Facebook and instagram: less and less posts by real people.
Reddit and other discussion sites: Controlled by "basement dwellers"(i.e. doomers w/ too much free time), trolls and, soon, AI bots. Dominated by groupthink and devoid of friendly discussion.
I think the only exception is my local community page on Facebook. People do seem to be civil(real names and close physical proximity help) and it's all real content.
Fundamental problem with moderation sites like reddit and HN: discussion is controlled by those with the time to moderate. These are also the least likely people you want controlling the discussion.
If only there was a reputation based site where, idk, people with more accomplishments got more weight...
Twitter is, in a way, like that. I can follow, say, John Carmack, and get things he says or has reposted and ignore content from people I don't care about. I think that's why I still find myself there. It's a high signal-to-noise site where I can still participate(and actually have discussions with high achievers and ignore basement dwellers. Vs say reddit where I'm constantly dragged down into debates with the basement dwellers).
> If only there was a reputation based site where, idk, people with more accomplishments got more weight...
Very good point. I personally find Reddit or HN fairer since it doesn’t depend so much on reputation (actually: popularity). But you are right there is a benefit to weighing certain people more. I sometimes wonder whether people like Dijkstra or Feynman would have bubbled up on Twitter too. I guess so. Both were pretty outspoken so the algorithm would pick up on that like people would pick up on Feyman lectures or Dijkstra letters. They had some virality about them.
> Reddit and other discussion sites: Controlled by "basement dwellers"(i.e. doomers w/ too much free time), trolls and, soon, AI bots. Dominated by groupthink and devoid of friendly discussion.
I sometimes have the feeling that most HN commenters are also unemployed or in academia and most non-commenting readers are employed.