Social media poster that is true
TL; DR Summary
Social media and its negative impact on productivity
High tech ought to be driving our economy forward, but as the linked article highlights, our productivity improvements and job opportunities are not nearly as great as past industrial advances. Why is that? Much of today’s tech industry is “social media” and: One reason [for a productivity slowdown] may be the nature of “social media,” which is largely a replacement for technology that already exists, or in many cases, is simply a diversion, even a source of time-wasting addiction for…
Research finds that social media rots teen brains
Analyzing the test results showed that students who frequently used social networking sites like Facebook or apps like Snapchat ended up wasting their brain cells, scoring on average 20 points lower in math, reading and science compared to those who didn’t partake in the online “social scene.” Source: Research Suggests Gamers Get Better Grades, While Social Sites Rot Your Brain Hmmmmm …. If you, say, wanted to control a population, you would use social media propaganda … with the added…
Republican Platform seeks to sell off all Western US Federal lands
TL; DR Summary The basic propaganda method used here is the strawman argument. In the strawman argument, you create a fictitious statement from your opponent (in this case by exaggerating what they said) and then argue against that fictitious statement, rather than what the opponent actually said or promoted.
“In the age of the Internet, the truth does not matter”
“In the age of the internet, the truth does not matter. The message you want to propagate can be told, and it will spread like wildfire. And spread it did.” Propaganda spreads faster than wildfire on social media, often torching everything in its path. The marriage of social media and propaganda is extraordinarily dangerous if you think about how Internet mobs convict people, groups, ideas – in a matter of hours – in the absence of a full set of…
Social media “influencers” secretly paid by companies
Social media stars have been paid – quite well – to secretly promote various brands and products. Source: FTC spanks Warner Brothers for failure to disclose social influencer payments | The Blog Box Social media is THE platform for all forms of propaganda!
Brexit ‘2nd Referendum Petition’ said to be a prank
The petition that was supposedly blasting through 3 million signatures 3 days after the Brexit vote, is acknowledged to have been filled with fraudulent signatures added by bots. Source: EXCLUSIVE: Brexit ‘2nd Referendum Petition’ A 4 Chan Prank: BBC Report It As Real | Heat Street The BBC has updated their news report to indicate the petition may contain “suspicious activity” and that fraudulently added signatures have been identified. Fake news runs rampant thanks to social media enabling anyone and everyone to become…
Social media platforms degenerate from trivia to propaganda and censorship
If you have followed this blog, you understand social media has become a frictionless conduit for the spread of propaganda. Propaganda is messaging intended to encourage a target to take some action. There are two sides to propaganda messaging – those promoting a propaganda message and those with opposing views. The strongest form of opposition is when platform operators directly censor third-party opinions. Normally, the answer to speech someone disagrees with, is more speech, not censorship. Today, Reddit censored comments from those quoting…
Users abandoning social media apps
Year over year usage of social media platforms, through social media apps, is plummeting. Of all four major platforms, there has been a 9% decrease in the number of installed apps, year over year (some are up and some are down). People are spending less time using social media apps, a new study from marketing intelligence firm SimilarWeb found. Source: People are spending much less time on social media apps, said report. These changes might be because users are concerned…