Vox Populi, Vox Humbug
Having sex with ChatGPT | What happened to 'social' media? | Democracy is a dirty word | The Lead Paint Prize |
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Social Contract
What happened to ‘social’ media?
Oh, how I miss the old social media. The one that claimed, with a straight face, to be ‘social’. Connecting people, it said. A lofty ideal, sure. But one worth at least paying lip service towards.
But what I really miss about the old Facebook is the wisdom one imbibed with each visit. You’d log on breathless, quivering in wonderment at the mere prospect of a day enriched forever.
I’m referring to the now defunct staple of those early days. The Thirst Trap with Inspirational Quote—a mode of intellectual smuggling so elegant it deserved a Royal Charter. First came the sugar: a lithe young woman in a bikini engineered to defy both gravity and modesty. Then came the medicine: quotes from Gandhi or Rosa Parks. Occasionally, for the more intellectually inclined, a dose of Foucault.
For the unadorned, Facebook’s philanthropy once possessed lofty intention. It worked like KGB subterfuge, apparent only years after the fact. Peppered across the old Facebook were photos related to friends, acquaintances, and people you might have once spied groping the wonky lemons in Aldi.
It was a community. On Sundays, you’d play a Masterchef host, picking apart your old English teacher’s gravy-sodden roast beef and questioning the sad pallor of his limp, insipid broccoli. The poor fool might know a bit about The Tempest, but he knows nothing about salting his cruciferous vegetables.
That was the old social media. Now Hell is empty and all the devils are here.
