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31 votes
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The life-ruining power of routines: Habits don’t lead to personal optimisation. They lead to suffering.
32 votes -
Notes on conciseness
30 votes -
Booktok and the hotgirlification of reading
19 votes -
Days of darkness: How one woman escaped the conspiracy theory trap that has ensnared millions
32 votes -
Everyone’s a sellout now
33 votes -
Third places, Stanley cup mania, and the epidemic of loneliness
11 votes -
Technology is making people busier during their so called free time
34 votes -
What does it mean to friend someone online?
Recently my daughter (third grade) has started learning to type at school. It's a Montessori program, so it's a pretty low tech environment overall, which I mention because I don't necessarily...
Recently my daughter (third grade) has started learning to type at school. It's a Montessori program, so it's a pretty low tech environment overall, which I mention because I don't necessarily expect them to have a nuanced view of technology issues.
One of the typing programs they use is nitrotype.com, which adds a competitive gameplay element. However, it also has mechanism to friend another player. Friends can only communicate with stock phrases, so there's not too much "Internet leakage" beyond being able to choose a username.
I set it up for my daughter on her Linux Chromebook (I whitelist things I want her to have and everything else is blocked at DNS). Seeing her interact with it the first time, I realized that she spends as much time "adding friends" as doing the typing.
On its face, this activity is pretty harmless. But I am worried about the patterns it might be creating for her. I'm worried about her uncritically engaging with the dopamine hit of getting a new friend. Or how it shapes her idea of how many friends she has or where idea of her self worth comes from. Or what she thinks friends are.
So after that long preamble, here are some questions:
- How would you explain "friends" in this context?
- Would you distinguish them from other kinds of friends, either real or virtual?
- Would you attach a moral component to the activity? E.g. that it is good/bad or helpful/harmful
- How would you frame it to the teacher? Not so much in terms of whether or not they should do it in the classroom, but what kinds of conversations should they be having about the friends experience?
- If I'm asking the wrong questions, what questions should I be asking instead?
I'm really interested in seeing the perspectives people have on this. My own ideas are a bit murky, but I will put them down as a comment.
37 votes -
Inside an OnlyFans empire: Sex, influence and the new American Dream
32 votes -
Jezebel and the question of women’s anger
33 votes -
Incel ideology has entered the mainstream
52 votes -
A handful of influencers are trying to turn the tide on toxic masculinity. But can they get anyone to listen?
36 votes -
Millions of people see staying home and cleaning as their idea of a good time
31 votes -
Queensland neighbours show how Voice to Parliament is splitting Australia
2 votes -
You're not traumatized, you're just hurt
20 votes -
In Alabama, white tide rushes on
10 votes -
It's not just male influencers who preach problematic manipulation
21 votes -
Japan's ridiculous weatherwoman fiasco
57 votes -
How are you actually supposed to network / LinkedIn?
I've been having a particularly rough time finding a new job in the field I graduated in. I'm doing pretty much everything most job sites have told me but networking is kinda hard. I don't...
I've been having a particularly rough time finding a new job in the field I graduated in. I'm doing pretty much everything most job sites have told me but networking is kinda hard.
I don't currently work in my field so I don't know anyone that would be particularly useful. Everyone I know is already aware of my situation and some of them have even found leads for me but no luck yet.
I have gone to events related to organizations I'm interested in and spoken to people there but it feels super weird to just approach people and tell them I'm looking for a job.
Similarly Linkedin is super foreign to me. This post is literally the most I've ever interacted with a social media site. What do I do once I open that app? Am I supposed to just stalk people on there that might hire me someday? I tried joining a "group" but it's been pending for a week now.
59 votes -
Bloodied Macbooks and stacks of cash: Inside the increasingly violent Discord servers where kids flaunt their crimes
8 votes -
The reaction economy
3 votes -
Crushed
7 votes -
How Finland is teaching a generation to spot misinformation
8 votes -
Stop talking to each other and start buying things: Three decades of survival in the desert of social media
17 votes -
Are you sure you’re not guilty of the ‘Millennial pause’?
11 votes -
The personal brand is dead
6 votes -
Former YouTuber Lindsay Ellis says she’s learning to live with the trauma of being ‘canceled’
16 votes -
The cost of engaging with the miserable: Were we always this lonely and embittered?
6 votes -
Monica Lewinsky’s verdict on the Johnny Depp–Amber Heard trial: we are all guilty
14 votes -
We should all know less about each other
12 votes -
Let’s please not make “the slap” more than what it is
17 votes -
Map drawn from memory helps man reunite with family decades after abduction
4 votes -
Walking away from Omelas - Lindsay Ellis says goodbye
33 votes -
Inside the online movement to end work
12 votes -
People are blasting Chanel's $825 Advent calendar on TikTok
6 votes -
The CIA is trying to recruit Gen Z—and doesn’t care if they’re all over social media
7 votes -
Identity fraud: On the rhetorical weaponization of identity
4 votes -
Don’t be surprised about Facebook and teen girls. That’s what Facebook is.
12 votes -
Facebook knows Instagram is toxic for teen girls, company documents show
16 votes -
Can we mock and/or threaten people into changing their beliefs? (And more importantly, should we?)
9 votes -
The last time I got into an internet argument
16 votes -
When people around you are suddenly forced to confront race - Watching white people. The year’s dark comedy of manners.
17 votes -
Nearly a decade after becoming an advice animal, "10 guy" Connor Sinclair reveals his identity and gives full account of his image
10 votes -
The things we do and do not say - Notes on the impossibility of talking online and rise of disinterpretation
19 votes -
My mommies and me
7 votes -
How one woman is sharing Kazakhstan’s national instrument and cultural dress on Instagram
6 votes -
I watched my friend dying on Facebook - but it was all a GoFundMe scam
9 votes -
An investigation into the concept of "lifestyle"
8 votes -
A message to TikTok parents who use my face to make their kids cry
43 votes