You’re a content machine and a slave to the algorithm. No longer do you share online out of artistic inspiration or genuine self-expression. You post for the attention. You post to stay relevant. You post to sell and market and grow. You post for that sweet sweet hit of dopamine, like hitting the lever on the slot machine for your chance at the jackpot (virality). You post because it’s your online business, your portfolio, your only way to showcase your work as a creative. You post because what else is there to do these days but document every breath, every movement, every profound insight that crosses your brain?
You’re both producer and consumer; both product and employee. Welcome to the Internet 2.0 where everyone has their own broadcast, everyone has their own platform to spew whatever opinion they believe is right. Ah, the 90s, the birth of the internet was mired with innocence. In our utopian fantasy, this was supposed to be an independent space free from the influence of corporations and government and advertising. We’ve woken up 30 years later to a dystopian future where our sacred space was infiltrated by the very forces we wanted to keep out, eyes glowing hungrily with dollar signs illuminated by ring lights.
The boundaries between virtual and real no longer exist; your online persona is who you think you really are; you pour all your efforts into maintaining the curated image; you’re merely an aesthetic, a two-dimensional simulacrum of your body and flesh.
“We used to go online to escape the real world and now we go to the real world to escape the online.”1
We swim in an endless stream of content so we never have to feel a thing. Perfectly numb, sedated, in a hypnotic trance. Some might call it the new meditation — doom scrolling for hours with no thoughts crossing your brain at all. You barely even notice the ads anymore which blend into one seamless, frictionless loop. The sun rises and sets and you haven’t lifted your eyes up once to see that big ball of fire that keeps this planet alive. Are we dead? Is this hell? It isn’t as bad as we thought it would be. All pleasure, no pain. The only catch is ignoring the gnawing emptiness inside our hollow tin chests.
We are having a Collective Crisis of Meaning. Existential dread and rotting in bed is how we’ve learned to cope. Depression is normalized, memefied, codified as a byproduct of living in the 21st century. Globalization brought the world together into a vast interconnected network. But there’s no escape button. There’s no logging off. You enter into the vortex and there’s no guarantee of when (or if) you might come out. It’s all pervasive, all encompassing, an invisible force which covers the planet reminding you constantly of its existence. Our physical survival might be taken care of but our spirit is dying.
They (these platforms) want your attention but you would gladly give it. Feed me, entertain me, inform me, tell me what I want, tell me who I should be. You’re at a banquet stuffing your face until you’re sick. But resisting temptation is like sitting outside of an amusement park with unlocked gates. All the cool kids are inside and they’re having a good time. Why can’t you? They haven’t left in days, weeks, months — likely, years — but infinite fun sounds more appetizing than dealing with the grim nature of reality right now. The world is falling to shit; you’re not delusional. But let’s not think about it too hard or we might fall deeper into despair. Oh look! More content!
The internet was never always like this; social media didn’t used to be like this. There were boundaries, limitations, an ability to step away from the device when you caught up with your chronological feed. Not every bitch and their dog was an influencer (sorry, content creator) trying to sell you merch or courses. There was a naïveté, an innocence, a blissful ignorance. You posted pictures of coffee or the sunset or your back faced towards the camera as you were walking along the pier. You had two likes and you didn’t care. Social media wasn’t your job or side hustle. It was a frivolous afterthought, a brief interlude, before returning to the world of atoms and matter.
This is the Age of Abundance. We stupidly assumed more is always more, that access to more choice is inherently good. Yet, here we are drowning under the seas of entertainment and content content content. It takes you an hour to choose a movie to watch on Netflix. Your inbox is flooded with Substack subscriptions you no longer read. You open Instagram and immediately groan at the annoucement of another podcast launch. You wonder if you should just give up and stare at the wall and contemplate the state of your existence. What is the point of it all? Is this really all there is? Is my sole purpose in life to make and consume content? Am I nothing more than a sack of bones with a brain to be stimulated?
We live in an economy of Surveillance Capitalism whose currency is your data and attention. It’s not our fault. It might not even be the tech giant’s fault. They didn’t know what they were doing; they didn’t know what they were creating, to what extent it would permanently alter the nature of human civilization with no ability to press rewind. These platforms started off as an extension of communication. Now, they’re an extension of Self, a second skin we wear permanently in disparate social contexts. (Don’t forget your employer is watching you and will fire you for your pro-Palestine tweets.)
We forget that the over-saturation of content wasn’t a “problem” until recently2. The initial honeymoon phase finally passed and now we’re settling into communal exhaustion. What was once entertaining now feels draining. You let out an exhaustible sigh as you line up for the rollercoaster for the gazillionth time. Like any addiction, it didn’t start out that way. It began harmless enough, the occasional chocolate-chip cookie for desert. But one day you wake up and realize you’re eating the entire box — everyday — and too much of anything eventually turns toxic.
It used to be the freaks and geeks who turned to the internet. Now, the New Black are those who refuse to engage, who live a life of anonymity in the offline, real world (wtf). When you meet someone who doesn’t have social media — you stare at them like they’re alien. After the initial shock wears off, you then congratulate them as if it’s some huge accomplishment; you’re jealous they eventually came clean. Maybe you could also live a life off the grid? No, it’s too late for you. You’re too deep in the waters to ever pull yourself out. Best allow the tides to take you out to sea with everyone else3.
Congratulations to those who made it this far. Congratulations to the 0.5% of you who have attention spans longer than 15 seconds. Congratulations to those who remember these words by tomorrow or next week. When everyone is fighting for you attention — when you are fighting for everyone else’s attention — take a step back. Pause. Go outside. Plant your feet on the earth. You are not a content machine but a human with blood and feelings. Remember your physical senses. Remember your ability to touch, taste, and smell. Close your eyes for a while. Be in the real world.
And if it all gets too much, well, there’s always more content.
The pandemic.
What is the future of social media and “content”? These are the questions I’m interested in.
“There’s no logging off” was absolutely anxiety inducing in the most important way possible. 😅
Communal exhaustion!!!!! Love this very Aries-fiery call out <3