This week opens a new door in writing for me, a sort of review and discussion on the ideas of a documentary. I felt in the midst of this social media expedition, I should watch Netflix’s The Social Dilemma, the documentary that drove a friend to delete his Facebook immediately after. First, a brief update.
The Brief Update
Admittedly, there isn’t much to update on this week. More time online hasn’t led to some new ascendant thought. I find myself procrastinating more as I spend time scrolling through sites in some gaps.
The biggest problem I’ve seen is how quickly time on social media is lost. What can start as a brief scroll can turn into several minutes looking for the next interesting post.
I did have a bit of an escape this weekend while working on a Game Jam project with some friends. With all my time and attention focused on getting the game wrapped up in a short period of time, I didn’t get my planned 30 minutes per day.
At a Glance
The documentary was produced by Exposure Labs and distributed on Netflix. The production has a number of partners including Mozilla and the Center for Humane Tech. The latter of which had a number of leaders appearing in the film, though I think there was someone from Mozilla as well.
The film went from interviews with various experts, including ex-insiders and activists, to a short film about this family and the members’ experiences with technology.
I found the family narrative often worked pretty well to show a slightly dramatized version of what was being discussed. For example, shortly after discussing how algorithms exist on pretty much all of these sites to learn what they can about you, we are introduced to this set of AI characters.
One scene I got a kick out of is a part where the son is trying to avoid his phone for a week. The AI characters are freaking out trying to get him to open something and come up with a plot to show him updates about an ex-girlfriend. As the son makes his way into the kitchen, it is shot like a horror movie scene. He enters alone into a dark kitchen. The camera looms behind him as suspenseful music begins to rise, but instead of a slasher making a deadly strike, his phone chimes and the screen lights up.
To provide a quick review, I found the film itself to be an enjoyable watch. The camera was often changing enough to keep a feeling of change without being distracting. The editing went largely unnoticed, which while unappreciated, I think shows that it was a great edit. The narrative was engaging enough to keep me interested even when the family took a backseat to a series of interviews, to return later. The points made by the interviews and family narrative worked well together to emphasize the points being made. All in all, I recommend checking it out, especially if you like interview focused documentaries.
Regarding the interviews with the experts, there was a lot to take away. I wrote notes while watching and after typing out my scribbles ended up with three single spaced pages.
Exploring the Ideas
There were more specific points brought up in the film, but looking through my notes, these were some of the main ideas I took away:
The Current Business Model of Many Tech Platforms is Harmful
I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase, “if you don’t pay for the product, you are the product.” The primary way that a lot of websites make money is through advertisements which require your attention to sell.
The documentary outlined the general model of these platforms as engagement, growth, then advertising. By driving the first two points, engagement and growth, ads become a viable way to make money.
There is a lot of concern about the sale of data, but from what the documentary explored, the sale of that information isn’t really the reason it’s collected. Your data is collected so that these platforms can learn more about you.
Because of this, the algorithms that drive what content you see are designed to get clicks and encourage you to share with others.
I do find it interesting, and sadly lacking, that the film pretty heavily critiques recommendation based algorithms on free platforms but not really those on paid platforms such as Netflix. I don’t know if there was interference from Netflix as the distributor or if the concerns of these experts are focused solely on the platforms that offer a free service through data collection and advertising.
The Spread of Disinformation
We’ve all probably grown tired of the term fake news, but the reality is that it is seemingly impossible to know the truth. With the aforementioned algorithms, we’ve become a more polarized society. Algorithms are deciding what to share with whom.
Depending on what data a site has about you, it will recommend different results than someone else. I think this is displayed pretty well on the website TheirTube, which shows the recommendations shown to a variety of groups based on a few source channels.
This doesn’t just apply to YouTube videos, unfortunately. This goes for Tweets, Facebook posts, and even Google search results. Practically all these platforms are built on sharing a specific feed to you directly.
The Future Doesn’t Look Great on Our Current Path
Now for the really scary part. The path we’ve laid for ourselves is not looking great. Not only has disinformation destroyed our shared understanding of reality, the generations growing up in this tech driven society are experiencing more direct harm.
The Center for Humane Technology shares a list of the problems caused by these tech platforms, and those listed under the “The Next Generations” are quite alarming. From increasing stats in self-harm to falling stats in social skills and interactions, things appear to only be getting worse. The page contains sources for all the claims.
At the end of the day, it’s not all doom and gloom. The documentary ends with some tips on how to better engage with technology as it becomes more and more integrated in our lives, including some that I shared last week. I’ve updated the post to include some additional ideas after watching:
- Determine an amount of time you want to spend on devices and set up rules to stick to that number. This also goes for children, ask them what they believe is a reasonable amount of time and work with them on setting up the systems needed to reach that.
- While not so much reducing use, but making a platform’s environment better for you, keep in mind that you always “vote with your click.” If you click on a post, page, or link, some algorithm is going to show you more content like that in hopes of getting more clicks.
The real solution as discussed in the documentary is regulation of tech industries. While the documentary doesn’t go into detail on the policies recommended, the Center for Humane Technology has made a page outlining propositions.
In looking into more information, I learned a lot on the Center for Humane Tech’s website, as well as an additional documentary on the subject of algorithms, facial recognition, and big tech. I also see the filmmakers have two additional documentaries on climate change that are now on my watch list.
I highly recommend checking out the documentary if you have access to Netflix. If the documentary or reading this post has inspired you to delete some of your social media accounts and that’s how you see when I post, feel free to subscribe or just drop by Fridays, as posts are up Thursday nights in the U.S. Central time zone.
Trying Out Before Buying In 