{"id":63562,"date":"2023-05-05T05:55:07","date_gmt":"2023-05-05T09:55:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?p=63562"},"modified":"2023-05-01T16:50:34","modified_gmt":"2023-05-01T20:50:34","slug":"discussion-the-end-of-social-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2023\/05\/discussion-the-end-of-social-media\/","title":{"rendered":"DISCUSSION: The End of Social Media?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Virtually everybody is complaining about social media.\u00a0 Facebook is under fire for disseminating false information and censoring true information.\u00a0 Even Elon Musk can\u2019t seem to fix Twitter.\u00a0 TikTok is controlled by the Chinese Communists, reportedly to gain information about Americans and apparently to make Americans stupider.\u00a0 They are all criticized for viciousness, harming their users mentally, inciting a mob mentality, and promoting social conformity.<\/p>\n

Ian Bogost in The Atlantic\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>(behind a paywall) has written about the woes of the social media platforms in his article\u00a0The Age of Social Media Is Ending<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

He points out that originally, the platforms were for social networking, letting you connect with people\u2013family members, old friends, business contacts\u2013and allowing you to form webs of acquaintance.\u00a0 Then arose a focus on content and communicating your thoughts with everyone in your network.\u00a0Then came the ability to pass along links and material written by other people<\/em> across your network and the network of everyone in your network.\u00a0 Whereupon, the rest of the internet became dependent on social media to generate traffic, so that a website post that \u201cgoes viral\u201d on social media can earn lots of money from advertisers who pay on the basis of \u201chits\u201d and page views.\u00a0 This latter stage, he says, is where the problems began to multiply.<\/p>\n

Now, he concludes, the fate of social media is uncertain, with regulation from various governments, consumer revolt, and new alternatives threatening to kill it.<\/p>\n

What I\u2019d like to discuss this weekend is social media as you are using it and thinking about it.\u00a0 Are you still on social media or have you sworn off?\u00a0 Are you still using it the way you used to, or has your use changed?\u00a0 How do you handle \u201cfriends,\u201d disinformation, censorship, virtual social pressure, and other problems?\u00a0 Do you think social media is doomed, or can it be reformed?<\/p><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Virtually everybody is complaining about social media.\u00a0 Are you still on social media or have you sworn off?\u00a0 Are you still using it the way you used to, or has your use changed?\u00a0 How do you handle “friends,” disinformation, censorship, virtual social pressure, and other problems?\u00a0 Do you think social media is doomed, or can it be reformed?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":59751,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,44],"tags":[2039],"class_list":["post-63562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-media","category-technology","tag-social-media"],"yoast_head":"\nDISCUSSION: The End of Social Media?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Virtually everybody is complaining about social media.\u00a0 Are you still on social media or have you sworn off?\u00a0 Are you still using it the way you used to, or has your use changed?\u00a0 How do you handle "friends," disinformation, censorship, virtual social pressure, and other problems?\u00a0 Do you think social media is doomed, or can it be reformed?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2023\/05\/discussion-the-end-of-social-media\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"DISCUSSION: The End of Social Media?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Virtually everybody is complaining about social media.\u00a0 Are you still on social media or have you sworn off?\u00a0 Are you still using it the way you used to, or has your use changed?\u00a0 How do you handle "friends," disinformation, censorship, virtual social pressure, and other 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