the techno-social environment
It’s the social system technology is embedded in that matters
the techno-social environment
The overall digital environment is dictated by tech companies with ruthlessly capitalist, expansionary motives, which do not provide the most fertile ground for culture. While the magazine fashion editor may periodically use their ability to pick out and promote a previously unheard voice, the algorithmic feed never will; it can only iterate on
... See moreKyle Chayka • Filterworld
“Commerce and culture are locked in an ever-tighter embrace.”
Rogers Brubaker • Hyperconnected Culture and Its Discontents
Every new medium creates a new environment. As we adapt to the environment, it shapes our perceptions and thoughts, our relationships with others, even our sense of self.
Nicholas Carr • Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart
Postman: Technological change is ecological…One significant change generates total change.
“Each medium creates a new orientation for thought, expression, and sensibility.”
When looking at the Mirror World, it can seem obvious that millions of people have given themselves over to fantasy, to make-believe, to playacting. The trickier thing, the uncanny thing, really, is that’s what they see when they look at us. They say we live in a “clown world,” are stuck in “the matrix” of “groupthink,” are suffering from a form of
... See moreNaomi Klein • Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World
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 moreInfluencers are opinion leaders with the power to influence what people believe or buy and the capacity to shape sentiment and norms within their niche. They innately understand how to connect with others in a digital age, developing intimate trusted relationships with their followers, yet are also capable of achieving reach commensurate with mass
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
You might also be aware that all this is delivered by means of “persuasive design”—an umbrella term for an armory of psychological techniques borrowed directly from the designers of casino slot machines, for the express purpose of encouraging compulsive behavior. One example among hundreds is the ubiquitous drag-down-to-refresh gesture, which keeps... See more
Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals
the multi-personal nature of our digital presence. We are forced to be digital multi-persons by the niche design of the platforms, as they seek to extract more of our data and attention by making us exercise the various forms of self-representation.
Andrey Mir • The platform paradox
self-representations in order to co-produce the digital mirror-world.