Everyone thinks they’re above it, that they can detect the bots or remain unmoved.
I’d say the bigger problem is that there’s nothing “to be done” at an individualist level. Bot swarms are going to exist and you’re going to be exposed to them either directly (via your social media diet) or indirectly (via traditional news, casual conversation with people who consume social media, and the public policies that inevitably emerge from these trends). Simply “being aware” isn’t a defense. You’re still going to have your priors chipped away by these tidal shifts in public discourse.
Look at the impact the High Protein diet fetish has had on every fucking food retailer. Seems like every product has to include a sticker telling you how many grams of protein is in it. We went through the same diet fad exposure with GMOs and saturated fats and fiber. We got deluged with crime statistics in news, entertainment, and politics at every angle to justify the War on Crime. We’re still eating tons of shit from the anti-vax trends of the Bush Era.
But that won’t stop society from imploding.
Society isn’t ending. It’s always doing this shit. What’s changed is you. When you were young, the baseline felt normal because its all you knew. Now its changing under your feet and you’re struggling to rectify your childhood awareness with an evolved landscape as an adult.
I’d say the bigger problem is that there’s nothing “to be done” at an individualist level. Bot swarms are going to exist and you’re going to be exposed to them either directly (via your social media diet) or indirectly (via traditional news, casual conversation with people who consume social media, and the public policies that inevitably emerge from these trends). Simply “being aware” isn’t a defense. You’re still going to have your priors chipped away by these tidal shifts in public discourse.
Look at the impact the High Protein diet fetish has had on every fucking food retailer. Seems like every product has to include a sticker telling you how many grams of protein is in it. We went through the same diet fad exposure with GMOs and saturated fats and fiber. We got deluged with crime statistics in news, entertainment, and politics at every angle to justify the War on Crime. We’re still eating tons of shit from the anti-vax trends of the Bush Era.
Society isn’t ending. It’s always doing this shit. What’s changed is you. When you were young, the baseline felt normal because its all you knew. Now its changing under your feet and you’re struggling to rectify your childhood awareness with an evolved landscape as an adult.
Yes, good comment. But in the past it at least took some effort. You had to write a book that got popular or something along those lines.
Also, bots aren’t really threatening to undermine democracy, at least in my country, as it was undermined a long time ago.
We’ve further mechanized the process of sales and marketing in an industry that we’ve been at the forefront of since the turn of the 20th century.
Modern anti-AI guys would have been eating up Adbusters 'zines 30 years ago.
Well yeah, adbusters was based