How Facebook makes us dumber(bloombergview.com)
bloombergview.com
How Facebook makes us dumber
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-01-08/how-facebook-makes-us-dumber
123 comments
At one point people estimated that a Facebook like was worth quite a lot of money. I am quite sure that now the value has greatly diminished, nevertheless I do think that it is better than having an e-mail.
There are several reasons for that:
- First (at least for me), an unsolicited e-mail goes directly into trash and I seek the unsubscribe button. Under no circumstances I am interested in additional stuff somebody has to offer beyond the first service.
- People who did not buy your stuff/service can still like you on Facebook, they can do it after they have forgotten some login to your site etc.
- The single best advertising that actually works is recommendation from friends. I think that seeing that somebody else liked something on your feed gets pretty close to that.
- People do like to have all of their "Internet" in one place. Why go to mail if they can have everything in their feed?
- If you use Facebook then they solve a huge number of stuff for you - administration, spam filtering, server hosting, account management (there are other solutions to this of course, but it is good to be able to throw all of this on somebody else)
- I think posting on media sites wastes no more time than creating mailing lists and also requires less tools.
- Advertising for Facebook is mutually beneficial, the more people there are, the more you can reach.
- Also, ads on Facebook have great reach (from what I have heard) and are quite cheap.
- I would hazard a guess that most people are more likely to have notifications on for Facebook rather than e-mail.
Facebook is also probably not going to fail, preparing for this scenario is a nice thought exercise but at some point you have to have some faith in your suppliers. Same goes for Google (mail, docs), Dropbox (file history), Github (issue tracker, code reviews).
There are several reasons for that:
- First (at least for me), an unsolicited e-mail goes directly into trash and I seek the unsubscribe button. Under no circumstances I am interested in additional stuff somebody has to offer beyond the first service.
- People who did not buy your stuff/service can still like you on Facebook, they can do it after they have forgotten some login to your site etc.
- The single best advertising that actually works is recommendation from friends. I think that seeing that somebody else liked something on your feed gets pretty close to that.
- People do like to have all of their "Internet" in one place. Why go to mail if they can have everything in their feed?
- If you use Facebook then they solve a huge number of stuff for you - administration, spam filtering, server hosting, account management (there are other solutions to this of course, but it is good to be able to throw all of this on somebody else)
- I think posting on media sites wastes no more time than creating mailing lists and also requires less tools.
- Advertising for Facebook is mutually beneficial, the more people there are, the more you can reach.
- Also, ads on Facebook have great reach (from what I have heard) and are quite cheap.
- I would hazard a guess that most people are more likely to have notifications on for Facebook rather than e-mail.
Facebook is also probably not going to fail, preparing for this scenario is a nice thought exercise but at some point you have to have some faith in your suppliers. Same goes for Google (mail, docs), Dropbox (file history), Github (issue tracker, code reviews).
Facebook likes have become almost useless to us. We have 61,000+ likes on one page and we're lucky if we "reach" (show up somewhere down their timeline) 1/12 of them in a week or month. "Boosting" every post is prohibitively expensive. So for 55,000 or so people, we'll never be able to interact with them in any way.
So, not worth much anymore.
So, not worth much anymore.
Only boost your few posts that are getting interest on their own. It saves a lot of money and you already know it's engaging content.
If you're not getting any interest in any posts at all, maybe your content is just not interesting. Facebook always shows some of your posts to some of your followers.
If you're not getting any interest in any posts at all, maybe your content is just not interesting. Facebook always shows some of your posts to some of your followers.
"At one point people estimated that a Facebook like was worth quite a lot of money. I am quite sure that now the value has greatly diminished"
Have you looked at a stock chart of Facebook recently? All time high basically and worth $220b.
Or did you mean the value the company brings to the user?
Have you looked at a stock chart of Facebook recently? All time high basically and worth $220b.
Or did you mean the value the company brings to the user?
Value for the user. One Facebook "like" has various estimations of a price and some of them were quite hight (even going to thousands of dollars). A quickly found link from 2013 resumes some estimates: http://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-a-facebook-like-actua...
You misread what was said I think. It's about a facebook like, not about facebook itself.
Ah my bad - need more coffee.
People are much less likely to enter in their email address and join a mailing list about dishsoap, than they are to click a "like" button next to an advertisement for dishsoap.
That you can pay Facebook to reach those people again has value, that's why people do it.
That you can pay Facebook to reach those people again has value, that's why people do it.
Huh. I do the opposite. I might sign up for direct emails about dishsoap, but I'd be too embarrassed to let facebook spam all my friends that I like melonball cotton candy dishsoap, so I'll NEVER publicly "like" it. I'm really meticulous about only liking things that I don't mind if people know I support the company/product. So, basically I like my coffeehouse and my dive bar and that's about it.
Note: Facebook is quite inconspicuous about displaying fanpage likes; i.e. your friends will probably miss the information that you've liked some fanpage. Each of your friends most likely has hundreds of books, movies and commercial venues liked (you can check that in their profile), and you probably haven't seen a single one of them popping up on your timeline.
Really? Interesting, because I get spammed pretty constantly that my friends "liked" Barkbox or whatever stupid MLM pyramid scheme is the current fad in my newsfeed pretty constantly. In fact, the Barkbox one shows up almost every few days. Is that just because Barkbox is advertising on facebook? I always thought if I liked anything it would reciprocatively show up in their newsfeeds.
You might find that those are actually sponsored advertisements in your feed. You might also notice it's often the same people who have liked it.
They didn't like it right then and there, it's just that an advert is showing and FB pulls up people you can relate to as others who recommend it.
They didn't like it right then and there, it's just that an advert is showing and FB pulls up people you can relate to as others who recommend it.
Damn, I think you're right. I guess because I am always posting pictures of my dog facebook really thinks I want to get him Barkbox! Fortunately I know Barkbox is overpriced junk. I don't know why I keep getting targeted for MLM schemes other than a bunch of my idiot frat buddies quit their jobs to sell MLM junk a few years ago and keep trying to get me roped into their "downlines."
Oh it's not a pyramid scheme though. Think of it as more of a circle. A circle of unity.
And in the middle of the circle of unity is us, the early adopters.
All we have to do is give Xenu all of our material belongings and buckle in for the incredible rewards coming our way!
And in the middle of the circle of unity is us, the early adopters.
All we have to do is give Xenu all of our material belongings and buckle in for the incredible rewards coming our way!
It depends on number of friends and your general feed load. What I've noticed is that articles you've liked tend to show more often on others' feeds than fanpages you liked. Also, the latter used to be a smaller notification. I think recently it's more visible because they started to show summaries of selected posts under the fanpage name.
They do both, but Facebook version is more appealing with the added drama to it because of comments. People, especially those with narcissistic tendencies are attracted to drama. FB (and other social networks) evolved this to new extremes.
People spend way more time in Facebook than email, and (paradoxically) it's way easier to get them to like a Facebook page than to enter their email address in a form and hit submit.
So yes, email is great, but marketing is multi-channel or pointless. Facebook is the single biggest channel out there.
Yes, you have to invest some $$ in Facebook to get above the noise floor, but again: that's marketing. Email costs money too. Nothing comes for free.
So yes, email is great, but marketing is multi-channel or pointless. Facebook is the single biggest channel out there.
Yes, you have to invest some $$ in Facebook to get above the noise floor, but again: that's marketing. Email costs money too. Nothing comes for free.
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> 1. You're advertising another company for free. Is Facebook paying you to put their logo on your site? No.
First of all, it doesn't matter. Facebook is not your competitor, so you're not harming yourself.
Secondly, Facebook is an immensely popular communications platform. Even if for some reason you dislike them because they're privately owned, it doesn't change the fact that that's where people are. If you want to reach people, you want to be where they are.
> 2. When people like/follow your page, they are trapped by FB(or some other social media) and you can only reach them there.
Facebook is not trapping anyone inside. If you mean that you can't contact them out-of-band, then well, that's by design and actually a feature.
> If you're banned or they pull bait-and-switch on you, like Facebook did, you've wasted all this time building user base for Facebook and not building your business.
Most businesses come to the rational conclusion that this almost never happens, and the small risk is worth being where the customers are.
> 3. You can't even reach them on Facebook, because you now have to pay Facebook to reach people that have already liked your page.
That is totally by design and again, very much a feature.
For some reasons businesses think they're entitled to "reaching out" to people with their unsolicited offers. They're not. We don't want your spam. Neither your, nor that of any of hundreds of companies we deal with every month. The etiquette here is the Hollywood principle - don't call us, we'll call you.
> 4. Posting on social media wastes a lot of time and money(tools + people).
It's actually simpler than writing quality e-mails, or quality snailmails. There is some additional work because people will reach out to you more through Facebook than through conventional channels, and you need someone to handle the communication.
> - Compare this to getting an email address from your visitors:
> 1. You are in control of your list.
Which is something we, the customers, don't want.
> 2. You can reach them anywhere & anytime almost for free.
And that we absolutely, positively don't want most of the time.
I mean, I get it. There are some exchanges we both agree that we want to have. You can't make a reliable newsletter via Facebook, nor I would like to get my account info through Messenger. But please move your ad communications to Facebook, where they will be unobtrusive for us and properly curtailed by the platform.
First of all, it doesn't matter. Facebook is not your competitor, so you're not harming yourself.
Secondly, Facebook is an immensely popular communications platform. Even if for some reason you dislike them because they're privately owned, it doesn't change the fact that that's where people are. If you want to reach people, you want to be where they are.
> 2. When people like/follow your page, they are trapped by FB(or some other social media) and you can only reach them there.
Facebook is not trapping anyone inside. If you mean that you can't contact them out-of-band, then well, that's by design and actually a feature.
> If you're banned or they pull bait-and-switch on you, like Facebook did, you've wasted all this time building user base for Facebook and not building your business.
Most businesses come to the rational conclusion that this almost never happens, and the small risk is worth being where the customers are.
> 3. You can't even reach them on Facebook, because you now have to pay Facebook to reach people that have already liked your page.
That is totally by design and again, very much a feature.
For some reasons businesses think they're entitled to "reaching out" to people with their unsolicited offers. They're not. We don't want your spam. Neither your, nor that of any of hundreds of companies we deal with every month. The etiquette here is the Hollywood principle - don't call us, we'll call you.
> 4. Posting on social media wastes a lot of time and money(tools + people).
It's actually simpler than writing quality e-mails, or quality snailmails. There is some additional work because people will reach out to you more through Facebook than through conventional channels, and you need someone to handle the communication.
> - Compare this to getting an email address from your visitors:
> 1. You are in control of your list.
Which is something we, the customers, don't want.
> 2. You can reach them anywhere & anytime almost for free.
And that we absolutely, positively don't want most of the time.
I mean, I get it. There are some exchanges we both agree that we want to have. You can't make a reliable newsletter via Facebook, nor I would like to get my account info through Messenger. But please move your ad communications to Facebook, where they will be unobtrusive for us and properly curtailed by the platform.
> First of all, it doesn't matter. Facebook is not your competitor, so you're not harming yourself.
You start by saying that Facebook is not a competitor, but in taking over part of your core business--- keeping track of potential customers--- it could be seen as that.
> Secondly, Facebook is an immensely popular communications platform. Even if for some reason you dislike them because they're privately owned, it doesn't change the fact that that's where people are. If you want to reach people, you want to be where they are.
Facebook's objective is total control of all communication and it will stubbornly refuse to allow the migration of its data off platform. It will fight tooth and nail to prevent any other competing alternatives for social communication (such as open ones like email) from being seen as viable. Frankly, that's a business risk for us all, because it moves control of communication into the hands of a third party. By coming down hard in support of them you are doing an important part of their marketing dirty work.
The net benefit for consumers is unclear. They may like it now but we are still in the honeymoon phase of this monopolistic process.
> I mean, I get it. There are some exchanges we both agree that we want to have. You can't make a reliable newsletter via Facebook, nor I would like to get my account info through Messenger. But please move your ad communications to Facebook, where they will be unobtrusive for us and properly curtailed by the platform.
Your support for them is so superlative that I have to ask: Do you have a stake in Facebook?
You start by saying that Facebook is not a competitor, but in taking over part of your core business--- keeping track of potential customers--- it could be seen as that.
> Secondly, Facebook is an immensely popular communications platform. Even if for some reason you dislike them because they're privately owned, it doesn't change the fact that that's where people are. If you want to reach people, you want to be where they are.
Facebook's objective is total control of all communication and it will stubbornly refuse to allow the migration of its data off platform. It will fight tooth and nail to prevent any other competing alternatives for social communication (such as open ones like email) from being seen as viable. Frankly, that's a business risk for us all, because it moves control of communication into the hands of a third party. By coming down hard in support of them you are doing an important part of their marketing dirty work.
The net benefit for consumers is unclear. They may like it now but we are still in the honeymoon phase of this monopolistic process.
> I mean, I get it. There are some exchanges we both agree that we want to have. You can't make a reliable newsletter via Facebook, nor I would like to get my account info through Messenger. But please move your ad communications to Facebook, where they will be unobtrusive for us and properly curtailed by the platform.
Your support for them is so superlative that I have to ask: Do you have a stake in Facebook?
> You start by saying that Facebook is not a competitor, but in taking over part of your core business--- keeping track of potential customers--- it could be seen as that.
I never checked it out personally, but from what I heard, Facebook allows for integration with various third-party CRMs and stuff, so you still get to track potential and existing customers to your heart's content.
Your points are valid in a long-term view. Facebook monopolizing communication is not a good thing. But since when do most businesses care about that? It won't affect their bottom-line at all. It's a worry for consumers.
> Your support for them is so superlative that I have to ask: Do you have a stake in Facebook?
I have no stake in Facebook and I'm not affiliated with the company in any way. My support being "so superlative" is because as a user and customer, I hate business communication. Most of the stuff companies send is a waste of time for me, and I value my time. I'd like businesses to use Facebook more precisely because it makes spamming me harder. :). That, and since it's all engineered so that it is in company's interest to allow people to comment on their stuff, suddenly you can communicate with them under public view of other customers - so you won't be ignored so easily when you have a legitimate complaint.
I never checked it out personally, but from what I heard, Facebook allows for integration with various third-party CRMs and stuff, so you still get to track potential and existing customers to your heart's content.
Your points are valid in a long-term view. Facebook monopolizing communication is not a good thing. But since when do most businesses care about that? It won't affect their bottom-line at all. It's a worry for consumers.
> Your support for them is so superlative that I have to ask: Do you have a stake in Facebook?
I have no stake in Facebook and I'm not affiliated with the company in any way. My support being "so superlative" is because as a user and customer, I hate business communication. Most of the stuff companies send is a waste of time for me, and I value my time. I'd like businesses to use Facebook more precisely because it makes spamming me harder. :). That, and since it's all engineered so that it is in company's interest to allow people to comment on their stuff, suddenly you can communicate with them under public view of other customers - so you won't be ignored so easily when you have a legitimate complaint.
> You start by saying that Facebook is not a competitor, but in taking over part of your core business--- keeping track of potential customers--- it could be seen as that.
If keeping track of lists of potential customers is such an integral part of your core business that someone else doing it is "competition", then it can be plausibly argued that you're in the spam business, at least to some degree.
If keeping track of lists of potential customers is such an integral part of your core business that someone else doing it is "competition", then it can be plausibly argued that you're in the spam business, at least to some degree.
> That is totally by design and again, very much a feature.
No, it wasnt like that when most of the Pages acquired the bulk of their followers, they could reach all their audience freely. It was a shitty idea solely to make money, it didn't "add value" to users. There were other, more meaningful ways to implement this, e.g. show Page posts on a separate tab, have limits of posts/day etc. Paying for views is a bad strategy to improve quality; imagine if HN worked like that.
No, it wasnt like that when most of the Pages acquired the bulk of their followers, they could reach all their audience freely. It was a shitty idea solely to make money, it didn't "add value" to users. There were other, more meaningful ways to implement this, e.g. show Page posts on a separate tab, have limits of posts/day etc. Paying for views is a bad strategy to improve quality; imagine if HN worked like that.
Facebook did not just give every "fan" page an equal-sized traffic haircut. They started limiting page content in accordance with how much organic (non-paid) engagement it gets.
So for example Facebook pages like "Humans of New York" or "I Fucking Love Science" or "Amy Poehler's Smart Girls" still get popped into a lot of timelines despite (to my knowledge) not paying at all for boosting. Why? Because a lot of people love that content.
But if some other Facebook page saw a huge drop-off that stayed dropped off, then maybe that content is just not as interesting as other pages (like the ones above for example).
And in fact this is why Facebook made changes to page content visibility in the first place. Most pages posted boring obvious ads instead of interesting content.
Pages can still pay for higher visibility, but those are ads. Just like people can pay to "get into the New York Times"--via ads, not articles. And just like the NY Times, there is only a fixed amount of ad inventory at Facebook. Even when pages are paying, Facebook limits their audience, in order to keep the audience happy. No one wants to see a newsfeed full of 100% ads. Or even 50% ads. Or 25%.
So for example Facebook pages like "Humans of New York" or "I Fucking Love Science" or "Amy Poehler's Smart Girls" still get popped into a lot of timelines despite (to my knowledge) not paying at all for boosting. Why? Because a lot of people love that content.
But if some other Facebook page saw a huge drop-off that stayed dropped off, then maybe that content is just not as interesting as other pages (like the ones above for example).
And in fact this is why Facebook made changes to page content visibility in the first place. Most pages posted boring obvious ads instead of interesting content.
Pages can still pay for higher visibility, but those are ads. Just like people can pay to "get into the New York Times"--via ads, not articles. And just like the NY Times, there is only a fixed amount of ad inventory at Facebook. Even when pages are paying, Facebook limits their audience, in order to keep the audience happy. No one wants to see a newsfeed full of 100% ads. Or even 50% ads. Or 25%.
You can still reach some of your audience freely. You can argue that Facebook is rent-seeking, but consider the problem that it solves: if every fanpage could reach all their audience for free, every user's timeline would turn into a product catalog.
Just go and count how many things you've liked so far. I have 821 "items" liked, most of them fanpages. If every one of them would be able to reach me with all their posts, I'd quit Facebook on the spot. The users are not there for the fanpages. That's why Facebook won't let companies hit everyone. Now whether or not they should allow people to pay for wider reach, that's questionable, but then again - it at least makes people prioritize. If you have a limited marketing budget, you will tend to pay for and thus prioritize more important communication.
Just go and count how many things you've liked so far. I have 821 "items" liked, most of them fanpages. If every one of them would be able to reach me with all their posts, I'd quit Facebook on the spot. The users are not there for the fanpages. That's why Facebook won't let companies hit everyone. Now whether or not they should allow people to pay for wider reach, that's questionable, but then again - it at least makes people prioritize. If you have a limited marketing budget, you will tend to pay for and thus prioritize more important communication.
I am not using facebook anymore, but i had a page that had organically grew its audience and brought a lot of traffic to facebook. I agree that pushing updates every day would clog users' timeline, but there are better ways to fix that. The fact that they chose to take your followers and basically resell them back to you is so dumb that i never bothered to pay up. Shows lack of vision on their part.
I guess they could've simply tied the post range to the inverse of posting frequency - i.e. if you post once a month, you reach everyone, if you post daily, you'll reach some random subset, etc.
But then again, Facebook has to get the money for their servers from somewhere (or at least enough of it to attract more investors). They could've chosen worse monetization strategies.
But then again, Facebook has to get the money for their servers from somewhere (or at least enough of it to attract more investors). They could've chosen worse monetization strategies.
Hm... the alternative explanation is, people were always dumb, Facebook (and internet in general) just makes it more apparent by giving us more oportunities to display our stupidity.
Or: people were always tribal and concerned more with shibboleths identifying the in-group than truth. Facebook (and Tumblr and Reddit, etc, even HN) just automates it.
I disagree with Tumblr and Reddit being compared with Facebook in this regard, and completley disagree that HN is in anyway similar in this regard. Facebook will automatically stop showing you things you disagree with, whilst it has to be a conscious choice on your part on Reddit and Facebook.
On HN you don't actually get to choose the content in any meaningful way, and therefore have no means of creating an echo chamber for yourself through other means then down voting.
On HN you don't actually get to choose the content in any meaningful way, and therefore have no means of creating an echo chamber for yourself through other means then down voting.
I agree with your assessment of things other than to point out that HN is already an echo chamber to some degree.
There have already been studies showing that frequent visits to FB make a person more unhappy in their overall life. Now this. So, a major worldwide internet power -- that is, a single company -- that is trying to disrupt so much of global life (India, anyone?), with the interesting side effect that it makes people unhappy and less intelligent. If you had heard this "reality" 20 years ago, you wouldn't believe the future could be so dark.
Yep, a major worldwide internet power has vested interest in mining data from its billions of users via its product, which is broadly detrimental to those users.
To be honest, it seems a lot like the oil companies: major worldwide energy powers with vested interest in extracting fossil fuels from the earth then selling them to billions of users to burn, which is detrimental to everyone.
A lot of these mega-scale corporations manage to get away with mass-scale detrimental effects because of a general state of addiction to their product, which was legitimately new and useful at an earlier point in time. That, and after a certain point they become too powerful for any one country to stop.
To be honest, it seems a lot like the oil companies: major worldwide energy powers with vested interest in extracting fossil fuels from the earth then selling them to billions of users to burn, which is detrimental to everyone.
A lot of these mega-scale corporations manage to get away with mass-scale detrimental effects because of a general state of addiction to their product, which was legitimately new and useful at an earlier point in time. That, and after a certain point they become too powerful for any one country to stop.
Also, because laws are only a subset of the many ways a society handles, judges, and distinguishes detrimental actions. Laws can only do so much.
As a search provider, DuckDuckGo tries to prevent the "gated community" syndrom:
http://dontbubble.us/
Yeah, too bad it fails at some searches and falling back to google is needed
For controversial stuff, the bubble is definitely a minus. For factual queries, it just makes things easier (yes, when I type 'python' I don't mean the reptile)
For controversial stuff, the bubble is definitely a minus. For factual queries, it just makes things easier (yes, when I type 'python' I don't mean the reptile)
How does it fail for you?
I persisted and find that although the results are different, they are often just different. Once I became used to DDG it's started to seem like Google is the broken one.
It did take a while for me to switch, maybe 3 tries before it was working right.
I persisted and find that although the results are different, they are often just different. Once I became used to DDG it's started to seem like Google is the broken one.
It did take a while for me to switch, maybe 3 tries before it was working right.
One of my really lazy really common searches is the module codes at my university. It's really nice that Google know which university I mean and always get it right even if I've never searched that code before.
If they're at your university are the results you're looking for not all under the same domain? I would have expected site:university.com to return the right results for you. (Okay, perhaps it's not the every-man solution.)
Yep, that'd work - it does make the query considerably longer than the 5 character code though. Like I said, very lazy search.
- Autocomplete gives "funny" (non-relevant) suggestions
- Queries need more grooming to get to relevant results (search for things in Dublin, get results for Ireland/Ohio/California mixed)
- Queries need more grooming to get to relevant results (search for things in Dublin, get results for Ireland/Ohio/California mixed)
It would be better if they would have visible button next to search input field that would let you to decide if you want to be in bubble or not.
I tried their test of googling for "guns" as usual, in incognito mode and using another browser. Identical results. Dunno if I'm doing it wrong?
It would be interesting to study Simulacra and Simulation when it comes to social media and memes.
People tend to align themselves with other people and communities who share similar beliefs. You can often see this where people Like and Share these meme images with some "profound" message (eg. "A real man/woman ...") when they like, agree with or find interesting for some or other reason.
So, what IMO would be interesting to see is how these things changes their world view and self-image. Are they replacing the reality of life with a simulacra (the meme; Social Media "friends" I supposed can be argued to be another simulacra)? How much more likely are they to like/share to share posts from others who they perceive to have similar world-views, even if they know very little about the topic? How likely are they to defend ideas which they only have by virtue of their social connection to other people?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation
People tend to align themselves with other people and communities who share similar beliefs. You can often see this where people Like and Share these meme images with some "profound" message (eg. "A real man/woman ...") when they like, agree with or find interesting for some or other reason.
So, what IMO would be interesting to see is how these things changes their world view and self-image. Are they replacing the reality of life with a simulacra (the meme; Social Media "friends" I supposed can be argued to be another simulacra)? How much more likely are they to like/share to share posts from others who they perceive to have similar world-views, even if they know very little about the topic? How likely are they to defend ideas which they only have by virtue of their social connection to other people?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation
That's a ridiculous headline to derive from analysis of published article with title "The spreading of misinformation online".
Sure the idea that Facebook makes us dumber might have some truth in it. But it cannot be fairly evaluated unless one proves that the alternative Network Television or Grandma email forwards were not making us even more dumber before Facebook rose to prominence.
Sure the idea that Facebook makes us dumber might have some truth in it. But it cannot be fairly evaluated unless one proves that the alternative Network Television or Grandma email forwards were not making us even more dumber before Facebook rose to prominence.
I think the problem with the article is that it doesn't dig deep enough.
For example, Facebook news feed is driven by an algorithm to push posts you are likely to be interested in. Liking an anti-vaccination post or anti-immigration post will surely result in more similar content in your news feed.
So Facebook inadvertently might be reinforcing confirmation bias more than anything else due to content being filtered and personalized to you only.
For example, Facebook news feed is driven by an algorithm to push posts you are likely to be interested in. Liking an anti-vaccination post or anti-immigration post will surely result in more similar content in your news feed.
So Facebook inadvertently might be reinforcing confirmation bias more than anything else due to content being filtered and personalized to you only.
Probably not a small nitpick, really, but the article explains not that we're dumber by using Facebook, but that we are less informed. I think that's an important distinction not only because people tend to conflate knowledge and intelligence/aptitude, but because we should worry as much about spending long amounts of time doing things that provide not even nominal information to keep our brains pliable and receptive to new knowledge and new ways of thinking.
I think I disagree. We actually spread lots and lots of "information" via Facebook. In other words, we're "very informed" (whether it's arguably correct information is another story.) But we are, really, becoming more rigid in opinions due to this "information" which means, we are less receptive to new knowledge and new ways of thinking.
(I think, in the big picture, our opinions on this overall point do align, so please don't completely disregard my comment :).)
(I think, in the big picture, our opinions on this overall point do align, so please don't completely disregard my comment :).)
Reddit too. I just wrote 500 words without using any logical fallacies backing up my assertions with scientific studies from trusted sources, why does my comment have -12 points without a single person taking the time to refute my position in a comment?
I believe managed, licenced hunting in Africa supports conservation efforts, there is no reason ever to spank or hit a child, all children should be vaccinated, and pitbulls are dangerous.
So, most people have unfriended and/or blocked me on Facebook. Now I live in a bubble. I'm not bothered by people who don't agree with me. I'm bothered by people who can't debate these topics without getting riled up. The African hunting topic ended with someone threatening my little sister. I can understand the business decision behind letting people live in a bubble.
I believe managed, licenced hunting in Africa supports conservation efforts, there is no reason ever to spank or hit a child, all children should be vaccinated, and pitbulls are dangerous.
So, most people have unfriended and/or blocked me on Facebook. Now I live in a bubble. I'm not bothered by people who don't agree with me. I'm bothered by people who can't debate these topics without getting riled up. The African hunting topic ended with someone threatening my little sister. I can understand the business decision behind letting people live in a bubble.
I wrote a long comment with some questions, but decided it was too wordy and wanted to just say this: I have some ideas about addressing some of these issues, and one of the things I haven't been able to figure a way around is in the differences in user ability or desire for interaction or level of effort.
Therefore, I think that a good next-gen social media website is going to have to offer multiple levels of interaction depending on the level of the user themselves.
For example, some users want twitter level interaction. <200 character headlines, <200 character comments
Others want a bit of expansion, maybe some commentary, but nothing too cumbersome or technical.
Another group wants citations for everything, but may not want discussion too extensively.
Yet another group wants extensive discussion that flows ideas back and forth, and educates all participants.
Another group wants both citations and discussion (I know it's hard to seperate, but bear with me).
To me, the fundamental mistake is that we are throwing all users of all types into a pool of mediocrity, to the point where perhaps trolling is somewhat limited, but excellence in discussion is also limited due to interuptions of the limited trolling. The troll doesn't want to and generally can't participate in the lengthy discussion.
So my proposed social media site works in two ways:
1) Stories are segmented into expected level of complexity. Eg, there is a twitter version of a story, a short paragraph version of story, an article version of story, and an extensive version with citations version of story. Any user can access whichever level they choose at any time... but...
2) Posting, instead of arbitrary points which tend to be about liking vs disliking arguments despite things like reddiquette, is about two factors.. quality of comment (upvotes but no downvotes for comment quality) and logical strength regardless of position, handed out in a slashdot style random mod distribution to those who opt in to participate in logical analysis of comments...
Users all start with limited commenting and submission capabilities. As a user shows they are adding value though, they get more priviledges, and conversely, as trolls troll, they get temp and perma-bans based on level. (so a troll can still troll the twitter level comments, but not the citation level comments)
What do you think about a system like this, or do you have any other ideas on how to defeat this kind of warping of the social media world without excluding the users who just want to make pun threads all day?
The bottom line is that I want a way to encourage and reward logical and rational discussion and debate for all levels of users, but allow users who wish to remain stagnant to at least participate in the way they so desire.
Therefore, I think that a good next-gen social media website is going to have to offer multiple levels of interaction depending on the level of the user themselves.
For example, some users want twitter level interaction. <200 character headlines, <200 character comments
Others want a bit of expansion, maybe some commentary, but nothing too cumbersome or technical.
Another group wants citations for everything, but may not want discussion too extensively.
Yet another group wants extensive discussion that flows ideas back and forth, and educates all participants.
Another group wants both citations and discussion (I know it's hard to seperate, but bear with me).
To me, the fundamental mistake is that we are throwing all users of all types into a pool of mediocrity, to the point where perhaps trolling is somewhat limited, but excellence in discussion is also limited due to interuptions of the limited trolling. The troll doesn't want to and generally can't participate in the lengthy discussion.
So my proposed social media site works in two ways:
1) Stories are segmented into expected level of complexity. Eg, there is a twitter version of a story, a short paragraph version of story, an article version of story, and an extensive version with citations version of story. Any user can access whichever level they choose at any time... but...
2) Posting, instead of arbitrary points which tend to be about liking vs disliking arguments despite things like reddiquette, is about two factors.. quality of comment (upvotes but no downvotes for comment quality) and logical strength regardless of position, handed out in a slashdot style random mod distribution to those who opt in to participate in logical analysis of comments...
Users all start with limited commenting and submission capabilities. As a user shows they are adding value though, they get more priviledges, and conversely, as trolls troll, they get temp and perma-bans based on level. (so a troll can still troll the twitter level comments, but not the citation level comments)
What do you think about a system like this, or do you have any other ideas on how to defeat this kind of warping of the social media world without excluding the users who just want to make pun threads all day?
The bottom line is that I want a way to encourage and reward logical and rational discussion and debate for all levels of users, but allow users who wish to remain stagnant to at least participate in the way they so desire.
>why does my comment have -12 points
Some views are unappealing at an emotional level without much reasoning coming in to it?
Some views are unappealing at an emotional level without much reasoning coming in to it?
Just out of curiosity why do you think children should never be spanked? Do you have children?
I'm not going to say that spanking isn't an effective way to discipline a child. I can also understand if a 3 year old walks into a street to feel like spanking the child. There is overwhelming scientific evidence that other forms of discipline for small children are more effective at correcting behavior and children who are spanked are often more violent towards other children with other developmental and learning problems in school. Also, what we can do is look at how adjusted, happy, and successful people are in life, whether they are a doctor or lawyer with their own practice, divorced, in jail for violent crimes, or if they have a drug or psychological problems and compare that to whether they were spanked or worse as children. What we discover is that people who were not spanked or spanked very sparingly for example only in the case they walked out into the street do much, much better in life. So if you have children and want to play the numbers game, it might be worth while to explore other ways of disciplining your child. Not only do they work, but they have better long term effects on the child.
OK it sounds like you are actually of the belief that spanking should be rare, rather than never. In this I agree, but I do think from personal experience that spanking is a useful "thermonuclear" option to stop dangerous behaviour in young children. To give you an example, I once caught one of my children at the age of two inserting objects into electrical power points. I gave him a good spank on the bottom and he never did it again. It is possible that another solution would have worked, but when you are dealing with a two year old playing with electricity do you really want to take the chance with another options? If spanking is rare children quickly learn that to get a spank means they have crossed a no-go threshold.
My limited personal experience of the results of disincline (of all kinds) is that inconsistent or random discipline from a parent is worse than almost all others. Children who live in fear of being disciplined for what appears to them to be for no reason, or where their actual behaviour plays very little role in affecting the discipline they experience, fair far worse. It is really hard as a parent, but being consistent is critically important. No means no.
My limited personal experience of the results of disincline (of all kinds) is that inconsistent or random discipline from a parent is worse than almost all others. Children who live in fear of being disciplined for what appears to them to be for no reason, or where their actual behaviour plays very little role in affecting the discipline they experience, fair far worse. It is really hard as a parent, but being consistent is critically important. No means no.
I strongly agree with this author: Spanking and Child Development: We Know Enough Now To Stop Hitting Our Children[1]
> Spanking remains a common, if controversial, childrearing practice in the United States. In this article, I pair mounting research indicating that spanking is both ineffective and harmful with professional and human rights opinions disavowing the practice. I conclude that spanking is a form of violence against children that should no longer be a part of American childrearing.
My stance is consistent with the recommendations of the American Psychological Association [2] and the American Academy of Pediatrics [3].
The issue is can we have a discussion about it without unfriending each other on Facebook building protective bubbles.
[1]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3768154/
[2]http://www.apa.org/about/policy/corporal-punishment.aspx
[3]https://www.healthychildren.org/English/family-life/family-d...
> Spanking remains a common, if controversial, childrearing practice in the United States. In this article, I pair mounting research indicating that spanking is both ineffective and harmful with professional and human rights opinions disavowing the practice. I conclude that spanking is a form of violence against children that should no longer be a part of American childrearing.
My stance is consistent with the recommendations of the American Psychological Association [2] and the American Academy of Pediatrics [3].
The issue is can we have a discussion about it without unfriending each other on Facebook building protective bubbles.
[1]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3768154/
[2]http://www.apa.org/about/policy/corporal-punishment.aspx
[3]https://www.healthychildren.org/English/family-life/family-d...
Yes this is one of the reasons I spend far more time on HN than Facebook.
DanBC(3)
Just out of interest, what is the overwhelming scientific evidence? Is it causal or just correlational? Because I can imagine tons of reasons why children who are often spanked have more problems in school - not least, reverse causality - that would not imply you should never spank your child.
I actually don’t think that there is any evidence of mild smacking being a major problem. Child abuse (beating of children is very bad), but measuring the effects of a rare and relatively minor event in a child’s life is very hard.
It's always a failure of parenting. It's abusive - it's an abuse the the rights of the child. It's ineffective.
You always hear some fucking idiot saying "my child ran out into the street, so I hit him". Hear the useless parent put their child at risk of harm by not teaching the child about road safety, by not providing adequate supervision in a dangerous situation, and then punishing the child for the parent's lack of skill.
"I hit my children" is no different from "I hit my spouse" or "I hit my employees".
You always hear some fucking idiot saying "my child ran out into the street, so I hit him". Hear the useless parent put their child at risk of harm by not teaching the child about road safety, by not providing adequate supervision in a dangerous situation, and then punishing the child for the parent's lack of skill.
"I hit my children" is no different from "I hit my spouse" or "I hit my employees".
It is not ineffective. I don't have to smack my children now they are older, but when they were very young reasoning with them was not an option.
I think we can avoid false emotional comparisons between spanking a young child and beating your wife.
I think we can avoid false emotional comparisons between spanking a young child and beating your wife.
Imagine there are giant creatures(like 5-6 meter tall) and they are proportionally stronger than you. They follow you everywhere and(though they wash and feed you) they also sometimes hit you with their huge palms?
I have quite a good memory of my childhood and my complaints about it are not over the occasional smack I received, but of the arbitrary and inconsistent nature of the punishment I received. Like the powerless everywhere, children are strong advocates of justice and rules and they absolutely hate inconsistent and arbitrary displays of power.
I just wrote 500 words without using any logical fallacies backing up my assertions with scientific studies from trusted sources
This is why you're getting downvoted. That's not how you convince people.
This is why you're getting downvoted. That's not how you convince people.
I think that might be the crux of the issue. Convincing people and making a logical argument aren't the same thing and are only tangentially related.
The former requires a level of emotional intelligence and coercion in addition to any logical arguments. Why? Because people are people and they will only resent you if you just mechanically present arguments even if you're 100% right. They will look for any reason to say you're wrong even if it doesn't make sense. That's why sometimes, it's just not worth participating in some arguments. Context matters.
The former requires a level of emotional intelligence and coercion in addition to any logical arguments. Why? Because people are people and they will only resent you if you just mechanically present arguments even if you're 100% right. They will look for any reason to say you're wrong even if it doesn't make sense. That's why sometimes, it's just not worth participating in some arguments. Context matters.
The candidates in the current US election cycle demonstrate this quite well.
Most people argue and make appeals to emotion not logic.
I have noticed this myself. I think it mostly comes from not knowing what or how to make an argument. For instance if I state a argument such as
Premise 1: All men are mortal. Premise 2: Socrates is a man. Conclusion: Therefore, Socrates is a mortal.
To refute my argument someone would have to demonstrate how my first two premises or my conclusion was wrong. Usually everyone just bashes the conclusions but never refutes the premises of the argument.
I have noticed this myself. I think it mostly comes from not knowing what or how to make an argument. For instance if I state a argument such as
Premise 1: All men are mortal. Premise 2: Socrates is a man. Conclusion: Therefore, Socrates is a mortal.
To refute my argument someone would have to demonstrate how my first two premises or my conclusion was wrong. Usually everyone just bashes the conclusions but never refutes the premises of the argument.
It's charitable to assume, like other commenters did, that your comment was totally fine, but I have to ask - what was the tone of it? And how did it happen that people actually unfriended you on Facebook?
The other potential reason is that you posted it to the wrong community. There are, unfortunately, groups of people who get the more angry the more you try to back up your point with science. Best to avoid those. They can be convinced, but it requires a lot of work and careful dancing around their egos.
> The African hunting topic ended with someone threatening my little sister.
What the hell. Who are these people? :o. I'm sorry this happened to you and I totally support staying away from such groups.
The other potential reason is that you posted it to the wrong community. There are, unfortunately, groups of people who get the more angry the more you try to back up your point with science. Best to avoid those. They can be convinced, but it requires a lot of work and careful dancing around their egos.
> The African hunting topic ended with someone threatening my little sister.
What the hell. Who are these people? :o. I'm sorry this happened to you and I totally support staying away from such groups.
The problem is that my ideas through the Reddit algorithm sink to the bottom and RES will automatically hide them if they fall below a threshold. This is another case of an algorithm creating an opinion bubble. As for being unfriended on Facebook, people are passionate about not getting their children vaccinated. I lost a couple friends over that. One woman posted a picture with text that said, "My parents spanked me and I turned out fine." I donated money and time to do Facebook marketing for a charity concert for a local homeless non-profit last year. They do awesome work getting people off the streets where I live, but they are weird. I didn't know the women well but my response about her being a recovered heroin addict and not being fine ruffled a lot of people's feathers. That ended with a bunch of people unfriending me too.
Uh, I see. Yeah, Reddit has this problem; I've noticed new subreddits often changing the top-level comment sorting order to counter exactly that effect.
I can see how the issue with that woman could cause some opposition - if I understand it correctly (she told she turned out fine, you pointed her out that in fact she didn't), I can see myself being in disagreement (depending on the full context). But unfriending over things like that? This surprises me. Their loss, sadly, they chose to form a bubble around themselves.
Thanks for responding with details!
I can see how the issue with that woman could cause some opposition - if I understand it correctly (she told she turned out fine, you pointed her out that in fact she didn't), I can see myself being in disagreement (depending on the full context). But unfriending over things like that? This surprises me. Their loss, sadly, they chose to form a bubble around themselves.
Thanks for responding with details!
What most people forget about networks like Facebook (or twitter for that matter) is that just a misinformation can spread quickly, corrections of that information can to.
What FB have helped with is to make sure that neither newspapers nor politicians will be able to communicate in a vacuum.
What we see now is the first steps of a more enlightened society not a dumber one because dissent both gets normalized and much better access to minds it didn't before.
Of course there is going to be people who think alike or people who only befriend people who think exactly like them. But the second they want to spread their gospel outside their groups they are going to be met with a lot of other perspectives and thats a good thing.
What FB have helped with is to make sure that neither newspapers nor politicians will be able to communicate in a vacuum.
What we see now is the first steps of a more enlightened society not a dumber one because dissent both gets normalized and much better access to minds it didn't before.
Of course there is going to be people who think alike or people who only befriend people who think exactly like them. But the second they want to spread their gospel outside their groups they are going to be met with a lot of other perspectives and thats a good thing.
For all its faults, old fashioned broadcast media was better in a way. It spread information to you whether you agreed with it or not. Having a strong opinion on anything was rare, because for all you knew you where alone with your views. You where not exposed to as many like-minded people. There wasn't this feedback loop where you decided what information to spread on to that group of people, and they decided what to spread back to you.
In Germany, vast parts of Facebook have become one big ugly hate fest. I've read so much utterly terrible crap in the past few days (in the aftermath of the NYE events in Germany), that I'm still sick to the stomach. People are completely resistant to any facts contradicting their favorite narrative and flagging is useless (moderation is a joke). Same for YouTube btw.
edit: typos
edit: typos
I guess it's also amplified by the fact that people tend to accept things as true by default, until it's proven otherwise. In other words, insertion of data is the way cheaper then its invalidation and probably happen much more frequently thanks to social media.
Agree- I think an anonymous dislike button might help catch some of the bs posts- I know I would certainly use it a lot on my feed!
At the very least, it would make the poster consider what they have posted in some cases and realise that people do not agree with or trust the content within that post.
Yes, everybody has always been like this, but tech has changed the social nature of interaction. It's not just Facebook. Any online community (including HN) has a desire to limit conflict -- you want people enjoying themselves and contributing. That means "Don't show me stuff that I disagree with"
There's a natural conflict of interest. In the real world, we are forced to live with and confront those of widely varying opinions. Many times this is a huge pain in the ass. But it's good for the species overall. Over time, initially unpopular and ugly opinions get vetted: about one in a 100/1000 turn out to be a critical evolution in the way all of us think about ourselves.
In the virtual world, no such limits exist. We cannot afford to have the 1% folks who destroy discourse, so we just magically make them not exist. People share and promote emotional things which the vast majority can agree on. Instead of the outliers driving change, we begin to norm down those farther and farther out on the bell curve.
So people turn inward to their phones and tribes. We physically live next to each other, but we don't actually live with each other. Instead of a diverse and accomplished species, we are slowly becoming one large, comfortable mob.
There's a natural conflict of interest. In the real world, we are forced to live with and confront those of widely varying opinions. Many times this is a huge pain in the ass. But it's good for the species overall. Over time, initially unpopular and ugly opinions get vetted: about one in a 100/1000 turn out to be a critical evolution in the way all of us think about ourselves.
In the virtual world, no such limits exist. We cannot afford to have the 1% folks who destroy discourse, so we just magically make them not exist. People share and promote emotional things which the vast majority can agree on. Instead of the outliers driving change, we begin to norm down those farther and farther out on the bell curve.
So people turn inward to their phones and tribes. We physically live next to each other, but we don't actually live with each other. Instead of a diverse and accomplished species, we are slowly becoming one large, comfortable mob.
Call me biased, but pretty much every on-line community I've seen in the past 15 years had no desire to limit disagreements. All they wanted is to get rid of assholes.
It's the same on HN and on your Facebook feed, as it was on the old topical boards and mailing lists. You can argue for any controversial position you like as long as you do this in a civil and substantial way. What ends up happening is people getting split into two camps - those who can discuss things in a detached way and learn from them, and assholes who just want to call people names. Or, in terms of pg's hierarchy of disagreement[0], groups tend to split somewhere around DH3-DH4 level.
Which is totally fine, IMO. Unfortunately most Internet denizens seem to be in the "DH3 and below" group. What we need to figure out is how to make them abandon their ways and join the civilized world.
[0] - http://paulgraham.com/disagree.html
It's the same on HN and on your Facebook feed, as it was on the old topical boards and mailing lists. You can argue for any controversial position you like as long as you do this in a civil and substantial way. What ends up happening is people getting split into two camps - those who can discuss things in a detached way and learn from them, and assholes who just want to call people names. Or, in terms of pg's hierarchy of disagreement[0], groups tend to split somewhere around DH3-DH4 level.
Which is totally fine, IMO. Unfortunately most Internet denizens seem to be in the "DH3 and below" group. What we need to figure out is how to make them abandon their ways and join the civilized world.
[0] - http://paulgraham.com/disagree.html
What social networks bring is the explosion of the hierarchy of information that mainstream media and politicians imposed on us for decades.
That's why a lot of media/politics criticizes social networks because it questions their role and place in the society.
That's why a lot of media/politics criticizes social networks because it questions their role and place in the society.
> Can anything be done?
Should anything be done?
Entertain the possibility that what is observed is not really about the "facts," but intragroup signalling serving to maintain group cohesion.
But yeah, since we all hate those groups...
Should anything be done?
Entertain the possibility that what is observed is not really about the "facts," but intragroup signalling serving to maintain group cohesion.
But yeah, since we all hate those groups...
So the study confirms that people naturally trust what their friends are posting, which then confirms that trust is what bonds friends together.
I view Facebook as a means to strengthen existing "physical" friendship, rather than a place to get unbiased information. So in that sense this is neither surprising, nor detrimental. Imagine what will happen if your friends start correcting your political views...
For less biased information, please refer to twitter. And please don't mix Facebook friends with twitter followings.
I view Facebook as a means to strengthen existing "physical" friendship, rather than a place to get unbiased information. So in that sense this is neither surprising, nor detrimental. Imagine what will happen if your friends start correcting your political views...
For less biased information, please refer to twitter. And please don't mix Facebook friends with twitter followings.
Few years ago Facebook was supposed to work with media to improve the activity feed. But from my perspective it is just became as bad as it can be, it gives me no relevant information and 80% of it is garbage. When close friends post something interesting, it does not get promoted and rapidity falls in the bottom. Filtering out noise in annoying so I end up not using Facebook as I used to.
What describe the article is not a Facebook problem, it's an Internet problem, Google and Youtube make you as dumb as Facebook does.
What describe the article is not a Facebook problem, it's an Internet problem, Google and Youtube make you as dumb as Facebook does.
In a broader sense I'd say it's also a societal problem. Growing up in a more traditional society as well as a Christian community, I had to deal with a huge variety of people and opinions on a regular basis, whereas nowadays the default is to associate with 'people I like', which tend to be people I agree with. And because others do likewise, it's difficult to actively counteract that, much as I try.
Of course there were some strong biases in these 'older' communities too (views on sexuality, abortion, etc.), but generally speaking people inside them varied greatly in political views, social class, upbringing, lifestyle, habits, and so on. It gave a face to many opinions that I would consider offensive or dangerous, and by extension an understanding and empathy that is much more difficult to have these days (for me).
I fear for the future of our societies (and social safeties) in part because of this. Changing views often starts with mutual respect, and that's much more difficult to do when opinions get separated from those who hold them, and when interaction is increasingly opt-in.
Of course there were some strong biases in these 'older' communities too (views on sexuality, abortion, etc.), but generally speaking people inside them varied greatly in political views, social class, upbringing, lifestyle, habits, and so on. It gave a face to many opinions that I would consider offensive or dangerous, and by extension an understanding and empathy that is much more difficult to have these days (for me).
I fear for the future of our societies (and social safeties) in part because of this. Changing views often starts with mutual respect, and that's much more difficult to do when opinions get separated from those who hold them, and when interaction is increasingly opt-in.
I'm generally curious whether or not most people on HN still actively use their Facebook account.
Of course the members of this tribe would certainly enjoy believing that we are above that tribe.
I rarely participate in commenting/sharing/liking like I used to years ago, and I don't click any links on it anymore, but I do still check it several times a week.
Make a poll?
I use mine actively, but from the discussions here it sems I'm in the minority.
I use mine actively, but from the discussions here it sems I'm in the minority.
I use it for events.
I'm not a facebook user but this just seems to be another article on the filter bubble.
Being extreme in a group is signalling. Which explains the echo chambers that form.
Actually, I've noticed that when people post misinformation in the form of a link to an article, FB often has some "See also" items posted below it that debunk the story.
I understood I have less than 10 contacts in my life after closing fb 5 years ago.
Facebook annoys me so much, I've stopped using it. It really is like an addiction. We've outsourced our feelings of belonging to Facebook. We want to be careful with that.
[deleted]
This was made true by the founder of facebook calling his own users "dumb fucks" https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...
meeper16(1)
I've never used facebook/AOL, never plan to. I use the Internet.
Facebook makes smart people smarter and dumb people dumber.
Same as with every other technology / medium.
And it doesn't make dumb people smarter and smart people dumber?
Not Wikipedia.
[deleted](2)
> Once people discover that others agree with them, they become more confident -- and then more extreme.
And then the example plus explanation.
> Arriving at these judgments on your own, you might well hold them tentatively and with a fair degree of humility. But after you learn that a lot of people agree with you, you are likely to end up with much greater certainty
This mechanism is considered extreme? Why? When a lot of people agree with me on some issue then naturally I'll be more confident in expressing my views.
So what if Facebook pairs tin foil hat wearers together so they can share their views? I doubt that they'll start believing that they are now the mainstream.
I suspect that the writer of this article just deeply resents the fact that persons with out of the norm beliefs or thoughts can now effectively organise and exchange ideas which in turn directly threatens the journalists monopoly on creating the mainstream narrative.
It is a good thing that ideas and views from other perspectives are now widely available online. You now can watch RT and then CNN or FOX and conclude that basically all of these channels are just feeding us propaganda crap with different goals.
And then the example plus explanation.
> Arriving at these judgments on your own, you might well hold them tentatively and with a fair degree of humility. But after you learn that a lot of people agree with you, you are likely to end up with much greater certainty
This mechanism is considered extreme? Why? When a lot of people agree with me on some issue then naturally I'll be more confident in expressing my views.
So what if Facebook pairs tin foil hat wearers together so they can share their views? I doubt that they'll start believing that they are now the mainstream.
I suspect that the writer of this article just deeply resents the fact that persons with out of the norm beliefs or thoughts can now effectively organise and exchange ideas which in turn directly threatens the journalists monopoly on creating the mainstream narrative.
It is a good thing that ideas and views from other perspectives are now widely available online. You now can watch RT and then CNN or FOX and conclude that basically all of these channels are just feeding us propaganda crap with different goals.
1. You're advertising another company for free. Is Facebook paying you to put their logo on your site? No.
2. When people like/follow your page, they are trapped by FB(or some other social media) and you can only reach them there. If you're banned or they pull bait-and-switch on you, like Facebook did, you've wasted all this time building user base for Facebook and not building your business.
3. You can't even reach them on Facebook, because you now have to pay Facebook to reach people that have already liked your page.
4. Posting on social media wastes a lot of time and money(tools + people).
- Compare this to getting an email address from your visitors:
1. You are in control of your list.
2. You can reach them anywhere & anytime almost for free.