24 December

You’re supposed to wish people a Happy Christmas here I’m sure, because we’re supposed to treat social media *as* our lives in the community, the venue for our social lives. The place we meet, the new public square. I will always refuse to use it in that way. It’s a hijack of our societies, by mostly American tech companies, whose algorithms transform everything from the personal to the professional to the political into endless debates and fights, to generate likes and traffic. If you don’t believe me, tell me how you mostly ‘keep in touch’ with what’s happening in the lives of your friends, colleagues and even family today? And how you keep in touch with the news of the world, or how you shop or get advice? For those who see social media as democracy in action, I share this story. You’ll find it’s a (violent) wrecking ball through everything we have ever called democracy. I live in the firing line of this shit every day at work. Social media is destroying centuries of social progress, and most insidiously because it targets our deepest addictions, so we don’t even notice it’s doing it. Oh and by the way I’m having a lovely Christmas. But I won’t use the Zuck’s platform to help do it. I chuckle when people use my social media posts as evidence of the life I’m living. They’re trapped in the bubble.