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Musings Report 2019-19 5-11-19 Facebook and the Commoditization of Social Networks
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For those who are new to the Musings reports: they are basically a glimpse into my notebook, the unfiltered swamp where I organize future themes, sort through the dozens of stories and links submitted by readers, refine my own research and start connecting dots which appear later in the blog or in my books. As always, I hope the Musings spark new appraisals and insights. Thank you for supporting the site and for inviting me into your circle of correspondents.
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Facebook and the Commoditization of Social Networks
Much has been written about the negative effects of social media and specifically Facebook on human well-being: those who spent significant amounts of time engaged in social media/Facebook are lonelier, more prone to feelings of inadequacy, etc. than those who avoid social media in favor of real-world social relationships.
This isn't surprising, as our feelings of adequacy and prosperity are based on comparisons within our circle, as opposed to some abstract measure.
The problem with social media is there is always someone in the circle who has more likes, more photos of exotic locales, higher social status, more wealth, more visibility ("fame") online, and so on. The system is essentially designed to atomize social relations and foster feelings of inadequacy and aloneness.
But it's also monetizing social relations, turning social relations into social networks that generate profit for the owners of the technology platforms.
A recent article explores how this monetization of social relations took place: The Internet Apologizes: Even those who designed our digital world are aghast at what they created. A breakdown of what went wrong — from the architects who built it.
Let's start with four quotes from the article:
“The web that many connected to years ago is not what new users will find today. The fact that power is concentrated among so few companies has made it possible to weaponize the web at scale.” —Tim Berners-Lee, creator of the World Wide Web
"The dopamine you get from outrage is just so addictive."
"Facebook has become the largest civilization-scale mind-control machine that the world has ever seen."
"The tech industry is creating the largest political actor in the world, influencing a billion people’s attention and thoughts every day, and we have a moral responsibility to steer people’s thoughts ethically."
These paragraphs capture the dynamic:
To keep the internet free — while becoming richer, faster, than anyone in history — the technological elite needed something to attract billions of users to the ads they were selling. And that something, it turns out, was outrage. As Jaron Lanier, a pioneer in virtual reality, points out, anger is the emotion most effective at driving “engagement” — which also makes it, in a market for attention, the most profitable one. By creating a self-perpetuating loop of shock and recrimination, social media further polarized what had already seemed, during the Obama years, an impossibly and irredeemably polarized country.
The advertising model of the internet was different from anything that came before. Whatever you might say about broadcast advertising, it drew you into a kind of community, even if it was a community of consumers. The culture of the social-media era, by contrast, doesn’t draw you anywhere. It meets you exactly where you are, with your preferences and prejudices — at least as best as an algorithm can intuit them. “Microtargeting” is nothing more than a fancy term for social atomization — a business logic that promises community while promoting its opposite."
This article I posted in April speaks to the same dynamic:
Nothing Fails Like Success: Internet investors don’t want a modest return on their investment. They want an obscene profit right away, or a brutal loss, which they can write off their taxes.
There is something even larger that these articles don't address: the core dynamic of neoliberalism, which is to turn everything into a market that's ultimately overseen by the state (central government).
The visible steps to monetizing social networks are well-known: design a platform that rewards engagement, ramp up its addictive qualities, collect data from users, sell the data to the highest bidder.
The less visible step is the commoditization of human social relationships--the process of turning every participant and every interaction into a marketable bit that is interchangeable with millions of other bits.
This is the essence of commoditization: transforming what was once unique and localized into an interchangeable commodity that can be bought and sold globally, with the profits flowing to those who own the distribution and sale of the commoditized items.
In the case of social media, this is user data.
The co-founder of Facebook made a splash recently by saying It’s Time to Break Up Facebook.
I don't think that's a real solution because it doesn't change the commoditization or the marketing of what's been commoditized. The only real solution is to turn all social media into public utilities, that is, remove them from private ownership and make them public utilities that are owned by the public and answerable to the public.
These utilities would not collect any user data. This would de-commoditize social media. The only revenue stream available to the utility would be non-targeted display ads, that is, ads shown to every user, as was the case in the early Internet.
Turning human social relations and networks into commodities that can be marketed for immense private profits is the essence of neoliberalism, and technology has enabled this process to reach pervasively into our lives and inner experience.
Highlights of the Blog This Past Week
Unrealistically Great Expectations 5/9/19
The Great Unraveling Begins: Distraction, Lies, Infighting, Betrayal 5/8/19
What Would It Take to Spark a Rural/Small-Town Revival? 5/7/19
Good Riddance to a "Nothing-Burger" Trade Deal 5/6/19
Best Thing That Happened To Me This Week
My recent interview with Dave of X22 Report went pretty well and has logged over 100,000 listens (at least partial listens--unknown how many stuck it out to the end...)
The World Is About To Change & It's Going To Be Glorious
Musings on the Economy: China and the Rule of Law
My friend Dave P. raised an interesting topic relating to the China Trade Deal that didn't happen.
"If China is going to become a true world leader, they really require the rule of law. Currently their people work very hard, they have fantastic infrastructure, they have the support of their government and they have a fairly perceptive long term policy viewpoint on many key issues – but the one thing they seem to be missing is the rule of law.
Rule of law is required for true competition in the global marketplace. Otherwise, corruption rules, and that inevitably dulls the edge of any national champions. Sure their companies do well inside their protected playpen, but they won’t be able to compete on the world stage."
Here are my thoughts on rule of law and China: Chinese culture has a long history of rules and laws (ultimately tracing back to the Emperor) but everyone serves the interests of the emperor–now the Party, which has neatly replaced the Imperial structure with a party structure along similar lines. Petty crimes are dealt with by a judiciary process that appears similar to western legal systems but once it becomes important–i.e. it reflects on the Party–then there is no real rule of law in China. Hence the 1 million Uighur Muslims in concentration camps–oops, re-education camps….
In other words the 'rule of law' will always be contingent in China rather than an absolute. Hence the impossibility of a trade deal without the US holding unilateral rights to impose tariffs if China backslides/ignores what they agreed to.
On a related topic: China is the only mercantile superpower that pegs its currency to another superpower’s currency. So how "super" is your power if you’re unable to support a free-floating currency and bond market?
From Left Field
Minds Turned to Ash: Is burnout simply the result of working too hard?
Why You Should Start Binge-Reading Right Now
Family in China paid $6.5 million to college admissions fixer for a spot at Stanford, sources say (via Maoxian)
ENDING MERCANTILISM: Find and Fix The Real Problems (via Chad D.)
America vs China ...nothing new here but it's interesting that The New Left Review couldn't come up with something more insightful...
Shifting from Central Planning to a Decentralised Economy (via Chad D.)
How Do People Afford to Live in the Bay Area? We Asked, You Answered -- quiet desperation is getting louder....
More anger, worry and sadness around the world than ever before, study finds
The Origins of European Neoliberalism: The real source of neoliberalism in Europe is neither technocracy nor hegemony but a problem specific to the continent: intergovernmentalism.
US Mainstream Media Worships Superficial 'Diversity,' but Diversity of Thought is Forbidden
Work harder so speculators can get more
The Economy Is Booming, But Young Workers Are Miserable
The Crash In US Economic Fundamentals Is Accelerating
Millennials' health plummets after the age of 27: Study finds the generation has unprecedented rates of diabetes, depression, and digestive disorders
"Not all problems have a technological answer, but when they do, that is the more lasting solution." Andy Grove
Thanks for reading--
charles |
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