Can the internet ever be fun again?
Can the internet ever be fun again?
Or is it just doomed to the vapidity of sterile commercialization?
It feels like everything is serious these days... and 'humor' is only of the commercial variety. Joke communities and circlejerk communities are considered 'hate groups' now. Mods will ban you for sarcastic comments on 'serious' topics, and even on non serious ones, and everything is politicized either by trolls, bots, or whackjobs.
It's boring when you can't joke anymore. I miss my internet communities of 5-10 years ago when you could joke around, and even people of different beliefs and persuasions could laugh at themselves.
Now everything is so deadly serious. It's a complete bummer. And any sort of 'edge' or sarcasm or sardonic remarks are ban-worthy.
I guess it's just poe's law run amok? I feel like mods could tell the difference 10 years ago and the non-jokey psychos were just ignored.
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There's a hypothetical phenomenon called the "asshole filter" that some have proposed. Basically, the idea is: hostile, humorless and trolling type people chase away the more pleasant people over time. The end result being, the concentration of assholes is always going up on social media and anonymous online forums, etc.
I don't think it's very scientific. How could you accurately measure such a thing. But I have felt like it was happening as various corners of the internet have grown in popularity.
One way I try to deal with it on here is I aggressively block people. Why let my energy get drained when there's any easy way to never see the jerks again.
I don't know if this tactic will work long term. There are potentially friendlier instances to migrate to, also. Lemmy is an interesting ongoing experiment.
Hope you hang in. Completely understand if you don't want to.
I've been thinking about social mechanics in online environments for a few years, and this arsehole filter definitively sounds true for me. I think that it has a twofold mechanism:
- it's easier to endure arseholes if you're one
- your behaviour sets up the example for newbies
So arseholes have a higher re-incidence and proliferation than nice people.
I also think that this applies to assumptive/dumb/disingenuous vs. smart, and entitled/whiny vs. contributive people. If that's correct then the phenomenon is likely wider, and we could actually measure it for something else. It wouldn't prove that the arsehole filter is true, but it would strengthen the hypothesis.
the concentration of assholes is always going up
True, but this isn't a natural phenomenon, it's a result of engagement-based ranking algorithms. Assholes attract engagement by starting flame wars and the like, so front page algorithms push them to the top.
Before social media, forums were popular and their sorting was simply by most recently updated. I think this is part of what made the internet more fun: instead of websites trying to guess what you would like most, you were given a practically random, diverse view of everything.
I think it may be both. Engagement algorithms are definitely part of the problem. Agree it was far more fun when it was random / organic interactions.
However, I also think it's kind of like a party that starts out like a book club, it gets more interesting, and then louder and more obnoxious folks hear about this, and they keep showing up.
By the end it's a completely different vibe, and the original folks are long gone. Have experienced it numerous times over the long years, before the sorting and engagement algorithms joined the fray.
I know this comes off as kind of hipsterish. But, most obnoxious people don't realize they are obnoxious. And confronting them seldom does anything but escalate the situation. So leaving is the mature choice. Therefore... mature folks leave, and the forum's relative aggregate immaturity goes up.
One way to fight it is with very strict moderation, and I have seen that work. But it's labor-intensive and requires moderators who are highly dedicated and fair, and don't "power trip". I'm not a huge fan of that approach overall. But in the right context (like academic discussions) it can be pretty good.
Same. IRL and online communities I have experienced this. Obnoxious people come in, take over, and then make everything about them... only people who want to be around that are other obnoxious people so things become a circlejerk.
not really hipsterish... but very common IME with any community that hipster types of people start joining. They start policing others because of their raging insecurity and need to be seen as cool.
I think that the ranking algo is a catalyst, but the underlying phenomenon is natural, due to two counterpoints:
- 4chan - same algo as old forums, and notoriously full of arseholes
- Jantelagen, tall poppy syndrome, crab mindset - the idea of people being arseholes to the ones who behave differently pops up across multiple offline cultures
I think that this is important because, if the Arsehole Social Shift (A.S.S.)* is a natural phenomenon, just avoiding a ranking algo isn't enough; you need active measures to counter it.
It might also have to do with community size, given that everyone has some triggers that makes them behave like arseholes, and they're more likely to be triggered in larger communities.
*sorry for the silly coinage. I couldn't help it.
Yup. There were some Reddit communities I left because of the population of assholes or "griefers". There seemed to be a disproportionate amount in certain gaming communities that lead me to believe age is a factor.
Thankfully, there were usually enough people leaving to create an alternate subreddit! Lol
Some of the alternate subs were really good. And some became worse than the thing they left behind. Ye olde circle of reddit.