Anti-social: It's fads, not friends, which now dominate social media feeds

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Was Social Media Ever “Social”?

  • Many argue early Facebook/MySpace/Hyves (mid‑2000s) were genuinely useful social tools: real‑life friends only, chronological feeds, event coordination, picture sharing, and serendipitous meet‑ups.
  • Others say even then it was shallow: friend-count contests, clout-seeking, and weak ties masquerading as social life.
  • Several note that real sociality increasingly moved to messaging (Messenger/WhatsApp/Discord) while feeds became less relevant.

Algorithms, Ads, and Engagement

  • A dominant view is that algorithmic feeds and ad‑driven “engagement maximization” flipped platforms from social networks into entertainment/propaganda channels.
  • Comparisons to cable news and yellow journalism: constant fear, outrage, and sensationalism to keep people watching, now supercharged by personalization and infinite scroll.
  • Some see benefits: discovering local friends’ travel, niche communities, small‑business outreach. Others reply that these upsides rarely outweigh mental‑health harms and time sink.
  • Many describe feeds now dominated by short‑form video, memes, influencer ads, and AI‑slop, with genuine friend updates buried or effectively gone.

Is Hacker News Social Media?

  • Large subthread disputes this.
  • One side: HN is clearly social media—user‑generated content, voting, algorithmic front page, karma, addictive design; structurally similar to Reddit/Digg.
  • Other side: HN is a forum/news aggregator; text‑centric, no personalized feed, no images or DMs, minimal growth/engagement optimization, so qualitatively different from Instagram/TikTok.
  • Some resolve this by distinguishing “toxic, engagement‑maximized social media” from “nutritious” or old‑school social sites; HN is put in the latter bucket.

Coping Strategies and Alternatives

  • Reported tactics: deleting apps, disabling notifications (“notification zero”), turning off YouTube history, using RSS, old.reddit, Mastodon, email digests, or browser/phone extensions to strip recommendations and ads.
  • People describe both relief (more focus, real‑world projects, calmer mind) and downsides (feeling isolated, missing updates from distant friends).

Broader Cultural Effects

  • Concerns include: polarization, bot/astroturf campaigns, weaponized targeted content (politics, advertising), erosion of local communities, and a globalized fad/monoculture.
  • Some nostalgia for pre‑algorithm internet (IRC, forums, blogs) and skepticism that today’s youth will experience anything similar.