the tools of sophisticated communication

[yakfak]

has anyone mastered social media at all? it has driven me fully mental. I look at what I do with twitter (post bitter jokes about myself, post links to music, post cringe, RT people who post bitter jokes about themselves, accidentally alienate the few people who wanted to talk to me) then I look at what even worse users than me do with it (post the cry-laughing emoticon) then I look at what celebs do with it (have an intermediary post platitudinal good-stuff for engagement OR post about "cultural marxism" lol) then I look at what genuinely excellent users do with it (good jokes and critique, terse pointed posts, threads which are genuinely interesting or useful without huge amounts of self-aggrandization, generally transforming twitter into an arguably worthwhile medium for monologue) then I look at what the average users do with it (natter like yr neighbours, repeat tailored political or culturally critical opinions that came from the pen of the paid disaffected two years prior) then I look at what harmful actors in your life can do with it (scrape all yr data, stalk your every move and update their prey.txt, send you brain damage in the form of tailored contentious or advertisey content or try to debate you, ban the good accounts for criticising the bad accounts, warn the bad accounts not to post death threats at the good accounts, bury the only decent political candidate you've ever cared about in thirty years etc) and I wonder how many of us should even have access to twitter at all. I know I shouldn't.

 

if you've ever followed me on twitter and felt assaulted by the junk I post I apologize

[Gokuma]

I got some tools of sophisticated communication...   MY FISTS!!

[Deleted_Account]

For a moment I thought this was a GoatLord thread, as it turns out, that it not the case. Am disappoint.

[taufan99]

5 hours ago, yakfak said:

post the cry-laughing emoticon

Something's wrong here. You forgot the blushing face and pensive emojis.

 

In all seriousness though, I also have yet to reach a "sophisticated communication" status on just about any social media I am using/have used. I can't suggest much, other than that you need to try finding out people of certain, um, potential. Most of my Twitter account is spent on Japanese 2D idol stuff (following actual Japanese people), while also looking for certain good people who post worthy stuff, while keeping their communication normal (eg. not jingoistic slangs like "based, SJW", and "post-modernistic" state of fandoms like "stan, cancel", etc.). Categorically, most non-Japanese accounts I follow are; a.) Indonesian progressives/centrists (much better than the Western ones IMO), b.) indie video game devs, and c.) cultural and linguistic accounts. It's hard at a first glance, but if you dig deeper, you can find some worthy social media people/organizations/accounts.

[Senor500]

I recently deleted both my Facebook and Twitter accounts and honestly I feel better than when I used them. There is indeed people worth following, but in the sea of bullshit, loss of time and stupid algorithms that don't actually seem to care about what I actually give likes to, I find it easier to just check those few people's profiles from time to time to keep up without using an account.

It's interesting because they are cleverly designed so even when I grew tired of what I was seeing or reading I still wanted to keep the app on, I'm also that one guy that keeps most of his things private and only a select few or nobody can look in, because I'm really scared of someone digging up stuff because I said something they didn't like once (Mostly just the cringy stuff that I used to say when I was way younger).

[Hellbent]

My problem with social media is I'm the type of person who likes having a few close friends. Social media isn't tailored as such. You post something, all sorts of people see it: some people you're close with, some people you hardly know. I don't know what kind of sensibilities or humor all those different people have. So I mostly don't post much. There's too much performance about the whole thing. I text individual people when I have something I want to share.  

[seed]

1 hour ago, Hellbent said:

My problem with social media is I'm the type of person who likes having a few close friends. Social media isn't tailored as such. You post something, all sorts of people see it: some people you're close with, some people you hardly know. I don't know what kind of sensibilities or humor all those different people have. So I mostly don't post much. There's too much performance about the whole thing. I text individual people when I have something I want to share.  

 

This right here. Contrary to popular belief (aka my spam on DW), my life is NOT an open book, and I do not share my most intimate things, since there is no such thing as privacy on these platforms. I'm also not the kind of person who opens himself to everyone I meet, or wants to form bonds of any kind with them. No thanks, I'd rather keep my circle as small as possible, with rare but useful people I can trust, count on, exchange ideas, and learn more from.

 

Honestly social media has some advantages (what isn't there nowadays, for instance?), but the amount of BS you have to swim through and the crappy algorithms that rarely ever give you what you want, plus censorship just isn't worth it. Your life must be odd in more ways than one if you share everything with randoms and you see nothing wrong with it anyway - "I have nothing to hide" is an idiotic excuse.

 

I would have gladly nuked these accounts long ago, but unfortunately I need them for one reason or another... I wish I never had one. I'm better off looking for websites dealing with the topics I'm interested in.

 

1 hour ago, Senor500 said:

I'm also that one guy that keeps most of his things private and only a select few or nobody can look in, because I'm really scared of someone digging up stuff because I said something they didn't like once

 

Oh yeah, also this.

[Senor500]

50 minutes ago, seed said:

"I have nothing to hide" is an idiotic excuse.

Whenever I hear that as an excuse I just know the conversation won't go anywhere.

I really don't understand how people can care so little about their privacy that they're willing to give all of it to a company that doesn't even benefit them at all, it also is never that clear how much they have on you.

I wonder if Facebook's onion link truly doesn't keep logs or if it's just all talk to get the most out of everyone.

[Nine Inch Heels]

Sophisticated communication does not take place on twitter, or facebook for that matter. There is a plethora of articles about social media, what it's used for, what it sucks at, and how it negatively affects people when they constantly get exposed to "highlight reels" of somebody else's life, or how people develop the disturbing habit of checking their social media every 10 - 15 minutes compulsively due to being afraid of missing something of importance. These platforms do not serve the purpose of communication. For the users they serve the purpose of self-portrayal and self-advertisement... That, and building echo-chambers, of course. For the people running them, they serve the purpose of making money off you in some way shape or form.

 

That being said, social media platforms can be used for the purpose of staying in touch with people you do actually care about, which is especially important during these trying times we're faced with, but as it stands, social media is not commonly used for that. Most of it is "here's what I cooked", "here's what I read", "here's what I played", "this is the place I travelled to", "memes", etc...

 

In other words, if you're looking for sophisticated communication, turn around and look elsewhere, or, if you really need these platforms to get in touch with anybody at all, make sure that the communication transitions from posting on the internet to actual face to face conversation and actual human interaction. That way you might just be able to extract some manner of value from these digital sink holes.

[Teabλg_Johnson]

don't talk about something that you never studied but have only observed. social intelligence (street smarts) are a vast topic in psychology and it depends on so many factors it's not even worth mentioning, let alone in a shit piss forum like this

[Nine Inch Heels]

41 minutes ago, Teabλg_Johnson said:

don't talk about something I arbitrarily decided you don't know enough about, especially not on this very forum that I don't like at all.

Why were you here again?

[Teabλg_Johnson]

1 hour ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

Why were you here again?

same reason why you're here

[seed]

10 hours ago, Senor500 said:

Whenever I hear that as an excuse I just know the conversation won't go anywhere.

I really don't understand how people can care so little about their privacy that they're willing to give all of it to a company that doesn't even benefit them at all, it also is never that clear how much they have on you.

 

Yeah, precisely, every time I hear that excuse I end the conversation then and there, there's nothing to explain to someone who cares so little about their personal life. I've almost learned that the hard way myself honestly, and I'd rather not repeat it... They will only learn when their own info is used against them.

 

NIH beautifully summed up social media in a nutshell honestly:

 

10 hours ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

Sophisticated communication does not take place on twitter, or facebook for that matter. There is a plethora of articles about social media, what it's used for, what it sucks at, and how it negatively affects people when they constantly get exposed to "highlight reels" of somebody else's life, or how people develop the disturbing habit of checking their social media every 10 - 15 minutes compulsively due to being afraid of missing something of importance. These platforms do not serve the purpose of communication. For the users they serve the purpose of self-portrayal and self-advertisement... That, and building echo-chambers, of course. For the people running them, they serve the purpose of making money off you in some way shape or form.

 

That being said, social media platforms can be used for the purpose of staying in touch with people you do actually care about, which is especially important during these trying times we're faced with, but as it stands, social media is not commonly used for that. Most of it is "here's what I cooked", "here's what I read", "here's what I played", "this is the place I travelled to", "memes", etc...

 

In other words, if you're looking for sophisticated communication, turn around and look elsewhere, or, if you really need these platforms to get in touch with anybody at all, make sure that the communication transitions from posting on the internet to actual face to face conversation and actual human interaction. That way you might just be able to extract some manner of value from these digital sink holes.

 

[yakfak]

yeah I don't think you can dismiss social media as a new form of communication just because some people use it as a photo album. it's missing the point that it's a new discourse n stuff. i definitely don't claim to be good at it but it's not useless

[seed]

1 hour ago, yakfak said:

yeah I don't think you can dismiss social media as a new form of communication just because some people use it as a photo album. it's missing the point that it's a new discourse n stuff. i definitely don't claim to be good at it but it's not useless

 

It depends on your needs more than anything I guess.

 

I can only speak for myself, but for me it's definitely cca. 95% useless. If it wasn't for a number of pages, lots of bands, record labels, publishers, and so on, I would have nuked it long ago - as much as I HATE admitting it, it does make following stuff a bit easier than following everything individually, although I've been contemplating doing just that recently, and I think I ultimately will, I heavily disapprove of enslaving one's self to things such as these in general - , so I'd say it gets both a complete pass, aaaaand not really. But, the point still stands, if I wouldn't have made accounts many years ago, I would absolutely not use it nowadays. At all. I already deleted most of them.

 

And if I want to communicate with someone else there's phone/video calls, Discord/Skype, etc. that I still use, so I don't use it for the purpose of communicating with others/staying in touch with them either.

[Fonze]

Twitter is a shit hole that only encourages overt plagiarism and discourages sharing sources. Sophisticated communication doesn't have a character limit and echo chambers don't advance our understanding of the world.

[Boaby Kenobi]

The creators of things like Facebook and Twitter don't allow their own children to use those platforms. What does that tell you about social media?

 

Spoiler

 

 

Spoiler

 

 

[DesecratorJ]

In my case, i've never used Twitter, Instagram or shit like that. The only social media i've been a part of was Facebook since like 2014. I used to be quite active for the first two years of my account's creation until I realized how shitty it is. I've since removed all my pictures and stuff like that from my account and doesn't post anything any more. The only purpose I found over the years was to keep in touch with a few people or getting information/updates from things you like, which I still obviously do. I'm not a social person at all when it comes to real life and my circle of friends is very limited. However, I'm much more capable of interacting with people online for some reason, especially if interest is shared. Otherwise, I really don't seek attention on social media in order to make random "friends".

 

This is probably the main reason I am on Doomworld, because I know that everyone has an interest in common and there's easy talking with relatable people. I actually end up finding most people great out there so I like to interact in that case.

[seed]

4 minutes ago, DesecratorJ said:

I'm not a social person at all when it comes to real life and my circle of friends is very limited. However, I'm much more capable of interacting with people online for some reason, especially if interest is shared. Otherwise, I really don't seek attention on social media in order to make random "friends".

 

This is probably the main reason I am on Doomworld, because I know that everyone has an interest in common and there's easy talking with relatable people. I actually end up finding most people great out there so I like to interact in that case.

 

We've got that in common buddy 👍.

 

I think the reason behind this is the fact that real life tends to limit ourselves in terms of the kind of people we interact with, and we discover that many people we run into don't really share much common ground with us, depending on what we'd like to see from them. I have mentioned in a previous post what I am looking for myself.

 

The internet has made connecting with people who do share common ground with us much easier, and we discover new stuff in the process as well if they're open to give/receive - or bash others because they don't know enough rather than making a change for better cause y'know, that's easier to do... - , without having to limit ourselves to just one aspect. Of course there's the usual assholes like I meantioned above but hey, something good comes with something bad :p.

[ReaperAA]

29 minutes ago, DesecratorJ said:

In my case, i've never used Twitter, Instagram or shit like that. The only social media i've been a part of was Facebook since like 2014. I used to be quite active for the first two years of my account's creation until I realized how shitty it is. I've since removed all my pictures and stuff like that from my account and doesn't post anything any more. The only purpose I found over the years was to keep in touch with a few people or getting information/updates from things you like, which I still obviously do. I'm not a social person at all when it comes to real life and my circle of friends is very limited. However, I'm much more capable of interacting with people online for some reason, especially if interest is shared. Otherwise, I really don't seek attention on social media in order to make random "friends".

 

This is probably the main reason I am on Doomworld, because I know that everyone has an interest in common and there's easy talking with relatable people. I actually end up finding most people great out there so I like to interact in that case.

 

9 minutes ago, seed said:

We've got that in common buddy 👍.

 

Count me in as well :D

 

I too am one of those who doesn't interact much with anyone unless there is some common ground. Which is why I visit Doomworld on a daily basis (expect for a couple of weeks now where I have been busy with RL stuff) whereas I rarely ever visit facebook. It has been probably 2-ish years now since I posted anything on my FB account and mostly the account just lays dormant.

[stphrz]

Sophisticated communication?

 

I would settle for honest and civil communication even if it was completely banal.

 

Or in the case of this forum, nerdy wit about a 26 year old computer game where you run around shooting hellspawn.

 

If that sounds like a putdown, I assure you It's not. It's high praise. I come here every day to remind myself that I don't have to despair the human race.

 

 

[Mr. Freeze]

Is Reddit considered social media? I use it daily, but the numbers of subreddits I visit have decreased over the last year or two. The Doom subreddit in particular is a trashfire.

[Dark Pulse]

I've found that an extended middle finger is a very effective communicator.

[Nine Inch Heels]

On 4/28/2020 at 6:08 AM, yakfak said:

yeah I don't think you can dismiss social media as a new form of communication just because some people use it as a photo album. it's missing the point that it's a new discourse n stuff. i definitely don't claim to be good at it but it's not useless

Well, it sure is a new "way" of communicating with people, but that doesn't make communication sophisticated in any way shape or form. As Fonze already pointed out, twitter's character limit is anything but suitable for sophisticated communication. Quite the opposite is the case, really.

 

Facebook does allow you to write more extensive comments than twitter, but facebook isn't a place where these opportunities are being used particularly often. Hell, any decent forum that exists allows you to write posts with thousands of characters, includes at least rudimentary formatting options, as well as the ability to embed links and share pictures. And now take a look at all the forums you're registered to, and you'll quickly notice that even outside the "social media bubble" most people will join whichever sort of discourse you want to encourage with just a few lines of text. To be fair, sometimes a few lines are all takes to get an idea across, or express your position with regards to whatever is up for discussion. But only sometimes.

 

In many cases a few lines don't do it, especially not when it comes to more complex subjects. Dropping a witty one-liner for the LULZ serves to express merely that the person posting it doesn't really have an interest in discussing the subject at hand, and that's already it. It doesn't really matter how sophisticated the tools are when nobody has an interest in using them in certain ways and for certain purposes, which is true especially in the "sphere" of social media, where the vast majority of people aren't interested in discussing anything thoroughly, but instead show up to wave their flag, and get a pat on the back for waving the "correct" kind of flag, or at least waving whatever flag it might be in a somewhat funny manner, and also getting a pat on the back for that - Bonus points if you pull off both at the same time. And, to be fair, we're all "guilty" of that to varying degrees, but this merely serves to underline the point that sophisticated communication on the internet does not take place in most cases. It's not like there's anything wrong in demonstrating that one doesn't really want to participate in a lengthy discussion, mind, the problem is, though, that this is true for most people. People read stuff on the internet primarily to entertain themselves. Discussing any given subject at length, never mind changing one's opinion about something, is not what people are looking for after a hard day of work. Thinking is "hard" when your brain has been fried for however many hours you've been doing your job, so I can't really begrudge people who don't want to fry it yet another time on the very same day.

 

There's also another problem with these supposedly sophisticated tools... People will act and react differently when writing or reading anything from the comfort of their office chair, or couch, for that matter. Not only is it much more difficult to make sure that whatever you're discussing comes across the way you would it like it to be "heard", it is also much easier to just evade or ruin discussions by throwing a few harsh words around. In fact, people are much more willing to take the easy way out and ruin a discussion on the internet than they are IRL, because there are close to no consequences involved. And you might be asking yourself "why ruin a discussion when you can just tune out instead?", and the answer is "I don't know, but people do it, because for some reason it makes them feel better about themselves, especially when the discussion isn't going their way, so ruining it for all the others seems like a small victory". This why people build themselves echo-chambers, or it's one of the reasons, anyway. Why go through the frustration of having to explain yourself to somebody who has already decided less than a minute into the conversation that you're wrong, and is just waiting for another reason to write you off entirely? Alternatively, you might as well surround yourself with like minded people, where being "understood" happens naturally, and without all the adversity that might be involved otherwise.

 

All that aside, communicating via "text only" removes key components from the equation: Tone of the voice, and body language. Text is much more open to interpretation because these components are missing entirely, and "emojis" don't help much either, because those are also open to various degrees of interpretation.... Unless of course you're discussing anything with people who are familiar with you in some capacity. But that brings us right back to echo-chambers again, and why they're basically a natural consequence of how much communication on the internet sucks, coupled with the issue that people don't want their ideas and ideals questioned or - even worse - challenged, because that's just too uncomfortable; Doubly so when you're part of an environment that allows you to get a pat on the back "on demand" instead, which is nice and all.

 

All that being said, people who are actually interested in having discussions on the internet do exist, but they're few and far between. It doesn't matter a great deal how good you are at using "modern forms of communication", because no matter how good you are, those very people, who are interested in discussions, don't magically increase in numbers. You just stumble upon them eventually, and the only way to make sure you encounter these kinds of people is to keep at it, against all odds.


/ramble

Edited April 29, 2020 by Nine Inch Heels

[seed]

4 hours ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

This why people build themselves echo-chambers, or it's one of the reasons, anyway. Why go through the frustration of having to explain yourself to somebody who has already decided less than a minute into the conversation that you're wrong, and is just waiting for another reason to write you off entirely? Alternatively, you might as well surround yourself with like minded people, where being "understood" happens naturally, and without all the adversity that would might be involved otherwise.

 

Essentially, it boils down to explaining yourself of certain things to someone who actually wants to listen, which sadly seems to be increasingly rare these days. Everyone just wants to be "right" and the others to be "wrong", we want to talk all the time but we no longer want to listen because we're probably not as smart as we think we are, and we probably don't know everything as we'd like to pretend or want our illusions shattered. Then there's also the issue of those who'd much rather bash you because that's more "fun" to do, or cognitive dissonance hits them a little too hard when they find out others don't think the same way they do and they're faced with contradictory information - gods forbid, they might actually become individuals themselves one day if they start questioning things rather than accepting or taking other's takes for granted. But until then, I guess the "I don't like what you're saying so I'm just going to casually shit on you for this. I'm right, therefore you're wrong. Full stop" approach is much easier.

 

This could also be why it is desirable to "connect" (no pun intended, heh) with someone else who "thinks like us" regarding certain aspects sometimes, since that common ground helps with forming a foundation and later expanding upon it, but then another problem surfaces, or more: They might turn into your "yes man/ma'am", and as a consequence, you also forsake the benefit of the opposing view. Uniformity doesn't help advance one's understanding of things in general.

[yakfak]

a large part of accepted, sensible, adult hack communication is circumlocution. (bits of accumulated performance speech you can wrap around your actual point to sound like you've written books and give everyone else a chance to sip champagne.) Twitter having a word limit doesn't get in the way of you making a point but actually encourages you to skip the posturing; you can just write the thing you want to say. conversation isn't the whole of communication; there's value in primarily just sending info.

 

a lot of people say "twitter is an echo chamber" kinda things but it doesn't jive with the way people complain about their opinions being tersely skewered so often. twitter is SAVED by the people who specialize in destroying terrible, exploitative posts with a single sentence because that instinct is dulled by other forms of media, and the world is full of suspicious information and rumour. not everyone deserves a million words from you and "fuck you" is both more honest and less keystrokes than "let's agree to disagree".

 

(ps I'm talking about the exchange of new ideas. i don't think that people should be doing sick dunks on each other when they're discussing preference in music, or whatever.)

[seed]

1 hour ago, yakfak said:

not everyone deserves a million words from you and "fuck you" is both more honest and less keystrokes than "let's agree to disagree".

 

I would definitely agree on the part of "not worth bothering" because yes, I don't consider assholes and trolls for instance worth my time or attention - fight the battles that are worth fighting.

 

But speaking of "fuck you" and similar reactions, that's definitely not an argument, and resorting to insults, name-calling, sarcasm, strawmaning, and so on instead of providing counter-arguments is usually an indication that the person in question is incapable of formulating an articulate response to deconstruct what was said, especially if that's how most of their responses look like. It doesn't have to be the most elaborate "reply" ever, but it needs to be more complex, otherwise it just looks like intellectual laziness.