All about social networks

Besides the infinite social media maelstrom1 and the continuously growing commercialization of the web2, we will soon have to deal with an avalanche of AI-generated content3 as well. The corners of the internet cultivated by individuals are important for its vitality and may even become critical to the very survival of a humane online ecosystem.... See more

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

If we get big enough, there’s a real consideration on how we train the algorithm and what objective function we get or give it, and what content gets produced for it. We need to be very mindful of that because what I’d rather have is a world where we have more original content, more interesting content, and less of this gaming-the-algorithm content

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One thing… I have this ongoing group chat with my friends on Facebook Messenger and something we talk about on and off is how it feels very impersonal like in Facebook Messenger, iMessage, WhatsApp, all of these, they all look more or less the same for every group. That has its uses because it means that you have a standardized interface and like... See more

The mistake of the 1.0 platforms was to optimize for engagement—likes, clicks, and shares. This was a successful short-term growth strategy, but at the long-term cost of sustainability. For engagement includes not only joy but rage, not only mirth but sadness. Incentivizing these things creates hellishness, driving people to disengage, to become... See more