I do have some Gen X friends who I think are not doing much better.
I wonder it being a “digital native” gives some level of defense against this kind of stuff versus people who were born when information was newspapers, radio, and the TV news one hour out of the day.
Digital natives know to be more skeptical. These people lack basic literacy and don’t understand that people can lie on the internet. In fact, it’s mostly lies, always has been.
Agreed. They also in many cases remember when the Internet “was good.” When every single website, tool, or product wasn’t tracking every microinteraction, when your email spam was Re: Re: Re: Re: forwards, when social media was a microcosm of what it is today , and when bots didn’t make up like more than half the user traffic. So the shit purpose built to engage kids and boomers falls flat.
And to your point about lying on the Internet, they forget (or flatly refuse to acknowledge) that like a corporation or government can and have easily create user accounts that look like normal people to convince people of things. Just because the name “John Goodbrown” sounds like a down to earth American and his picture is of him and his truck and cowboy boots doesn’t mean it’s not one of thousands of bot accounts created specifically by the FSB to cause chaos and stir opinion.
GenX here - certainly in my friendship circle we’re doing better because we grew through both the start of home computing and the beginning of the home internet etc… we remember what it was like before the social media and 10 second videos crap and are generally using the current tech without it
I’m gen x, and I’m about as close to a digital native as possible, been around computers since 1981 and ever since.
My advantage in this allows me to have conversations online and with actual digital natives, so I think you’re right that being around the tech and using it yields a cultural advantage.
Most people my age (over 50) are hopelessly just sucked into any little app or service with zero thought about repercussions. And they are now the absolute worst to deal with because they have a strong sense of entitlement on top of the ignorance. It’s embarrassing.
Yeah, have family who 80% of their retired day is sitting in the lazy boy with an iPad locked on Facebook in one hand and cable news on the tv. We’re in Canada, but it’s a lot of CNN.
And it’s not just my family, lot of friends have the same.
It’s a Skinner box. We need to ban these companies, but the government doesn’t have the spine to ban the obvious foreign interference.
Part of the problem here is that too many people live to work, instead of the other way around. Once they retire, they have no idea what to do with themselves and take the least-effort path to occupy their time. Which makes them perfect targets for the addictive aspects of social media.
Maybe what we need to do is flood Facebook and Instagram and all the rest with material about the rewards of volunteering for charity.
(Sometimes I’m almost thankful my mother is a technophobe.)
The problem is that their only connection to the world is electronic. The generation before would go to bridge clubs and the VA. They just talk to some Russian disinformation bot on facebook and it takes the place of socializing.
I’m 50, and on my computer an awful lot. I use Reddit/Lemmy/X/Mastodon but that is about it social media wise. No Facebook/Insta/Tiktok/etc. I also haven’t had cable/satellite TV in 25+ years, so perhaps not typical for someone my age.
My dad is almost 80 and has zero interest in social media/tv. He’ll watch the occasional YouTube video about something sciencey or about whatever project he’s working on, and might catch a movie on my plex server or a DVD from his small collection once a month or two.
I do see others my age (or his) glued to social media, but from my very limited data set I don’t think it’s some age related brain rot that will get us all.
My brother uses a cellphone at the dinner table at family gatherings and he even plays a video while the rest of us are talking.
My friend was using his cellphone during a poker game with the phone stand up so he can scroll while we’re playing. He also just throws iPads to his kids this entire weekend at cottage.
I’m gonna copy Seinfeld (especially with his pro-IDF shit but anyways …) about cellphones about rudeness but do we even know what rudeness is any more? it’s like I’m gonna hold this device to your face and then I’m going to compare what’s more interesting to me …
Yeah, I am a millennial, 39 this year, and my dad is far more addicted to his computer than I am, I even work in IT.
He used to sell railroad safety systems (and was a brilliant sales person who actually knew and still knows the technical details of the system)
You and me are pretty similar ages.
I do have some Gen X friends who I think are not doing much better.
I wonder it being a “digital native” gives some level of defense against this kind of stuff versus people who were born when information was newspapers, radio, and the TV news one hour out of the day.
Digital natives know to be more skeptical. These people lack basic literacy and don’t understand that people can lie on the internet. In fact, it’s mostly lies, always has been.
Agreed. They also in many cases remember when the Internet “was good.” When every single website, tool, or product wasn’t tracking every microinteraction, when your email spam was Re: Re: Re: Re: forwards, when social media was a microcosm of what it is today , and when bots didn’t make up like more than half the user traffic. So the shit purpose built to engage kids and boomers falls flat.
And to your point about lying on the Internet, they forget (or flatly refuse to acknowledge) that like a corporation or government can and have easily create user accounts that look like normal people to convince people of things. Just because the name “John Goodbrown” sounds like a down to earth American and his picture is of him and his truck and cowboy boots doesn’t mean it’s not one of thousands of bot accounts created specifically by the FSB to cause chaos and stir opinion.
GenX here - certainly in my friendship circle we’re doing better because we grew through both the start of home computing and the beginning of the home internet etc… we remember what it was like before the social media and 10 second videos crap and are generally using the current tech without it
I’m gen x, and I’m about as close to a digital native as possible, been around computers since 1981 and ever since.
My advantage in this allows me to have conversations online and with actual digital natives, so I think you’re right that being around the tech and using it yields a cultural advantage.
Most people my age (over 50) are hopelessly just sucked into any little app or service with zero thought about repercussions. And they are now the absolute worst to deal with because they have a strong sense of entitlement on top of the ignorance. It’s embarrassing.
Yeah, have family who 80% of their retired day is sitting in the lazy boy with an iPad locked on Facebook in one hand and cable news on the tv. We’re in Canada, but it’s a lot of CNN.
And it’s not just my family, lot of friends have the same.
It’s a Skinner box. We need to ban these companies, but the government doesn’t have the spine to ban the obvious foreign interference.
Part of the problem here is that too many people live to work, instead of the other way around. Once they retire, they have no idea what to do with themselves and take the least-effort path to occupy their time. Which makes them perfect targets for the addictive aspects of social media.
Maybe what we need to do is flood Facebook and Instagram and all the rest with material about the rewards of volunteering for charity.
(Sometimes I’m almost thankful my mother is a technophobe.)
The problem is that their only connection to the world is electronic. The generation before would go to bridge clubs and the VA. They just talk to some Russian disinformation bot on facebook and it takes the place of socializing.
I hope it’s not an aging issue that comes for us all. Digital native or not.
I’m 50, and on my computer an awful lot. I use Reddit/Lemmy/X/Mastodon but that is about it social media wise. No Facebook/Insta/Tiktok/etc. I also haven’t had cable/satellite TV in 25+ years, so perhaps not typical for someone my age.
My dad is almost 80 and has zero interest in social media/tv. He’ll watch the occasional YouTube video about something sciencey or about whatever project he’s working on, and might catch a movie on my plex server or a DVD from his small collection once a month or two.
I do see others my age (or his) glued to social media, but from my very limited data set I don’t think it’s some age related brain rot that will get us all.
Headline 40 years from now: “Torment Nexus addiction affecting millenials”
My brother uses a cellphone at the dinner table at family gatherings and he even plays a video while the rest of us are talking.
My friend was using his cellphone during a poker game with the phone stand up so he can scroll while we’re playing. He also just throws iPads to his kids this entire weekend at cottage.
I’m gonna copy Seinfeld (especially with his pro-IDF shit but anyways …) about cellphones about rudeness but do we even know what rudeness is any more? it’s like I’m gonna hold this device to your face and then I’m going to compare what’s more interesting to me …