Top Posts Tagged with #wizchan

The "Dead Internet Theory" is Bad Actually.

You have heard of "dead internet theory" but you probably haven't looked at the theory as originally posted. It's often summed up as "the internet is just a bunch of bots talking to each other" ... and it's tempting to nod along: it's fun to say that "things were better in my day" and YES many sites have too many bots. But, the original "theory" is the product of deeply sad, cynical and isolated minds.

The idea that "most interactions online are bots" and therefore the internet is just imaginary pointless cycles of the same nonsense designed to generate "interaction" for the purpose of advertising has its roots in another "Bad Actually" theory: the notion that life is a simulation and everyone (but you!) are NPCs.

I recently tried to read some of the original thread from wizchan and 4chan that are credited with starting "dead internet theory" and they are...

deeply questionable.

Some of the points raised are:

* Content is Recycled * News is Recycled * People online vanish without reason * The internet makes people "sexually perverted" * People are in bubbles

Now all of these has a ... touch of truth, except for possibly #4 which seems more like a personal problem to me. (and it might be the reason for point #3) But, even if you leave those in, these are also nothing new. It's where the theory goes that is so extreme.

Thinking that people you interacted with for years online are bots is deeply unstable thinking. Bots can do reactions, but bots can't do relationships.

But when you read up on the people who are into this idea they think that they are *really* being Trueman Show'd by bots and that nearly everyone online is a part of a psyop to get them to take COVID shots, live in a pod and eat bugs.

This stuff isn't coming from a good place or a healthy place and I somehow didn't know that. I thought it was just a general "golly there are too many ads and bots and that sucks."

(and I do think it sucks, that's why I keep trying to tell everyone about mastodon and the fediverse... )

You want a real conspiracy?

Here is mine: Why do theories as sophomoric as "dead internet theory" and "NPC theory" or "simulation theory" or "Roko's basilisk" get *any* oxygen at all in media?

These are half-baked shower-thoughts at best.

But they are also concepts that teach helplessness and self-isolation.

Who does that benefit? If you were the kind of person who feared the internet as a tool for grass roots organizing "dead internet theory" would make all would be activists dead in the water.

#dead internet #dead internet theory #rokos basilisk #NPC #NPC theory #simulation #we are in a simulation #simulation theory #conspiracy theories #the hacker known as 4chan #4chan #wizchan #bad ideas

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>divide and conquor! Normie invasion! Actually the site is going through an intensified phase of fanaticism entirely brought about by people on the inside. Trolls are in greater force because the site population has swelled, so the mods have a greater incentive to hardline and fellow travellers on the fringe (like myself) who just want to use the site without getting caught up in the "wizard" circlejerk get banned because black and white are becoming more distinct. Fanaticism is typically a response to the threat of decline, attempting to reassert former values by making their expression much more extreme. But by doing so they change the original expression and alienate themselves from the many of the original groups being used to attain prosperity. It works in the short run, but becomes an increasingly rigid defense and survives only by undercutting the group's own support base. Each sectional interest group has a incentive to gain more at the expense of others in this situation, and as a result everyone tries to ban everyone else. in the short run, fanaticism can effectively reduce the size of a population and control expanding levels of disruption. But it causes increasing levels of potential disruption through unrest... which means the long run is only to end up banning and persecuting their own elements. The sooner the mods move back to the old equilibrium state of minimum persecution whithin the confines of the rulebook save for obviously outsider elements validating the use of harsher justice, the more the site will prosper. Come back Chadmin

#cross-post #wizchan