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holmesworcestertoday at 8:46 AM2 repliesview on HN

Good luck finding any objective distinction between HN, Reddit, WhatsApp, Signal, or email + listserv and "social media"!

Or finding any one of "social media's harms" that could not, in some world where Facebook, Instagram, and Tiktok did not exist, be delivered in just as socially harmful (and beneficial) a form by sufficiently-accessible versions of the apps and protocols you value and use every day.

I met someone recently whose primary addiction is Wikipedia.

For me, Signal and Hacker News are the most addictive pieces of software I still use.

Serial television (best delivered by WebTorrent and The Pirate Bay) is by far the most addictive, for me, so much so that I had to quit.

And you can definitely run successful social movements and political campaigns (for both very good and very bad things) over HN or WhatsApp/Signal, given sufficient adoption.


Replies

nsowztoday at 9:15 AM

> I met someone recently whose primary addiction is Wikipedia.

I met someone recently whose primary addiction is whisky. Therefore, whisky is social media.

xigoitoday at 9:16 AM

> Good luck finding any objective distinction between HN, Reddit, WhatsApp, Signal, or email + listserv and "social media"!

Hacker News:

• doesn’t have a personalized feed

• encourages intellectual discussion rather than brainrot

• doesn’t support images or videos

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