>I think it's important to know what an incredible position this is to be in,
The old saying goes that knowledge is power; everyone here with deep knowledge of computers and the things they enable really are in a blessed position.
Re:Senate Bill to Ban TikTok
by olkingcole on Wednesday March 29, 2023 @06:21PM
(#35364681)
Thank you for this comment. I would like to add that social media and foreign manipulation thereof has been demonstrated to be spectacularly capable of affecting peoples' mental states and beliefs and by extension our stability as a country. We haven't figured out how to deal with it yet in a way that balances with our values of free speech and enterprise but a platform with tiktok's pervasiveness taking orders directly from the Chinese government is a huge, bright and shining risk that our government knows it needs to address.
Not to mention the data collection.
Re:Senate Bill to Ban TikTok
by rumblerock on Wednesday March 29, 2023 @07:09PM
(#35365213)
Exactly. We've already seen the damage that foreign manipulation can cause when they're exploiting the cracks of FB, Twitter, etc. It doesn't take much imagination to think about what the art of the possible is when you can control the system itself.
Exactly. We're a decade into the social media experiment now, and it's absolutely clear that it in its current form it doesn't make us smarter, it doesn't make us happier, and it doesn't bring us closer. If anything, it makes people sick and it weakens the social fabric. The proposed solution of "more free speech better" is clearly not working in the face of organized, AI-fueled, nation-state manipulation efforts.
Hacker News is made up of people with a birds-eye view of social media technology. Most of us understand how it works and who operates it. I think it's important to know what an incredible position this is to be in, and to remember that most people aren't like us. Most people can't just say, "screw it, I'll get my information elsewhere."
I think we'll improve over time, but we're at least a generation away from any kind of widespread media literacy. What do we do in the meantime?