All about social networks

But the constant changing of these privacy norms might only work to confuse our subliminal user habits even more. Our brains are increasingly disoriented by the different rules of each platform:

On LinkedIn, people can see if I view their profile.

On Instagram, people can see if I view their stories, but not their profile.

On TikTok, people can see w... See more

Something I’ve noticed, however, is that exclusively using TikTok doesn’t mean I’m only exposed to TikTok-specific trends and culture. In fact, many of the dust-ups from other platforms still make their way onto my For You page. Rather than a standalone platform, as it was in its early days, TikTok has become the ocean into which—and out of which—t

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I think the core, critical sin was choosing the advertising model to begin with. Brand advertising is not like direct advertisement, which is more programmatic. It requires something like a Disney to essentially give you a favor, because the only players that matter to them are Google and Facebook. Snapchat, Twitter, everything else did not matter.... See more

It’s tricky, because, you know, we’ve created it as these spaces that are controlled. And they’re economically, you know, managed in particular ways. Yes, the individuals are, you know, co-constructing these systems. Absolutely. But they’re doing it within an environment that has been defined for, you know, value extraction, not necessarily for ple... See more

So right now, it’s like the sparkle and spectacle of the shininess of the internet, it’s started to fade, and we’re really aware in this moment of, you know, trash in the comments and crowds on the timeline and, you know, misinformation graffiti on the walls.

Is Substack that different from other social media?

Yes, and no. No, in the sense that the same rule applies as on other social media, namely reciprocity, status, traffic, and ‘picks’. Yes, in that most of the Substack crowd is creative, so it’s much more muted and quiet than X or Instagram. People are more polite, older, more contained—there is ba... See more