers. There is something so disgenuine about things that are too perfect looking (but they're not because AI still doesn't get things 100% right. Like, at first glance, some of those images look really polished, but the closer you look, the more issues you find with hands looking weird or a clothing strap not lining up and things like that. Humans don't make those mistakes because we have our human experience to draw from.
I have sensory overload issues and social anxiety already and one of the things that absolutely infuriates me nowadays is TV screens at gas pumps blasting in my face the latest junk info and ads while just trying to pay attention to the gas I'm pumping ...or walking into Walmart, they have blaring speakers outside in the parking lots spewing ads or shitty music. I loathe how disgusting our society has become with raping our ears and eyes non-stop with advertising. Our culture doesn't value silence, pausing or reflecting and it is taking a major toll. Sorry, I know this isn't specifically internet related.
I was just talking about this with a coworker. I still wish to utilize the internet as a resource. I want to search for the information/content. I don’t want suggestions. that’s a major part of my disenchantment personally
On the topic of retro fashion becoming popular again due to algorithms... I'm 28 years old, I've been dressing like a 1960s hippie since I was 16. I got laughed at for it for a good couple years, but eventually folks kinda came around to it because I owned it so well. Every piece of my wardrobe at that point was slowly curated not only to the fashion from the 60s, but also things that reflected myself. It wasn't just the bell bottoms and tweed belts and tie-dye, it was also the little patches and homemade headbands and buttons I had found at a range of places from Hot Topic to Goodwill to even ones I made myself or friends made or gifted to me. I'd make my own jewelry, and sew and modify my own clothes over time, adding patchwork or tailoring something to fit me better or adding on intricate stitches onto my pants to look like flowers. And I had a LOT of things expressing my political and social views on my outfit, ranging from Black Lives Matter to LGBT+ rights, and anti-Drump buttons. I even found some political/social rights buttons from the 60s that I wore that were still relevant. That being said, when I saw folks wearing bell-bottoms and stuff recently, I got really excited. Especially because I started transitioning at this time and I was trying to find more ways to take my hippie look and make it more masculine, so seeing it come in fashion was good because I figured that I might be able to make some friends who understood the hippie movement and what it was all about, as well as trade fashion tips and ways to express yourself more. But I also started noticing everyone was wearing the same brand of bell-bottoms. And the same print of psychedelic shirt. And the same exact accessories. I thought it was kinda odd until I found out that apparently it was a part of a TikTok fashion trend. I hate to sound like an old man here, but it really annoyed me that something that I worked hard to develop over the course of 12, soon to be 13 years, has just been boiled down into algorithmic soup. Like, the hippie movement had an actual meaning and I feel like it's something that 10000% should be brought back in today's climate in earnest, because the hippie movement wasn't just about the fashion, it was a political movement. It was anti-war, it was for civil rights, it was pro-choice, it was feminist. These are all things we need right now. But it got boiled down into a commodity which like.. I dress this way for fun to an extent, yes. All the bright colors, and all the sewing and modification, and collecting buttons both old and new are fun. But it's not just about the fun, the way I dress is a political statement and always has been. It feels very uncomfortable seeing plastic versions of it floating around. It makes me wonder if there's even a point to what I'm doing if it's going to be seen as just a commodity and a trend..
Don't ever stop being who you are. This was an awesome comment to read. So much truth in what you are saying, it is sad. I feel that tik tok trends have done that a lot, like you said, boiling it down and making it feel cheap. A way less intense example might be a song you have a deep connection with that now is reduced to 16 counts of dance steps and forgotten about later. Or songs that have deep meanings about deep topics that are now associated with "what cartoon character are you?" And stupid stuff like that. You said it way better but I agree so much with your comment. Please don't stop being your hippie self!!! I will always be stuck in the rawr xD era of fashion, hair, the like.
This was fantastic! Exceptional commentary! I recently re-installed FB on my phone after 3 years, out of sheer boredom and I was blown away by what it's become.
I always find that your videos so mirror my feelings. It’s nice to know I’m not alone. Thanks for taking the time and effort to put your videos together that way you do. Appreciate ya!
My spouse and I have noticed the same thing with Google Maps. During an hour drive to their dad's house, we were sent through multiple neighborhoods that we've never been to before, and through a busy shopping center. It also once sent us to a house that didn't exist, (it was 55 minutes from the house we were actually supposed to go to). I think it could be corporate complacency. They've monopolized these services, and don't need to optimize them because we'll just use them anyway.
i think it’s just about time we say goodbye to the internet for most things, especially entertainment and social media. it’s clearly not the same internet we knew and loved, and it’s just creating more harm than good at this point. money’s gotta go and ruin everything doesn’t it :(
The reason money is a problem, is because money literally isn't real. It isn't real. That green piece of paper that people hand around, it does not stand in for anything with actually real social function. You might think of it like a fairytale.
algorithms are helpful to some degree in discovering something new, but when i really want to deep dive, actively looking for those things the old school way hits so different last year i discovered two j-pop groups that i adore so much and their whole discography isn't readily available anywhere so taking the time to find that endeared me even more to them
From my experience, Google Maps has also gone rough here in Argentina. It’s defying me to make U turns in the middle of highways or to go through dangerous neighborhoods. 😮 And I’m soooooo tired of remakes and Disney human-little mermaid, lion king, etc. No new ideas
Yep Google Maps keeps giving wrong directions these days, how many u turns I was asked to do in the last couple of months only to be told 2 mins later I was actually on the right road.
I straight can’t use google maps anymore. If it gets fed a lightly wrong address, the kind that doordash spits out, “124 address st” instead of 124 address street, it doesn’t take you anywhere near 124 address street, it just takes you to a random business that paid to be listed with them. No errors or anything is shown, so you actually think you’re headed to 124 address street.
I totally blame the Property Brothers for the Grey Walla/White Trim aesthetic. What's worse is that I was shopping for a home & seeing before & after shots & preferring the before. I hate Flippers & refuse to buy a house that was Flipped.
i used this video as a call to action to be more mindful of what i want to see & do & learn. so i pulled up a lecture on a topic that interests me (botany) and i am going to watch that now.
I started using zapier for my business and found a load of pre-built AI sequences made to create and post images to platforms!! 🤯🤯🤯 this is how it’s happening. No one is even creating it.
Have anyone bought anything from ads recently? Seriously for all the bazillion ads I see everyday 0.5 are for a product I might buy. Each time I see an ad for yet another useless AI app I just wonder WHY.
I almost automatically ignore all ads. I occasionally get something from an ad I get for Etsy, but I have to make sure it isn't some drop shipped slop first, which is ridiculous.
I haven’t bought anything from ads, but I have noticed that ads have been subconsciously effecting my perceptions of which brands are “reputable” or “industry leaders.” If I hear the name of a brand enough, I start thinking of that brand when I think of that category of item. If I consider buying something, a brand that I’ve heard of, be it from friends or from ads (my brain doesn’t keep track) tends to be what I consider first. I’ve noticed this especially since I moved to a new country last year, so I’m a bit of a blank slate when it comes to impressions of local brands. A brand feels more reputable if it’s a name that I recognize, regardless of how it is that I first heard of it. This also ties into the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon where when we learn something or become aware of something for the first time, we feel like we suddenly start seeing it everywhere. If a brand can get their name in your head, you’ll start noticing them more. The more you notice them, the more your opinion of the brand is likely to improve which increases the likelihood that you may buy from that brand. Maybe not today, but perhaps weeks or months from now. To be fair though, this mostly applies to real brands that are paying for things like UA-cam ads. Not the dropshippers that take out cheap pintrist ads. I think they’re just hoping you’ll click on accident and then make an impulse purchase.
I've not bought a single thing from an ad. Ever. If I see something interesting, I make a note of it and revisit in a week. If I still want it in a week, I do research online to find the best product that serve the purpose and the company behind it.
I get ads all the time for onion and garlic things. I am highly allergic to onions and garlic and would be sent to the hospital for consuming the things I get in ads. I literally say into my phone "you are wasting your money you are advertising to the wrong person"
You've articulated and conveyed this in a way that's helpful for me to re-think how I interact with social media (and this is coming from someone who has never had TikTok). Thank you for making this video!
Regardless of whether you don’t think you’re well versed on this topic, I (and I’m sure many others) appreciate you talking about this. This problem needs to be discussed, and you made a nice, straightforward and engaging video. I’m worried about how algorithms will affect children as they are introduced to the internet and touch screens at younger ages. Hell grown adults get sucked into the trap. If only intentional mindfulness would become popular and stick rather than being yet another fleeting trend
I’d love to see a video on how being an only child influences a child’s development and if not having siblings causes them to miss out on anything developmental important because I’ve noticed that there seem a lot more parents only having one child now.
I think it depends on the parenting and "village." I'm an only child. My mom was a single mother and had my grandmother move in with us to help take care of me. But I had a few cousins my age that I would routinely get together and play with, as well as friends I made as i started and went through school. I'm now in my thirties, married, and have a toddler of my own. He might be our only as well but he has cousins around his age and neighborhood friends we routinely see. When he starts preschool or Kindergarten I'm certain he'll make friends there. He also sees his grandparents often. So far his life is just as fulfilled as his cousins with siblings. I know people with siblings who struggled and only children who struggled. But it all comes down to the parenting. How they are treated, what they are taught to value, etc. Regardless, I'd like to hear her take on this as well.
As a single child myself, I did feel as a teen I maybe didn't have like the social skill set others had, but I'm not sure if that's down to lack of siblings. I learned charisma through waitressing though and now see no difference between me and friends with siblings! I think it all comes down to the parents and how they raise you.
I’m an only child and didn’t have this problem. There are people who have multiple kids but the kids just go to their own rooms and do their own thing. It is highly depended on the parenting and exposure the kids receive. I was constantly around other children and I was told how I was supposed to act. My friends who were only children are also fine socially. I have students who have siblings and they have terrible social skills. It can go either way.
I’m an only child with parents who worked a lot (which I think is an important aspect) and I think the only real effect has been that I’m very comfortable on my own. I played on my own a lot as a kid because my parents had to work, but often from home, negating the need for childcare or a babysitter. As an adult, I now feel very confident living alone and doing things on my own. I’ve heard that a lot of people struggle with the quietness of living alone or doing things in public like going to the movies alone. That’s never been a huge issue for me, which I think relates back to having to spend time having fun alone as a kid. I still went to normal public school and had friends though, so I can also socialize with others just fine
21:45 Oh my god, seriously though! Pinterest used to be so much fun, now it's just AI slob, ads, and the same five other links repeated every six posts or so. It's completely unusable!
At around 11:30pm a few weeks ago, about 8 hours into a 10 hour road trip, Gmaps decided to keep me on my toes by making me go down a dirt road, I’m pretty sure through someone’s farm, only to circle back onto the same empty highway I had already been driving on. Thanks, Google.
It was nice to see you reference Mina Le's video - I like listening to both of you speak on a variety of topics because you give perspectives on important topics that I align with
I feel like this also why fandoms are so terrible now. It less about being a fan and more about trend hopping. A surprising amount of people will never engage with the media before hopping on to posting art.
My only hope for this trend is that the new one will be moving life back to the real world, in an almost hardcore way. Real life meet-ups will be cooler. Real life events. Reading or knitting together at cafés. People going to true local indie concerts. Secret high fashion gatherings. No uploading of photos. This has to be the next step.
I loved this video. I've been very uncomfortable for the longest time. This happened when i realized there's no novelty in anything anymore. Everything is the same. I saw this pattern ironically on Instagram pictures. From sameness of personalities to same poses people strike for pictures. All the same goddamn angle. A gazillion same pictures of a scenic places. No nuance in anything. But I quit instagram bc something sent me off the edge. And that is, homogeneous language used by everybody. That scared me the most. I realized i started using vocabulary that are used indiscriminately on social media. People everywhere are not unique in their use of language anymore. That made me feel like a clone more than anything else.
1:17 I think with the new rush of trying to push out the newest exciting thing, we’ve lost touch with the community. During quarantine we had community with going through the same process and we all connected but that we aren’t all going through the same thing, we’ve lost touch. Now the internet or social media doesn’t seem as good or engaging anymore because everything has lost meaning, we don’t see too many relatable things instead we see AI made videos or some people trying to be the newest-most exciting thing. I wish I could feel good on social media and not have think about the fact most people on social media platforms don’t even care too much about anything except going famous
I've definitely noticed that globalisation of teen slang. Slang is interesting and used to be more regional. Now it is age and Internet based. Ps. I keep physical media (CDs, DVDs) of my favourites. Although I can't easily LEND to a friend any more as no one has a player! So I can enjoy culture but I can't share it.
What I find sinister and what actually proves the point that people are so deeply manipulated is how all these influencers on TikTok use the same hand gestures. Have you noticed? The same type of hand gestures over and over again. Makes me sick to my stomach.
If you turn off your history and recommendations, the home page is completely disabled. I save a lot of videos to playlists because of the no-history thing, but seeing what I want is SO much better. My caveat of "to learn something new" is that I have enough interests I look up new, relevant-to-me info when I'm ready. 😅
This trend of boring globalization started long before the Internet. In the late 80s we got the term “accidental tourist“ to describe the McDonaldnazation of the world. No matter where you go - the same crap is there.
I guarantee its not just optimized for engagement, but for what powerful entities and corporations want it to be. Theres not just sponsored posts or advertisements, but likely ways based off of hashtags that certain more profitable subjects are emphasized in the algorithm.
When Facebook started to make it impossible to view content chronologically, I knew social media had crashed and burned. The other time I felt that huge "betrayal" was when Skype no longer sent messages unless you and the receiver were both online at the same time, and started showing people as online all the time if they were on their phones. Both of these things are an example of taking away the actual social aspect. If you can't tell when people are actually online, you can't message them when they are actually available. If you can't tell what people are actually doing and saying in the moment on Facebook, you can't properly keep up with them. Both of those things happened long ago. Social media's been dead a long, long time.
14:10 my Google maps has been giving the most insane routes through neighborhoods lately too! It doesn't even give me the highway route option anymore, I think it knows I hate driving around other people 🤔 I get so stressed watching other people weave through the rush hour wave going 80 in a 65
“Algorithmic recommendations are addictive because they are always subtly confirming your own cultural, political, and social biases, warping your surroundings into a mirror image of yourself while doing the same for everyone else. This had made me anxious, the possibility that my view of my own life-lived through the Internet-was a fiction formed by the feeds.” - Kyle Chayka. Highly recommend some of his writing on the topic. Personally kinda quit using Instagram and spotify and started being more mindful about consumption habits. Made a huge difference in my well-being, and in how I curate what I consume.
one thing i noticed last year since i've stopped using social media except youtube was that even youtube is now an echo chamber. if i watched one gaming video ,every video on my fyp is about the same game. if i leave auto play on and i watch this video i guarantee the next video to play with be a gaming video. i don't know how to reset my youtube algo so i can get new suggestion
Deleting my socials 4 years ago was BY FAR the best decision I ever made for myself. Every time I watch your videos about social media I am more happy with this decision❤
I think one long-term casualty of the embrace of AI on the micro scale is the loss of curiosity. It used to be, even when you used a search engine, it was all the incidental stuff you came across that would spark interest in other topics. I see it with interns and new grads coming in and I, at least, find it so devastating. Maybe I'm just getting old
Second hand clothing shops in my home district are really coming into their own. There’s new ones opening frequently and they’re often full of people of all ages and backgrounds. Gives me hope that folk are sick and tired of today’s algorithm-driven fashion, Amazon and the bland selection in high street stores. Doing their own thing, making their own choices, offline. (Incidentally better for the planet too.)
THE GPS THING IS SO TRUE FOR ME TOO. I've been wondering if it's just me or my phone being dumb but it's been going haywire for a while now for me too. It's been really aggravating but I'm glad it's not just me though. 🤣😭
Social media is a depressing strip-mining operation of low content marketing. Where the virtue signal is more important than the actual virtue. I've re-discovered reading books and it is great!
This is why we need community ran social media on platforms like the Fediverse, rather than the centralized corporate ones we've been using for so long now.
History will disagree with you in less than 2 years, your viewpoint will be wiped out by the textbook writers. I agree, but unfortunately your viewpoint will be buried
This. The government has just quit enforcing America's copyright laws. What's going on is total thievery no limits abuse by the filthy rich Silicon Valley Wall Street billionaires
idk, I feel like there's still subcultures on the internet that have the same community feel as the old internet had back when I first started using it in 2004/2005... There are still pockets of the internet where people are kind of fighting this algorithmic suggesting - one example I can think of is breakcore playlists where they find a bunch of breakcore artists that have small audiences and put them into hour long compilations...
I use YT music because the genres and artists I like for example, progressive psytrance, aren't on most popular platforms like Spotify or Apple music. Many amateur mixes and DJ sets, which is how we find and discover new tracks just aren't on those platforms.
I'm so glad there are social medias such as Mastodon and Bluesky when those two lack algorithms and the thing I like about them, there's no ads and you pretty much never see people fight or argue with each other.
I think artificial "intelligence" is a bubble set to burst, personally. It's cheap, but it's also wildly incompetent, and is completely reliant on actual people making actual things for it to crib off of. The more of a market share artificial "intelligence" takes up, the more culture starts to homogenize into an unappealing slop, the more people are going to actively avoid it whenever possible. Sooner or later not using artificial "intelligence" will be a highly marketable selling point, and once that happens I doubt the market will ever swing back in favor of artificial "intelligence" again. So like capitalism at large, even if you aren't one of the people who can do anything to stop it, you can at least weather the consequences in the hopes you'll be one of the people who get to outlive it.
Well you're right about everything except A.I being cheap. I even heard OpenAI just switched from being a non-profit to being for profit. And remember the data centers.
@@AlekseyMaksimovichPeshkov Machine art is expensive for the company that develops it. For the companies that commission it, it's so cheap it may as well be free.
As far as google maps go, Apple Maps and google maps be tripping. Apple will have my cursor facing the totally wrong way and it doesn’t change orientation in the app to whatever I’m facing like it used too.
Didn’t even start the video and it brings me to the way ppl either over consuming or stealing each others content. I’ve seen like 5 different ppl do the same video, it wasn’t even a trend. They literally stole the original video from an old man. 🥴 Also the algorithm has gotten so wild, I’m seeing actual ppl I follow posts a week from when they originally posted or I’m being shown posts I already liked 3 weeks ago. Outside of that, it’s a bunch of ads.
I was actually just talking to my coworker about this. We're both in IT and I said "I'm really concerned that everything's the same." I explained that the content that my male coworkers were finding was similar to the content my BIL was getting (not a techy person at all and twice his age) and that I was getting the same content as my MIL & SIL who are wildly different from me. Or at least, we used to be. We used to get together as a group and be like look what I found and none of us had ever seen it. But this past holiday? Every single tiktok or trend I had already seen online. I picked up crochet the same time my SIL did because we both saw it online and decided to give it a go. Was it kind of nice? Yeah. But at the same time it set off alarm bells that *my online viewership isn't my own.* It's barely unique. And sure there's an argument to be made the uniqueness is overrated to a degree, but uniqueness is part of what makes us human and life interesting. It's fantastic that we have this massive overarching culture where people can always find commonality, but too much of a good thing is very quickly turning the experience sour. I've found the things that I genuinely love are things I've curated on my own in person and then shared with others. I have a local coffee shop that is quite literally a dive or a hole in the wall. It's not trendy, but the owners are awesome & the coffee is phenomenal. They don't even exist online beyond an outdated Facebook page and their website that's just for ordering not social media presence. I found them during a college assignment to go for a 30 minute walk without a destination in mind. The best thing we did as a family this past Christmas was play a game I stumbled upon while killing time to donate blood walking around some shops in a shopping center I don't usually visit. That's the future of finding cool stuff or experiences. It's not going to be online anymore. We'll have to go digging around for it ourselves. The old school phenomena of meme curators has evolved into real life curators looking for genuine and authentic experiences/products/businesses. Is it more work? 100% But I feel a lot less depressed knowing these are things I actually found on my own.
I liked social media and streaming services because I hated commercials. Now it feels like everything is just one big commercial. Social media feels like micro entertainment more than anything close to social media.
I have 4 apps on my phone (besides preinstalled apps like maps and safari); my library’s app, an app to find campsites, my bank app, and UA-cam. I only watch UA-cam on the weekends for a short period of time and what people are talking about here is like my weekly checkup of the social media realm. I started cutting back a year or so ago and I love it. I rarely even touch my phone. I journal and go outside and color and write down random thoughts and observations. I go on walks and ask real people for book and restaurant recommendations and directions and meet people in person through hobbies and just talking to people around me. I’ve been so much happier and I’ve seen actual changes like my consumption has gone down drastically because I have no idea what people online are buying. I don’t buy fast fashion and I only buy clothes or decor or whatever else because I actually like it without any input from the online public. I spend more time with my dog who seems so much happier because of it. I’m moving more and feeling better because I no longer have an endless source of entertainment at home. I’m still slowly cutting back and recognize that it isn’t perfect but this is one of the best changes I’ve made.
the AI stuff really freaks me out! I homeschool my kids, but learning about grammerly and AI programs that basically write essays for you it's so crazy. I worry about the kids in the future.
It's not just algorithms that manipulate us. I noticed opinions on reddit are very different and I think its because you can get down voted. You might speak a truth that isn't very nice or likeable, resulting in punishment. So it's a sugarcoating competition.
Reddit deletes a lot of stuff that goes against their own agenda. Try posting something you don’t often see you’ll get banned it’s basically mob rule think of it in real world examples if minorities posted and lived in majority county they’d get ratioed or banned from posting
Reddit in general is more of a hivemind that punishes those who think outside the box. Regardless of whether or not the box is actually correct in any sense
I'm really glad you made this comment tho. Because everytime I google something the first thing to pop up is a reddit thread, whether the thread is right or wrong
Wait... there are people that just... go... with autoplay/ suggested stuff? I've never engaged with any of that, not on purpose anyways. I want what I search out, no more, no less. I want to curate my own internet experience and get angry if a site tries to do that for me. I've un-installed most apps, only using Firefox with add-ons to remove all the algorithm noise and other unwanted "features" from sites. I highly suggest this way of going about things, it will make the internet a nicer place to be.
I think yt got my other comment. Do you have a recommendation for the add ons? The algorithm has caught my interests but the AI content is driving me up the wall.
What you were talking about with chornology is something I do really like with tumblr. I have my list of people I am following, and I can look literally just at them. I can also follow specific tags, though because the tags I follow are not very popular they are not readily filled, but tumblr doesn't let me see a tag feed chronologically and their systems really suck at it so I never use it. But it does mean I have the handful of people I follow, I see whatever it is they have shared and then that is it, and after 15 minutes of scolling, that is the whole of the feed for the last third of a day.
“No getting canceled for bad human behavior” - this right here is why I left social media. I watched “drama tok” viciously go after just regular people because their “former besties” decided to release the hounds on them. There’s only so much sociopathic behavior you can witness before you exit stage left
34:42 and speaking of the accidentally loosing a video if the feed refreshes and you don't save it, I think another issue as far as the original content stuff is all the re-posts. like on places like Facebook or Instagram, where you might see something you really like, but the video or thing won't say who it's really from and their channel. and I think for some reason the repost pages tend to have way more engagement and reach than the original creator. 🤔 UA-cam also has a weird issue in the past 6-7 years. or whenever shorts became a thing🤷♂ some channels share specific clips, gags and moments from certain shows or movies, but will never say what show, movie or episode it's from in the description. and as a result that I think was made on purpose, you get a lot of people commenting asking movie/show name and episode number. thereby driving up engagement. and how it'll spread it to way more people
The last time I had actual genuine fun on the internet I think has to be invite-only adults-only discord groups I've met some of my closest friends over these. I play incredibly emotionally deep tabletop rpgs, and write truly moving fiction with my friends. The best crowd to be running with in a fandom is ~30 y/o queer women (and adjacent) with established careers some of the most hinged yet hilarious people I have ever met I have to wonder if this is what old school forum culture felt like
yeah... I've just naturally stopped using everything on the internet that I used to other than just these 3 things - Reddit, UA-cam, video games. everything else has gotten so boring and stupid to me. if my friends wanna talk or share pics with me... they'll reach out other ways. I ain't doing the social media shit anymore.
Same, except it's only UA-cam and video games for me now (but mostly video games). The only time I look to Reddit is for an answer to a niche/specific question.
The algorithm took me to this video at the same time I've been experiencing a mental shift. Thanks for saying and validating the things I've been thinking.
What was your master’s major? Whatever it was, your research skills transfer beautifully to these more sociological topics (if that wasn’t already your field lol). I find the illusion of choice in the context of this video essay very interesting. As a sociology student I am interested in agency, or more so the lack thereof, and this topic highlights how we’re, in a sense, mere products of our environments. Great video!
I will say, getting community is a struggle when everything is out of reach as well need to have a car to travel. Especially in the USA. Most of social media is bad and the corporates only drive for attention and data. It’s annoying. Great video
One things this video brought to mind is how trends used to be driven by human desire to buy an item or piece of clothing. They would sell out in stores and there would be so much hype for the products. Now, trends seem to be dictated my mass marketing on social media and paid sponsorships. So sad to see how things have changed, I miss the old internet that was in chronological order… that was the golden age
Ashley, your channel is legit scary because you're voicing the thoughts I try to push to the back of my brain and keep being delulu :')))) Also if this helps to anybody: For the last 5 years I have my youtube algorithms turned off due to "enhance youtube" extension, so I mostly find content that I intentionally want to watch. I wish I could do that on instagram too... And for Facebook there's an extension "News feed eradicator" that limits your time on the service
Those type of things the governments of the world need to regulate by law the social media platforms etc. Must do. Not letting the billionaires do literally anything they want that is only in their no limits at-all-costs self-serving profit motive that is not anyone's well being in real world.
17:23 / I’m an Apple Music user and I have honestly never had the current trending songs recommended to me. I play my discovery playlist often and it’s always songs I usually do like.
Social media is no longer meant for connecting with friends. It's designed almost entirely to facilitate the following of brands and the monetizing of personalities
I keep saying to all of my friends that social media is just one big ad now. It's just more insidious because it's often "real" people advertising a lifestyle or aesthetic vs a specific product like a traditional ad
and to feed you ads every possible second
It is simply a tool for both capitalism and social thought control.
I feel the people that are connecting and socializing are the influencers themselves. The rest of us are consuming.
The only personalities being monetized are fake actors doing a fake act
I notice when I use reels or fast paced algorithmic systems, I can't think straight and do work. Whenever I restrict it I feel so much better, I'm more patient and my focus improves. Everything is too quick for my brain these days. In the middle of watching them it feels like my brain is frying, but its so addictive that I keep watching.
I deleted Instagram a few weeks ago for that reason. I spent so much time watching random people I didn't even know, just forever scrolling. I now click the "show less shorts" button Everytime UA-cam recommends one too. I only allow myself to watch long form content, and only 1 video per sitting.
That’s what cocomelon does to kids. It’s intentionally too quick and bright for their little brains, so they get overstimulated and experience anxiety when the show goes off
Yup I feel like a gold fish!
Im a writer, and just sitting for 1 chapter was difficult bc i found myself scrolling
I've noticed my boyfriend seems to be addicted. The other day I watched him pick up his phone, open social media, close it seconds later, set his phone down & then do it all again. 3x in about 5 minutes like it was some kind of mindless tick.
People that have never experienced real time feed social media, have no idea how bad they have it now.
Fact.
Nailed it. The billionaires algorithms are pure 😈
It's funny to think that not so long ago, you could legitimately run out of new social media posts to see. You could fully catch up with your feed and be done with it.
@PocketMirror Twitter stole so much of our material.
Man i wished i experienced that kind if social media, checking your feed seeing what tomfoolery your friends are doing seems fun ngl
9:09 It feels like everyone is so burnt out. It’s difficult to escape and decompress because everything demands your attention. Social media has become another one of those things. I don’t think human beings were meant to be this aware of so many things, or this intellectually active, because the burnout is hard to shake and hits like a ton of bricks.
You really hit the nail on the head, I've been feeling this unnatural burnout for years now, because rather than just withdrawing from busywork, just finding something or somewhere to withdraw without a constant barrage of spam and ragebait has essentially started to feel like a project that takes work and energy in itself.
This in combination with this wacky economy makes it so there is barely time to recuperate from any burnout. You have to consistently work and you have to consistently post to keep your engagement so you can use social media for money. But like you said, so everly draining.
Amen. the burnout is sooooo real.
The ‘burnout’ is because on every social media platform the feed is an array of vastly different topic related videos and chats and everyone is consuming far too much needless content and absorbing information that at the end of the day straight up IRRELEVANT TO OUR REAL LIVES.
I was trying to tell ppl 10+ years ago THE INTERNET ISNT REAL SO STOP REGARDING IT AS SUCH.
100%
Our algorithms become an 'echo chamber' of things most engaging to us... including ragebait and drama which is why i think we've argued so much the last few years.☹️
I agree
2025 - make *energy* consciousness a thing ❤
Which is why I have deleted most social media I’ve become aware how rage baiting they are the algorithms suck 😊
I don't actually think we argued so much, that could actually be beneficial.
Instead most people I tried to argue with where just so stuck in their echo chambers that constructive arguing was basically impossible.
It get's pretty nasty when you have to explain, or rather convince people of basic facts and reasons for morality before you can bring up your actual argument.
Can't really blame the algorithms for an influx of people bandwagoning their way onto two or three platforms, full of people they obviously won't get on with, and giving corporations carte blanche to do what they want with their captive audiences.
I stopped using social media in 2018. Now I only use UA-cam to watch specific creators, and discord to keep up with my friends online. I think a lot of people that say they're busy should give up on social media for a week. Completely give it up and see how busy you are. Because dropping social media has freed up a lot of my physical time and my brain space. Regarding where we can find curated information, in the past those were found in magazines. You could look through the magazine and the magazine would eventually end lol but you had to pay for it, and nowadays people just expect everything to be free. Now if everything is free, the product becomes you!
magazines sucked ass too when they sell you "top 10 sponsored gadgets I bought!". Focusing solely on the money is the problem. Bring good content and people will pay.
Legit I left social media last year and I could FEEL the gears in my brain creeking to get going again - the brain rot was so severe that it physically hurt to learn how to be an active consumer again
Plus the way it freed up my time like you said. Literally learned how to play guitar, become more active in my exercise, etc
I’ve been thinking about taking a break from social media again because there’s SO MANY ADS! I hop on there to see what’s going on with my friends but my friends don’t post much and I don’t blame them because neither do I and then it’s all just ads and mindless stuff and sometimes it doesn’t hook me in and other times I feel like so much time has been wasted because I’m hooked. I think the last day of 2024 is a good time to start my break.
dude I tried to have an Insta account last year for the first time since 2018, and I was shocked that it was all ads and sponsored content and NOTHING from my friends. I deleted it after about a month I think. I still like youtube (especially the comment section - I think it's really interesting to see how the other internet people are thinking and feeling), but if I couldn't use my ad blocker, I wouldn't. I think taking a social media break is always a great idea!
@ Right!? It wasn’t like that before and then suddenly BOOM! ADS! And FB is exactly the same and now you even get notifications about sponsored stuff, it’s insane! I posted a happy new year post on Insta and FB and have removed both of them from my phone so I won’t be using them for a long period of time because they’re honestly exhausting with how much they try to cram in your face. I also like YT, I won’t be leaving here. I need Sims content in my life and content like in this video 😅
I don't have to do any of that all you people kicked me off because I'm a conspiracy theorist. Even though everything I say and it ends up happening
I'm so disappointed with the state of social media, the good thing is I spend less and less time online because it has become so empty that it's just wasting my time, but I miss the inspiration and fun I used to have in the beginning. I hate that it's all marketing now.
Love your content! ❤
My phones charging port busted, so I can’t use my phone when it’s charging on a wireless charger and it’s made my life SO MUCH BETTER to not be able to scroll when I get home bc I’ve found other ways to pass my time 🙏🏻 I learned embroidery, how to use a drill, and I’ve started reading and working out again. I feel like I know who I am again 🥳
That's actually a great tip to get a wireless charger! Good for you
so happy for you emboridery is a great hobby been doing it for a while now and its so calming
this video is making me wonder if that's why i've pivoted toward using reddit a lotttt more in the past year or so. because that way, if i am endlessly scrolling, it's at least about topics i know i want to see, and it feels like i'm in community with the other people in the subreddit.
Feel the same way about Tumblr. Finding fandom communities on there is so much easier than trying to do the same on Insta.
I did that, then also got rid of Reddit. You said it yourself, "it feels like" you are in a community. I have decided to be in real F2F communities with friends and family, I'm too tired of the digital world.
Yeah! This is why I will never leave amino, even though it's becoming increasingly more broken and is slowly dying, but the handful of communities I'm in there feel like my internet home full of genuine people being excited about things we love. There's no algorithm or endless scroll, it's just genuine posts made by real people excited to share their love with people who love the same things.
@@jonferngut i think it depends. when face to face interaction isn’t always feasible, i’ll take what i can get
@@tinygreenleaf oh interesting, i’ve never heard of this platform! there really are so many great online communities out there. having a shared interest can do a lot to bring people together
i do genuinely feel like i stop using social media the more and more i see ads and none of my friends' stuff, and then i just text them directly and hang out irl
also small note, its pronounced mina "lay"!
Worse than "the internet" is every search browser. I miss the old google that would give you 100 pages of possible hits to your query that actually have the phrase on the page.
Pinterest used to be the place where I’d explore some great ideas that I could actually implement. Now a quarter of it is just wonky AI images. It’s weirdly upsetting
The art is all AI, the outfit ideas are just ads, and everything else is either overly marketed or political. I think the recipes are the only thing that somewhat survived on there...
@glassbirds Clothing and art are definitely goners, but I've still had some luck in finding activities for kids, recipies (like you mentioned), party themes, and niche crafting ideas.
Yes! And scrolling on Pinterest (on Mobil) constantly opens ads and takes me to safari and Amazon
:( infuriating stuff.
@@glassbirdsI still use Pinterest for recipes, but it’s almost unusable due to the onslaught of relentless ads.
Can’t stand when I open an image then spawns multiple ones similar to it
Watch any futuristic dystopian movie, and it feels like we are moving towards that at lightning speed. It's honestly scary.
The matrix
i miss the pre-algorithm internet so much. it was all about seeing posts from your friends and people you follow. now it's all strangers and ads and undisclosed ads
ding ding ding ! 🙌🌈Cringe🌈🙌
This is not an algorithm problem, but a technology problem. Even as far back as the 1920s, technology has been used to break down the diversity of culture to mold it into a homogeneous whole for the convenience of advertisers and business. If any of you want prof I recommend "Propaganda" by E. Bernay's from 1928, there are free PDFs online.
It's the problem of "dominance" and "colonization" mindset.
We should have never allowed people to link personal content and monetarisation. What was unique about social media was that people shared their uncorrupted views on there because there was no compensation. Now I get the ick when I see what people are doing for money on social media, like people posting their kids in vulnerable situations and everybody desperately wanting to look like the mainstream because it has been proven to be successful. We are chasing the money and selling our individuality, normal humans have become corrupt and I’d argue that it’s not really valued anymore to create real art, that could potentionally disturbing and human because people are scared it’s not gonna please the algorithm.
Exactly
One other thing I have noticed is that so many Gen Z & A produced videos have absolutely no pauses between statements. It is all one run on sentence, there's no time to really taken what is said in. It reminds me of the old days of radio when Dead Air was a cardinal sin.
This video put the final nail Inthe coffin and I have removed Instagram from my apps!
🎉🎉🎉
I think AI and the internet as a whole will eventually devolve to a point where people decide to put down their phones and go outside.
I think people will devolve before the internet does
So what are you then actually doing outside, if it looks depressing and this meaningless world there arent much to actually do outside.
The last couple months I’ve strictly limited my social media intake, and it’s been great for my brain. I took Facebook and TikTok off my phone, and put Instagram (which I do enjoy and have to use a bit for my job) on a daily timed limit. I was very much hooked and the thing I’ve mostly noticed is I don’t get mad/annoyed as easily lately.
Also, everybody should read more! Not only are books physical things that you actually own, but they’re the only medium left where you won’t be interrupted with ads.
I also think that there’s seriously a PUBLIC aspect of online, such as there being absolutely no barrier between people of different ages. Thus, there are 30 year olds making content alongside 55 year olds alongside 8 year olds. This has never happened before. EVER.
Very interesting point!
I dunno, I was on the internet as a child from the late 90s to the early 2000s, and I chatted with adults on gaiaonline, chanboards, and deviantart. What's actually happening is that normal people never used to use things like deviantart and chanboards. Now the entire internet is like deviantart and chanboards, participation-wise. Any non-branded content is being made by people with the most free time, hence, weird people and kids. (Like on deviantart and chanboards back in the day.) Normal people are the consumers more often than creators, because normal people are busy.
One of the saddest things I witness and personally deal with is AI "artists" saying things like "I don't want to pay an artist to make something that's not as good as what the AI can make" and this is literally so devastating because humans should not have to compete with computers. There is something so disgenuine about things that are too perfect looking (but they're not because AI still doesn't get things 100% right. Like, at first glance, some of those images look really polished, but the closer you look, the more issues you find with hands looking weird or a clothing strap not lining up and things like that. Humans don't make those mistakes because we have our human experience to draw from.
Yeah, we shouldn't be competing against a technology that stole from our work without our permission or consent to get as good as it is now.
I have sensory overload issues and social anxiety already and one of the things that absolutely infuriates me nowadays is TV screens at gas pumps blasting in my face the latest junk info and ads while just trying to pay attention to the gas I'm pumping ...or walking into Walmart, they have blaring speakers outside in the parking lots spewing ads or shitty music. I loathe how disgusting our society has become with raping our ears and eyes non-stop with advertising. Our culture doesn't value silence, pausing or reflecting and it is taking a major toll. Sorry, I know this isn't specifically internet related.
You can mute the ads pressing the second button from the top on the right side of the screen
I was just talking about this with a coworker. I still wish to utilize the internet as a resource. I want to search for the information/content. I don’t want suggestions.
that’s a major part of my disenchantment personally
On the topic of retro fashion becoming popular again due to algorithms...
I'm 28 years old, I've been dressing like a 1960s hippie since I was 16. I got laughed at for it for a good couple years, but eventually folks kinda came around to it because I owned it so well. Every piece of my wardrobe at that point was slowly curated not only to the fashion from the 60s, but also things that reflected myself. It wasn't just the bell bottoms and tweed belts and tie-dye, it was also the little patches and homemade headbands and buttons I had found at a range of places from Hot Topic to Goodwill to even ones I made myself or friends made or gifted to me. I'd make my own jewelry, and sew and modify my own clothes over time, adding patchwork or tailoring something to fit me better or adding on intricate stitches onto my pants to look like flowers. And I had a LOT of things expressing my political and social views on my outfit, ranging from Black Lives Matter to LGBT+ rights, and anti-Drump buttons. I even found some political/social rights buttons from the 60s that I wore that were still relevant.
That being said, when I saw folks wearing bell-bottoms and stuff recently, I got really excited. Especially because I started transitioning at this time and I was trying to find more ways to take my hippie look and make it more masculine, so seeing it come in fashion was good because I figured that I might be able to make some friends who understood the hippie movement and what it was all about, as well as trade fashion tips and ways to express yourself more. But I also started noticing everyone was wearing the same brand of bell-bottoms. And the same print of psychedelic shirt. And the same exact accessories. I thought it was kinda odd until I found out that apparently it was a part of a TikTok fashion trend.
I hate to sound like an old man here, but it really annoyed me that something that I worked hard to develop over the course of 12, soon to be 13 years, has just been boiled down into algorithmic soup. Like, the hippie movement had an actual meaning and I feel like it's something that 10000% should be brought back in today's climate in earnest, because the hippie movement wasn't just about the fashion, it was a political movement. It was anti-war, it was for civil rights, it was pro-choice, it was feminist. These are all things we need right now. But it got boiled down into a commodity which like.. I dress this way for fun to an extent, yes. All the bright colors, and all the sewing and modification, and collecting buttons both old and new are fun. But it's not just about the fun, the way I dress is a political statement and always has been. It feels very uncomfortable seeing plastic versions of it floating around. It makes me wonder if there's even a point to what I'm doing if it's going to be seen as just a commodity and a trend..
Don't ever stop being who you are. This was an awesome comment to read. So much truth in what you are saying, it is sad. I feel that tik tok trends have done that a lot, like you said, boiling it down and making it feel cheap. A way less intense example might be a song you have a deep connection with that now is reduced to 16 counts of dance steps and forgotten about later. Or songs that have deep meanings about deep topics that are now associated with "what cartoon character are you?" And stupid stuff like that. You said it way better but I agree so much with your comment. Please don't stop being your hippie self!!! I will always be stuck in the rawr xD era of fashion, hair, the like.
This was fantastic! Exceptional commentary! I recently re-installed FB on my phone after 3 years, out of sheer boredom and I was blown away by what it's become.
I always find that your videos so mirror my feelings. It’s nice to know I’m not alone. Thanks for taking the time and effort to put your videos together that way you do. Appreciate ya!
This sounds like an AI comment lol
My spouse and I have noticed the same thing with Google Maps. During an hour drive to their dad's house, we were sent through multiple neighborhoods that we've never been to before, and through a busy shopping center. It also once sent us to a house that didn't exist, (it was 55 minutes from the house we were actually supposed to go to). I think it could be corporate complacency. They've monopolized these services, and don't need to optimize them because we'll just use them anyway.
I recently went to a diner didn’t use any of these it was their own style…It felt homey, cozy, warm and fresh. Be you, decorate however you want!
I've been telling people this for the longest!! Thank you so much for putting in the research to verbalize this 🙌🏽🙌🏽
i think it’s just about time we say goodbye to the internet for most things, especially entertainment and social media. it’s clearly not the same internet we knew and loved, and it’s just creating more harm than good at this point. money’s gotta go and ruin everything doesn’t it :(
The reason money is a problem, is because money literally isn't real. It isn't real.
That green piece of paper that people hand around, it does not stand in for anything with actually real social function.
You might think of it like a fairytale.
algorithms are helpful to some degree in discovering something new, but when i really want to deep dive, actively looking for those things the old school way hits so different
last year i discovered two j-pop groups that i adore so much and their whole discography isn't readily available anywhere so taking the time to find that endeared me even more to them
From my experience, Google Maps has also gone rough here in Argentina. It’s defying me to make U turns in the middle of highways or to go through dangerous neighborhoods. 😮 And I’m soooooo tired of remakes and Disney human-little mermaid, lion king, etc. No new ideas
You hit on everything and didn't even mention how ads are a huge contribution to this phenomenon
Yep Google Maps keeps giving wrong directions these days, how many u turns I was asked to do in the last couple of months only to be told 2 mins later I was actually on the right road.
I straight can’t use google maps anymore. If it gets fed a lightly wrong address, the kind that doordash spits out, “124 address st” instead of 124 address street, it doesn’t take you anywhere near 124 address street, it just takes you to a random business that paid to be listed with them. No errors or anything is shown, so you actually think you’re headed to 124 address street.
Google Maps has massively messed up my work commute so many times. Claiming to save me 15 minutes and in actuality losing me 30 to 45.
I totally blame the Property Brothers for the Grey Walla/White Trim aesthetic. What's worse is that I was shopping for a home & seeing before & after shots & preferring the before. I hate Flippers & refuse to buy a house that was Flipped.
i used this video as a call to action to be more mindful of what i want to see & do & learn. so i pulled up a lecture on a topic that interests me (botany) and i am going to watch that now.
I started using zapier for my business and found a load of pre-built AI sequences made to create and post images to platforms!! 🤯🤯🤯 this is how it’s happening. No one is even creating it.
Have anyone bought anything from ads recently? Seriously for all the bazillion ads I see everyday 0.5 are for a product I might buy. Each time I see an ad for yet another useless AI app I just wonder WHY.
I almost automatically ignore all ads.
I occasionally get something from an ad I get for Etsy, but I have to make sure it isn't some drop shipped slop first, which is ridiculous.
I haven’t bought anything from ads, but I have noticed that ads have been subconsciously effecting my perceptions of which brands are “reputable” or “industry leaders.” If I hear the name of a brand enough, I start thinking of that brand when I think of that category of item. If I consider buying something, a brand that I’ve heard of, be it from friends or from ads (my brain doesn’t keep track) tends to be what I consider first. I’ve noticed this especially since I moved to a new country last year, so I’m a bit of a blank slate when it comes to impressions of local brands. A brand feels more reputable if it’s a name that I recognize, regardless of how it is that I first heard of it.
This also ties into the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon where when we learn something or become aware of something for the first time, we feel like we suddenly start seeing it everywhere. If a brand can get their name in your head, you’ll start noticing them more. The more you notice them, the more your opinion of the brand is likely to improve which increases the likelihood that you may buy from that brand. Maybe not today, but perhaps weeks or months from now.
To be fair though, this mostly applies to real brands that are paying for things like UA-cam ads. Not the dropshippers that take out cheap pintrist ads. I think they’re just hoping you’ll click on accident and then make an impulse purchase.
I've not bought a single thing from an ad. Ever. If I see something interesting, I make a note of it and revisit in a week. If I still want it in a week, I do research online to find the best product that serve the purpose and the company behind it.
Recently 😹 I’ve never bought anything from an ad ever and never will
I get ads all the time for onion and garlic things. I am highly allergic to onions and garlic and would be sent to the hospital for consuming the things I get in ads. I literally say into my phone "you are wasting your money you are advertising to the wrong person"
You've articulated and conveyed this in a way that's helpful for me to re-think how I interact with social media (and this is coming from someone who has never had TikTok). Thank you for making this video!
Regardless of whether you don’t think you’re well versed on this topic, I (and I’m sure many others) appreciate you talking about this.
This problem needs to be discussed, and you made a nice, straightforward and engaging video. I’m worried about how algorithms will affect children as they are introduced to the internet and touch screens at younger ages. Hell grown adults get sucked into the trap.
If only intentional mindfulness would become popular and stick rather than being yet another fleeting trend
I’d love to see a video on how being an only child influences a child’s development and if not having siblings causes them to miss out on anything developmental important because I’ve noticed that there seem a lot more parents only having one child now.
I think it depends on the parenting and "village." I'm an only child. My mom was a single mother and had my grandmother move in with us to help take care of me. But I had a few cousins my age that I would routinely get together and play with, as well as friends I made as i started and went through school. I'm now in my thirties, married, and have a toddler of my own. He might be our only as well but he has cousins around his age and neighborhood friends we routinely see. When he starts preschool or Kindergarten I'm certain he'll make friends there. He also sees his grandparents often. So far his life is just as fulfilled as his cousins with siblings. I know people with siblings who struggled and only children who struggled. But it all comes down to the parenting. How they are treated, what they are taught to value, etc.
Regardless, I'd like to hear her take on this as well.
As a single child myself, I did feel as a teen I maybe didn't have like the social skill set others had, but I'm not sure if that's down to lack of siblings. I learned charisma through waitressing though and now see no difference between me and friends with siblings! I think it all comes down to the parents and how they raise you.
I’m an only child and didn’t have this problem. There are people who have multiple kids but the kids just go to their own rooms and do their own thing. It is highly depended on the parenting and exposure the kids receive.
I was constantly around other children and I was told how I was supposed to act. My friends who were only children are also fine socially. I have students who have siblings and they have terrible social skills. It can go either way.
I’m an only child with parents who worked a lot (which I think is an important aspect) and I think the only real effect has been that I’m very comfortable on my own. I played on my own a lot as a kid because my parents had to work, but often from home, negating the need for childcare or a babysitter. As an adult, I now feel very confident living alone and doing things on my own. I’ve heard that a lot of people struggle with the quietness of living alone or doing things in public like going to the movies alone. That’s never been a huge issue for me, which I think relates back to having to spend time having fun alone as a kid. I still went to normal public school and had friends though, so I can also socialize with others just fine
@mrggy yes. I'm also super independent which could be a result of being an only child.
21:45 Oh my god, seriously though! Pinterest used to be so much fun, now it's just AI slob, ads, and the same five other links repeated every six posts or so. It's completely unusable!
At around 11:30pm a few weeks ago, about 8 hours into a 10 hour road trip, Gmaps decided to keep me on my toes by making me go down a dirt road, I’m pretty sure through someone’s farm, only to circle back onto the same empty highway I had already been driving on. Thanks, Google.
It was nice to see you reference Mina Le's video - I like listening to both of you speak on a variety of topics because you give perspectives on important topics that I align with
I feel like this also why fandoms are so terrible now. It less about being a fan and more about trend hopping. A surprising amount of people will never engage with the media before hopping on to posting art.
I started an album club with friends because I'm fed up with the crappy Spotify algorithm serving me the same 10 songs all the time.
My only hope for this trend is that the new one will be moving life back to the real world, in an almost hardcore way. Real life meet-ups will be cooler. Real life events. Reading or knitting together at cafés. People going to true local indie concerts. Secret high fashion gatherings. No uploading of photos. This has to be the next step.
I loved this video. I've been very uncomfortable for the longest time. This happened when i realized there's no novelty in anything anymore. Everything is the same. I saw this pattern ironically on Instagram pictures. From sameness of personalities to same poses people strike for pictures. All the same goddamn angle. A gazillion same pictures of a scenic places. No nuance in anything. But I quit instagram bc something sent me off the edge.
And that is, homogeneous language used by everybody. That scared me the most. I realized i started using vocabulary that are used indiscriminately on social media. People everywhere are not unique in their use of language anymore. That made me feel like a clone more than anything else.
1:17 I think with the new rush of trying to push out the newest exciting thing, we’ve lost touch with the community. During quarantine we had community with going through the same process and we all connected but that we aren’t all going through the same thing, we’ve lost touch. Now the internet or social media doesn’t seem as good or engaging anymore because everything has lost meaning, we don’t see too many relatable things instead we see AI made videos or some people trying to be the newest-most exciting thing. I wish I could feel good on social media and not have think about the fact most people on social media platforms don’t even care too much about anything except going famous
I've definitely noticed that globalisation of teen slang.
Slang is interesting and used to be more regional. Now it is age and Internet based.
Ps. I keep physical media (CDs, DVDs) of my favourites. Although I can't easily LEND to a friend any more as no one has a player! So I can enjoy culture but I can't share it.
What I find sinister and what actually proves the point that people are so deeply manipulated is how all these influencers on TikTok use the same hand gestures. Have you noticed? The same type of hand gestures over and over again. Makes me sick to my stomach.
Maybe we should go to our yt subs page instead of the home page more regularily (not always in order to discover something new from time to time)
If you turn off your history and recommendations, the home page is completely disabled. I save a lot of videos to playlists because of the no-history thing, but seeing what I want is SO much better. My caveat of "to learn something new" is that I have enough interests I look up new, relevant-to-me info when I'm ready. 😅
Y'all can do it, it's worth it, I believe in you, and it's super rewarding when you start getting better at feeding your curiosity ❤
This trend of boring globalization started long before the Internet. In the late 80s we got the term “accidental tourist“ to describe the McDonaldnazation of the world. No matter where you go - the same crap is there.
I guarantee its not just optimized for engagement, but for what powerful entities and corporations want it to be. Theres not just sponsored posts or advertisements, but likely ways based off of hashtags that certain more profitable subjects are emphasized in the algorithm.
When Facebook started to make it impossible to view content chronologically, I knew social media had crashed and burned. The other time I felt that huge "betrayal" was when Skype no longer sent messages unless you and the receiver were both online at the same time, and started showing people as online all the time if they were on their phones. Both of these things are an example of taking away the actual social aspect. If you can't tell when people are actually online, you can't message them when they are actually available. If you can't tell what people are actually doing and saying in the moment on Facebook, you can't properly keep up with them. Both of those things happened long ago. Social media's been dead a long, long time.
13:23 THANK YOU!!!!! I’m so picky with my music I will “hide” almost every song in my discover weekly
i hate that i listen to such niche stuff and am only fed popular crap. it used to be so cool.
it meaning discovering things on social media, i don’t mean spotify
14:10 my Google maps has been giving the most insane routes through neighborhoods lately too! It doesn't even give me the highway route option anymore, I think it knows I hate driving around other people 🤔 I get so stressed watching other people weave through the rush hour wave going 80 in a 65
This was genuinely one of the most well said, crafted, and educational video i’ve watched on UA-cam.
“Algorithmic recommendations are addictive because they are always subtly confirming your own cultural, political, and social biases, warping your surroundings into a mirror image of yourself while doing the same for everyone else. This had made me anxious, the possibility that my view of my own life-lived through the Internet-was a fiction formed by the feeds.” - Kyle Chayka.
Highly recommend some of his writing on the topic. Personally kinda quit using Instagram and spotify and started being more mindful about consumption habits. Made a huge difference in my well-being, and in how I curate what I consume.
one thing i noticed last year since i've stopped using social media except youtube was that even youtube is now an echo chamber. if i watched one gaming video ,every video on my fyp is about the same game. if i leave auto play on and i watch this video i guarantee the next video to play with be a gaming video. i don't know how to reset my youtube algo so i can get new suggestion
there is a "new to you" button on mobile or desktop, look up how to find it for your platform
Deleting my socials 4 years ago was BY FAR the best decision I ever made for myself. Every time I watch your videos about social media I am more happy with this decision❤
I think one long-term casualty of the embrace of AI on the micro scale is the loss of curiosity. It used to be, even when you used a search engine, it was all the incidental stuff you came across that would spark interest in other topics. I see it with interns and new grads coming in and I, at least, find it so devastating. Maybe I'm just getting old
Second hand clothing shops in my home district are really coming into their own. There’s new ones opening frequently and they’re often full of people of all ages and backgrounds. Gives me hope that folk are sick and tired of today’s algorithm-driven fashion, Amazon and the bland selection in high street stores. Doing their own thing, making their own choices, offline. (Incidentally better for the planet too.)
THE GPS THING IS SO TRUE FOR ME TOO. I've been wondering if it's just me or my phone being dumb but it's been going haywire for a while now for me too. It's been really aggravating but I'm glad it's not just me though. 🤣😭
Social media is a depressing strip-mining operation of low content marketing. Where the virtue signal is more important than the actual virtue. I've re-discovered reading books and it is great!
This is why we need community ran social media on platforms like the Fediverse, rather than the centralized corporate ones we've been using for so long now.
Thanks so much for posting this
The whole TikTok thing is the US Government trying to steal a company, btw I have never done "a little tiktok dance"
They're not "AI creators", they're plaigarism lauderers.
History will disagree with you in less than 2 years, your viewpoint will be wiped out by the textbook writers. I agree, but unfortunately your viewpoint will be buried
This. The government has just quit enforcing America's copyright laws. What's going on is total thievery no limits abuse by the filthy rich Silicon Valley Wall Street billionaires
idk, I feel like there's still subcultures on the internet that have the same community feel as the old internet had back when I first started using it in 2004/2005... There are still pockets of the internet where people are kind of fighting this algorithmic suggesting - one example I can think of is breakcore playlists where they find a bunch of breakcore artists that have small audiences and put them into hour long compilations...
omg yeees i remember seeing like the "cranberry cheese cake bacon burger" (referring to the ai recipes at around 20:20) omg girl they were insane
I use YT music because the genres and artists I like for example, progressive psytrance, aren't on most popular platforms like Spotify or Apple music. Many amateur mixes and DJ sets, which is how we find and discover new tracks just aren't on those platforms.
Yeah. I feel like trance and psytrance are especially forgotten about genres now, sadly.
I'm so glad there are social medias such as Mastodon and Bluesky when those two lack algorithms and the thing I like about them, there's no ads and you pretty much never see people fight or argue with each other.
A wonderful perspective! Nothing about what we are doing now is organic. I’m glad you’ve got some views on this one; spread the knowledge!
I think artificial "intelligence" is a bubble set to burst, personally. It's cheap, but it's also wildly incompetent, and is completely reliant on actual people making actual things for it to crib off of. The more of a market share artificial "intelligence" takes up, the more culture starts to homogenize into an unappealing slop, the more people are going to actively avoid it whenever possible. Sooner or later not using artificial "intelligence" will be a highly marketable selling point, and once that happens I doubt the market will ever swing back in favor of artificial "intelligence" again. So like capitalism at large, even if you aren't one of the people who can do anything to stop it, you can at least weather the consequences in the hopes you'll be one of the people who get to outlive it.
Well you're right about everything except A.I being cheap. I even heard OpenAI just switched from being a non-profit to being for profit. And remember the data centers.
@@AlekseyMaksimovichPeshkov Machine art is expensive for the company that develops it. For the companies that commission it, it's so cheap it may as well be free.
As far as google maps go, Apple Maps and google maps be tripping. Apple will have my cursor facing the totally wrong way and it doesn’t change orientation in the app to whatever I’m facing like it used too.
this happened to me so bad i had to get a new phone! i had an iphone 13 and now i have a razr 2024 and google maps finally works again🙌🏻
Didn’t even start the video and it brings me to the way ppl either over consuming or stealing each others content. I’ve seen like 5 different ppl do the same video, it wasn’t even a trend. They literally stole the original video from an old man. 🥴
Also the algorithm has gotten so wild, I’m seeing actual ppl I follow posts a week from when they originally posted or I’m being shown posts I already liked 3 weeks ago. Outside of that, it’s a bunch of ads.
I was actually just talking to my coworker about this. We're both in IT and I said "I'm really concerned that everything's the same." I explained that the content that my male coworkers were finding was similar to the content my BIL was getting (not a techy person at all and twice his age) and that I was getting the same content as my MIL & SIL who are wildly different from me. Or at least, we used to be.
We used to get together as a group and be like look what I found and none of us had ever seen it. But this past holiday? Every single tiktok or trend I had already seen online. I picked up crochet the same time my SIL did because we both saw it online and decided to give it a go. Was it kind of nice? Yeah. But at the same time it set off alarm bells that *my online viewership isn't my own.* It's barely unique. And sure there's an argument to be made the uniqueness is overrated to a degree, but uniqueness is part of what makes us human and life interesting. It's fantastic that we have this massive overarching culture where people can always find commonality, but too much of a good thing is very quickly turning the experience sour.
I've found the things that I genuinely love are things I've curated on my own in person and then shared with others. I have a local coffee shop that is quite literally a dive or a hole in the wall. It's not trendy, but the owners are awesome & the coffee is phenomenal. They don't even exist online beyond an outdated Facebook page and their website that's just for ordering not social media presence. I found them during a college assignment to go for a 30 minute walk without a destination in mind.
The best thing we did as a family this past Christmas was play a game I stumbled upon while killing time to donate blood walking around some shops in a shopping center I don't usually visit. That's the future of finding cool stuff or experiences. It's not going to be online anymore. We'll have to go digging around for it ourselves. The old school phenomena of meme curators has evolved into real life curators looking for genuine and authentic experiences/products/businesses. Is it more work? 100% But I feel a lot less depressed knowing these are things I actually found on my own.
I liked social media and streaming services because I hated commercials. Now it feels like everything is just one big commercial. Social media feels like micro entertainment more than anything close to social media.
I have 4 apps on my phone (besides preinstalled apps like maps and safari); my library’s app, an app to find campsites, my bank app, and UA-cam. I only watch UA-cam on the weekends for a short period of time and what people are talking about here is like my weekly checkup of the social media realm. I started cutting back a year or so ago and I love it. I rarely even touch my phone. I journal and go outside and color and write down random thoughts and observations. I go on walks and ask real people for book and restaurant recommendations and directions and meet people in person through hobbies and just talking to people around me. I’ve been so much happier and I’ve seen actual changes like my consumption has gone down drastically because I have no idea what people online are buying. I don’t buy fast fashion and I only buy clothes or decor or whatever else because I actually like it without any input from the online public. I spend more time with my dog who seems so much happier because of it. I’m moving more and feeling better because I no longer have an endless source of entertainment at home. I’m still slowly cutting back and recognize that it isn’t perfect but this is one of the best changes I’ve made.
the AI stuff really freaks me out! I homeschool my kids, but learning about grammerly and AI programs that basically write essays for you it's so crazy. I worry about the kids in the future.
It's not just algorithms that manipulate us. I noticed opinions on reddit are very different and I think its because you can get down voted. You might speak a truth that isn't very nice or likeable, resulting in punishment. So it's a sugarcoating competition.
Reddit deletes a lot of stuff that goes against their own agenda. Try posting something you don’t often see you’ll get banned it’s basically mob rule think of it in real world examples if minorities posted and lived in majority county they’d get ratioed or banned from posting
Reddit in general is more of a hivemind that punishes those who think outside the box. Regardless of whether or not the box is actually correct in any sense
What Reddit are you using?? That's the absolute worst echo chamber on the Internet!
Reddit has always been a cesspool it's just mainstream now
I'm really glad you made this comment tho. Because everytime I google something the first thing to pop up is a reddit thread, whether the thread is right or wrong
Wait... there are people that just... go... with autoplay/ suggested stuff? I've never engaged with any of that, not on purpose anyways. I want what I search out, no more, no less. I want to curate my own internet experience and get angry if a site tries to do that for me. I've un-installed most apps, only using Firefox with add-ons to remove all the algorithm noise and other unwanted "features" from sites. I highly suggest this way of going about things, it will make the internet a nicer place to be.
I think yt got my other comment. Do you have a recommendation for the add ons? The algorithm has caught my interests but the AI content is driving me up the wall.
What you were talking about with chornology is something I do really like with tumblr. I have my list of people I am following, and I can look literally just at them. I can also follow specific tags, though because the tags I follow are not very popular they are not readily filled, but tumblr doesn't let me see a tag feed chronologically and their systems really suck at it so I never use it. But it does mean I have the handful of people I follow, I see whatever it is they have shared and then that is it, and after 15 minutes of scolling, that is the whole of the feed for the last third of a day.
“No getting canceled for bad human behavior” - this right here is why I left social media. I watched “drama tok” viciously go after just regular people because their “former besties” decided to release the hounds on them. There’s only so much sociopathic behavior you can witness before you exit stage left
34:42
and speaking of the accidentally loosing a video if the feed refreshes and you don't save it, I think another issue as far as the original content stuff is all the re-posts.
like on places like Facebook or Instagram, where you might see something you really like, but the video or thing won't say who it's really from and their channel. and I think for some reason the repost pages tend to have way more engagement and reach than the original creator. 🤔
UA-cam also has a weird issue in the past 6-7 years. or whenever shorts became a thing🤷♂
some channels share specific clips, gags and moments from certain shows or movies, but will never say what show, movie or episode it's from in the description. and as a result that I think was made on purpose, you get a lot of people commenting asking movie/show name and episode number.
thereby driving up engagement. and how it'll spread it to way more people
The last time I had actual genuine fun on the internet I think has to be invite-only adults-only discord groups
I've met some of my closest friends over these. I play incredibly emotionally deep tabletop rpgs, and write truly moving fiction with my friends.
The best crowd to be running with in a fandom is ~30 y/o queer women (and adjacent) with established careers
some of the most hinged yet hilarious people I have ever met
I have to wonder if this is what old school forum culture felt like
yeah... I've just naturally stopped using everything on the internet that I used to other than just these 3 things - Reddit, UA-cam, video games. everything else has gotten so boring and stupid to me. if my friends wanna talk or share pics with me... they'll reach out other ways. I ain't doing the social media shit anymore.
Same, except it's only UA-cam and video games for me now (but mostly video games). The only time I look to Reddit is for an answer to a niche/specific question.
The algorithm took me to this video at the same time I've been experiencing a mental shift. Thanks for saying and validating the things I've been thinking.
Just shared ! This video is so true !! Been feeling this lately .. 😢
What was your master’s major? Whatever it was, your research skills transfer beautifully to these more sociological topics (if that wasn’t already your field lol).
I find the illusion of choice in the context of this video essay very interesting. As a sociology student I am interested in agency, or more so the lack thereof, and this topic highlights how we’re, in a sense, mere products of our environments. Great video!
I will say, getting community is a struggle when everything is out of reach as well need to have a car to travel. Especially in the USA. Most of social media is bad and the corporates only drive for attention and data. It’s annoying. Great video
I agree…
The internet is hell.
I’m having to escape to my offline media so I can be myself again.
One things this video brought to mind is how trends used to be driven by human desire to buy an item or piece of clothing. They would sell out in stores and there would be so much hype for the products. Now, trends seem to be dictated my mass marketing on social media and paid sponsorships. So sad to see how things have changed, I miss the old internet that was in chronological order… that was the golden age
Ashley, your channel is legit scary because you're voicing the thoughts I try to push to the back of my brain and keep being delulu :'))))
Also if this helps to anybody: For the last 5 years I have my youtube algorithms turned off due to "enhance youtube" extension, so I mostly find content that I intentionally want to watch. I wish I could do that on instagram too...
And for Facebook there's an extension "News feed eradicator" that limits your time on the service
Those type of things the governments of the world need to regulate by law the social media platforms etc. Must do. Not letting the billionaires do literally anything they want that is only in their no limits at-all-costs self-serving profit motive that is not anyone's well being in real world.
I purposely got banned on my alt account so i get zero adds and zero algorithm on my pc (im on mobile rn) its so much better being banned 😭
17:23 / I’m an Apple Music user and I have honestly never had the current trending songs recommended to me. I play my discovery playlist often and it’s always songs I usually do like.
7:36 ad/sponsor skip