The social internet is a reflection of both the best and the worst of us

Social media platforms are built on one objective: to maximize engagement – to keep us scrolling, watching, and clicking. The algorithms that curate our feeds don’t care about truth or nuance. They care about predictability.

Our actions are data. If we pause on a post about a topic we care about, hit “like”, or watch a video to the end, the social internet platforms record a strong, positive signal.

The machinery of the internet – originally built to help us consume unimaginable quantities of information – takes note of our likes, dislikes, and prejudices – to deliver more of what we might be interested in, and less of what might challenge us. It wants to do the right thing by us. And there’s the rub – if we are not challenged we never grow.

I think it’s important to realise the machinery of the social internet isn’t necessarily evil, or misguided. The algorithms delivering content to us aren’t trying to manipulate maliciously – they are simply optimising a blizzard of information by leveraging the most straightforward part of our cognition – our desire to be right.

Accepting that the information we are exposed to is a mirror of our own likes and prejudices, and not a holistic window onto the wider world has been perhaps the single most important thing I have learned in recent years. We don’t have to play by the rules of the machinery though.

I have deliberately started following a number of writers and publications whose perspectives are fundamentally different than my own. I don’t engage with them, but I do try to take on board their views.

I no longer rely on social media for any form of critical, or factual information. When I want to read news, or find out about a pressing subject, I try to use published news sources with a variety of political and cultural biases.

Make no mistake – it’s difficult. It’s difficult to ignore your own impulses – to take a step back – to view the world through other people’s eyes – to appreciate their point of view.

What am I trying to say?

Perhaps that confirmation bias is a weakness of the human condition that we can’t erase – and the algorithmic timelines of the social internet are a dangerous amplifier.