the techno-social environment
It’s the social system technology is embedded in that matters
the techno-social environment
The constant scrolling tells us that nothing is worth remembering, nothing is worth reflection, nothing is worth production because the act of consumption is simpler.
Kyla Scanlon • Gen Z and Financial Nihilism
An electorate that has lost the capacity for long-form thought will be more tribal, less rational, largely uninterested in facts or even matters of historical record, moved more by vibes than cogent argument and open to fantastical ideas and bizarre conspiracy theories. If that sounds familiar, it may be a sign of how far down this path the West... See more
Opinion | Thinking Is Becoming a Luxury Good
... See morePlatforms have imbued crowds with new qualities. They are no longer fleeting and local, but persistent and global. They engage symbiotically with influencers, but don’t require a leader or physical space to assemble. Platform affordances empowered crowds; they are now active participants in chronicling history and shaping narratives.
Invisible
Different genres, same engine: trust earned through charisma, resonance, and the steady performance of alignment, inside a media ecology built for niches.
Renee DiResta • Crisis of Trust 2026: The Retreat Into Insularity
But it is not clear whether such systems – even if they work as advertised – can solve the problem of reliable knowledge in a balkanised public sphere. Just as commercial incentives led to fake content and filter-bubbles, LLMs likely face the same pressures in a world of sharply diminishing returns. Because the firms training them desperately need... See more
The sovereign individual and the paradox of the digital age | Aeon Essays
Much of what we do is immediately authenticated as we do it, stored as data, classified or scored on some sort of scale, and deployed in real time to modulate some outcome of interest – usually, the behaviour of a person, or a machine, or an organisation.
The sovereign individual and the paradox of the digital age | Aeon Essays
The engagement with digital flow is stimulated by hormonal rewards—evolutionary physiological mechanisms that encourage people to search for something useful and share it with others for bonding and recognition, much like real hunting and gathering.
Andrey Mir • The Digital Reversal. Thread-saga of Media Evolution
If there is one thing the advent of social media has brought home to us, it is how little we think for ourselves.
Ian Leslie • How To Be Influenced
This instability extends to identity itself. Where offline identity is grounded in lived experience, online identity forms through affinity and alignment. We become collections of interests, allegiances, and aesthetics. The internet’s second self becomes a curatorial project, constantly revised according to shifting community standards and platform... See more