What is happening now in the US (the soft power of Silicon Valley teaming up with the hard power of President Trump) does not herald a new world order on its own. It’s the West following suit into a new fragmented world order that the rest of the world has already been moving towards years before by architecting its infrastructure around cultural a

X has turned into a bullhorn for “anti-woke” sentiments used to boost Musk’s political messaging, Meta has abandoned its fact checking in deference to possible Trump retribution against the Zuckerberg empire; Starlink, TikTok, and Nvidia/TSCM are becoming geopolitical bargaining chips in nativist industrial trade wars; Network States are gaining po

Similar projects online and off followed suit as countries like India, Singapore, and EU began to make rules concerning how data was shared, what apps were allowed in their territory, and demanding that online infrastructure at least partially reflected the value of the state.

The west had “won” the Cold War and now a global consensus had halted the march of historical change as everyone settled into a unified global liberal economic, political, and social order.

Social media incentivized more extreme views at the same time that China began to develop an entirely different internet that, unlike the Western internet, was built on the values expressed by the state.

to the Dark Forest of the internet; off mainline socials where their speech and behavior was broadcast to anyone and into small niche communities on invite-only forums, p2p networks, and group chats.

It’s not just a vibe shift. Being “good” simply doesn't cut through the noise as once it did in today’s media.

Masks are off in 2025. After years of virtue signalling, hopes for progressive politics, waves of inclusivity programs, and community-oriented messaging, the do-good era of being online is now over.