the techno-social environment
It’s the social system technology is embedded in that matters
the techno-social environment
... See moreThe influencer's primary job is to grow an audience, a crowd of followers who will serve as eyeballs on the content as well as secondary distribution machine. Reach significantly determines to what extent the influencer makes money or accrues power, so the temptation to pepper content with the kind of bait that the algorithms will boost to a niche
The media and society can be understood as conversations - Jeff Jarvis
in any community there is always a tension between the maintenance of tradition and the pursuit of progress, between stability and change, insularity and expansiveness. This tension manifests itself in different modes and tools of communication, and as the variety of available media grows, so too does the tension. What’s crucial to a society’s... See more
Nicholas Carr • The Tyranny of Now
From, The Master Switch. Mid-century TV networks were probably the most powerful, centralized information system in history.
In the post-Narrative age of the Database, we all assume responsibility for improvising our own, often tentative and fragile, narratives about both the world and ourselves. Because narrative is so critical to our sense of identity, however, we are tempted to zealously guard our narratives.
L. M. Sacasas • Narrative Collapse
If professional editors serve as gatekeepers, determining the importance of various stories before publication, the Internet opens the gates, deciding on the significance of content after it’s published. Hence, it’s not just a collective editor—it’s what I call the Viral Editor. Anyone can post anything, including rubbish. But people then vote with... See more
Andrey Mir • The Viral Inquisitor
platforms as assignment editors
The experience of boredom is contingent. It is culturally, socially, and institutionally produced…Our age features a set of technologies and social conditions that work together to maximize our boredom if we are not constantly diverted from it.
The Sirens Call
This current manifestation of the internet and consumer technology is insidiously powerful because of the way that it can mimic these loops that evolved for other things and were necessary for our survival. They’re now essentially being co-opted by a sort of fake system. The tech systems have gotten so good at mimicking these ancient reward
... See moreMichael Easter • Scarcity Brain
The internet drastically increases the ease of finding and fulfilling one’s preferred phenomenological feedback loop, whether that be righteous anger, a sense of shared victimhood, or any other appealing gradient.