Are you on the Internet? Then it’s time you watched The Social Dilemma

Are you on the Internet? Do you have a Social Media account on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter? Then it’s time you watched The Social Dilemma on Netflix

If you are a Netflix subscriber, you may have come across The Social Dilemma, a documentary by Jeff Orlowski that has been much talked about recently. The biggest revelation it makes — though not exactly new if you have been following the Cambridge Analytica scandal or watched The Great Hack — is how well thought out, planned and engineered our addiction to social media is. So if you have been googling ‘best colours for living room walls’ and suddenly start seeing ads for wall paints all over your Facebook newsfeed or similar google ads on websites you visit, it isn’t a cute coincidence but a carefully crafted strategy. Essentially, all the Big Tech companies like Facebook and Google work by manipulating users, their behaviour and their minds.

If you’re not paying for the product, then you are the product

Nowhere is this statement more true than on social media. Yes signing up on FB, Instagram, Gmail, Youtube, Twitter and elsewhere is free, so you may be wondering what’s sneaky about it. The content that appears available for free is actually being paid for by the advertisers (one of the reasons why you can’t do Skip Video on YouTube instantly). They pay Big Tech companies for the attention of users which inevitably leads to us spending money and benefitting the advertisers. The documentary also tells us how algorithms are manipulating our minds.

Sounds scary? Are you ready to hit the deactivate button on Facebook?

We aren’t asking you to. For many of us, Social Media is also a space to connect, bond and work. So the solution isn’t deleting or moving out of Social Media as these platforms have a good side too. The idea is to empower yourself with information and use it in a sensible way. A few suggestions we collated from the documentary:

Question everything you read online

Just because it’s on the internet, doesn’t mean it’s true. FACT CHECK. FACT CHECK. FACT CHECK. You can find more on this here. 

Use Social Media carefully

Every action of ours on Social Media is monitored and helps Big Tech algorithms stay informed about us to serve us content that is guaranteed to keep us engaged. Liking way too many political websites? Follow innumerable cooking videos? Well turns out over following is not always a good thing as it can make our Social Media timeline an echo chamber, leading to a very lopsided view of the world and feeding us the same kind of information us the same thing over and over. Solution? Don’t start hitting the like button on FB and Twitter with a vengeance. Or following everything you spot on Instagram. By doing that, you’re playing into the algorithm’s hands.

Sanitize your feed

Unfriend, unlike and unfollow

When was the last time you looked at everything you like and follow on social media? Or trimmed your friends’ list? Take a good look, declutter and sanitize your feed. Unfollow pages that you do not connect with and friends you don’t interact with. The more the clutter, the more the information. Remember that information we receive across the Internet has increased multiple times but your brain’s capacity to process that information remains the same. Give your brain some space and do some housekeeping!

Stop all social media notifications on your phone 

It is not only irritating, but it is also a clever way of keeping you engaged and addicted. You don’t really need to know the moment someone presses the like button on your latest post about the Dahlias growing on your balcony, do you?

Don’t scroll away

On a similar note, stop the aimless scrolling. In recent times, with the Covid-19 pandemic, there’s a new term for it?-?doom-scrolling, which is scrolling down to see one unpleasant news after the other. We have all done this and we know how mentally exhausting it can be. It is also strangely, something that is very hard to stop!

Avoid suggestions. Find what you want to like and follow on your own

Reclaim your tech space 

Don’t let algorithms decide what you need to see. The next time you watch something on YouTube and then see suggestions of videos you may like, give it a miss. Run your own search or do your own selection. The same goes for pages you like on Instagram or Facebook. Even in the teeniest bit, this gives you more control over your Social Media feed. As the documentary says, in order to gain control of the kind of content we are exposed to, we need to choose it ourselves. And that’s done by avoiding suggestions.

Avoid Social Media on your phone

If you are on multiple social media apps, at least delete some if not all, from your phone. Or if you continue keeping them, avoid checking your phone first thing in the morning or last thing at night and most importantly, stop the notifications.

The Social Dilemma is streaming on Netflix

Want to learn how to use the Internet in a safe and secure way? Join Silver Talkies Presents ‘Easy Tech Classes For Seniors.’ Details of the upcoming class here. For more info on future classes, email us on connect@silvertalkies.com

Featured image courtesy: Pixabay