Social media ‘a menace to society’
Facebook creates ‘bright dings of pseudo-pleasure’ says the man who created the social network’s famous ‘like’ button, Justin Rosenstein
Before the Cambridge Analytica news broke, a string of high-profile tech figures, including several former Facebook executives, warned about the toxicity of social media and its consequences for society. Facebook creates "bright dings of pseudo-pleasure" said the man who created the social network’s famous "like" button, Justin Rosenstein. "Everyone is distracted. All of the time," he said. Former vice-president for growth Chamath Palihapitiya warned: "The short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops we’ve created are destroying how society works. No civil discourse, no co-operation; misinformation, mistruth. And it’s not an American problem – this is not about Russians ads. This is a global problem." He added: "We have created tools that are ripping apart the social fabric of how society works." Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the man who created the World Wide Web, marked his invention’s 29th anniversary a week before with a warning about how the dominant online players have been able "to weap...
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