i think privacy, true real privacy, is going to become the next status symbol post-polluted internet.
the first video i saw when i opened youtube was "Tracking Down the Girl on the Deftones' Album 28 Years Later". why are we doing that. why do we want to know so much about one another. (i know why)
i was looking for this video where this dj is talking about what they've termed "digital pollution theory" and connecting it to extractivism and racial capitalism. basically who will have the privilege of having a healthy and safe offline life with fulfilling actual relationships and who will be forced to earn their living through content and outrage farming for a "community" of mostly bots (dead internet theory).
and then, the only substack i actually read, sam kriss' Numb at the Lodge, where he's talking about his 2026 prophecies and being right about all of them:
"Most prophetically of all, I said that as Twitter’s cultural cachet waned, it wouldn’t be replaced by Bluesky or Threads or Substack, but the real world. Not in the sense that everyone would put aside all this frothing online hysteria and just focus on their actual lives—I meant that instead of trying to whip up cancel mobs on social media, people would just start physically attacking each other."
and even though i don't really like her writing because they're weirdly unfairly misogynistic sometimes, i skim her articles sometimes:
"I see 2026 as the year when people actually take the effort to live a life more offline in good faith, and from a place of genuine desire to do so. It isn’t just some niche trend like the “Luddite teens” who opt for flip phones or the return of book clubs, though it’s these things, too. It’s a subtle change, the vague sense that the novelty has worn thin. That joke isn’t funny anymore. This sweater is last season. I’m tired of this show, and I’m ready to change the channel."
i think people are really not having fun on the internet anymore. no one is finding the fulfilling connections they once did when this first started and it felt like everyone behind every screen name was a real person. it just feels like a giant mall, but like a dead mall so it's extra sad. i've been tweeting since 2010 but i think i'm finally done with that website, which sucks because i'm so good at tweeting. but putting your every thought out online in short little quips that no one even reads feels very prole-coded and gross. do not even get me started on instagram. every post feels like someone is announcing the death of a family member. and there's no way, no actual way everyone is "thrilled to announce" something new every single day. why do we all say that now lol? "so excited to announce" "honored to announce" what are we doing.
a lot of twitter people jumped ship to substack but no one really reads that either. i'm actually shocked by how bad most of the writing on substack is. you can tell that people on there are looking for a "wholesome" way to content farm and make some extra cash.
i even feel weird about personal writing on this blog for some reason. i have transcended the desire to have anyone know anything about me but i'd still like a way to kind of track the development of my thoughts about things in a quick and dirty way, adding links and quotes etc., basically research--i have written in a journal since i was 7 years old, and since i have that practice i feel like i can separate discussion of my like, emotional life and specific people and events from writing like this where i'm kind of just putting a pin in a thought.
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