(January 2, 2018 at 2:12 pm)wallym Wrote: What's interesting about this forum environment, is that there isn't really any practical purpose to want to collect kudos/rep. There isn't a chance to go viral. And with such a small community, it's not like someone is going to become famous in any way because they got 10 kudos on a post, or hit 50 rep. Everybody is a pretty known commodity.
In this specific situation, I think maybe the kudos/rep is a loose reflection of the responses one's posts receives, which is where the echo chamber effect takes place. So a kudos is a substitute for "I agree with Kevin" rather than posting "I agree with Kevin." So it serves as shorthand more than anything? But what it's shorthand for is the stuff about positive feedback.
All I know is that more people should agree with me on things.
But, yeah, there are a few different things going on, even in the context of this thread. The first is the nature of social media. The second is the gamification of it (being tangibly rewarded for expressing certain opinions). The third is the ubiquity of it, and of mobile devices in general.
I don't think that the gamification aspect - kudos, likes, etc. - is the root of the problem. It's really just an add-on to an existing thing. Social media, itself, however, is rife with problems. In a weird way, it highlights the pitfalls of the so-called free marketplace of ideas. Turns out most people are some combination of gullible, ignorant, and/or lazy, and it's really easy to shape opinions with targeted misinformation campaigns that latch onto binary thinking, cultural/religious/race/gender/political bias, and snarky quips.
The echo chamber effect is magnified because it's really easy to simply escape into these digital safe spaces (irony intended) where one's opinions are simply defended and reinforced by the herd a person feels comfortable in. We see it on a smaller, more focused scale with all those religious forums that ban atheists for simply being, but it definitely happens on a larger, more personal scale when the user has the power to curate what they see and who they interact with. We're at the point where we can effectively silence the dissent in our personal lives with the click of a button. And that, I think, is what's at the root of our social dysfunction. We're no longer forced to get along with each other during the course of our lives.
And that's not getting into the aspects of harassment, doxxing, abuse, etc.
All I know is that it's really easy to tell people to get off their devices and experience the real world once in a while, but that kind of demand isn't really helpful. There's a reason why we escape into our little corners, and until the real world can be a better alternative, there's no impetus for change.
