Review of The Social Dilemma (2020) by Tony1984 — 20 Oct 2020

I’m awarding one point for Jonathan Haidt who is an excellent modern-day anthropologist, especially with regards to children and the negative effects of social media. The rest is mostly manipulative guff. Packaged angst presented by disgruntled former employees, a few academic nobodies, and even a couple of deadlocked purples haired oddballs for good measure. The arguments were mostly false. And they indulged in the same manipulation they ostensibly disagreed with. The idea that money and advertising is the sole defining force is just plain wrong. Social media advertising is far less intrusive than tv’s, or even radio’s, is. The fabled all knowing all seeing algorithm isn't that efficient either for all the scaremongering. How often have you bought something based on a Facebook ad? Yeah me neither. Advertising isn't bad per se. It's in a person's best interest to be aware of good products. The other main argument that social media interaction is addictive and abusive has major weaknesses. So was tv, radio, video games, sports you name it ( even books). And high school girls have been abusive to each other since before the invention of high school. It's far better connecting with others than withdrawing from society. Ideally in person but online can be a good substitute. How much they interact online is up to the person or their parents, not the government.

Number 3 criticism is fake news. They fail to mention the main producers of fake news are MSM and always have been. Social media helps to expose liars. That it used flat earth as its main conspiracy theory is pathetic and the glossing over pizzagate says enough doesn't it?

Its so-called solutions are draconian authoritarianism or stupid. Tax data? Already done. One final point is that the collection of data is presumed to be always malicious. That's a horrendously stupid opinion.

Nail in the coffin was the dramatization scenes that were cringe. Enough said.

The biggest danger internet monopolies pose isn't even addressed which is shameful. That of censorship and de-platforming. Orders of magnitude more dangerous than social media addiction. Netflix has a reasonably good track record with documentaries but it's an insider, not one of us. And it really shows here.