this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2023
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I'm really starting to think that Musk deliberately destroying Twitter is not a conspiracy theory.
I mean, with Twitter and Reddit gone, only Facebook remains.
Ah, well, there are also WhatsApp, Viber, Tik-Tok, Youtube, Telegram which need similar treatment.
Of these I casually use YT and Telegram.
The former is slowly being replaced by uploading videos to the platforms they are posted on.
The latter - well, there was a time Durov promised there would be no ads ever, there are ads everywhere now. And technically it's junk (the protocol, I mean, while the QT desktop client itself on the contrary is notoriously CPU and memory efficient for my loads of subscribed channels, groupchats etc ; it does crash sometimes, but no Matrix or XMPP client would simply survive that amount of garbage perpetually updating, so).
I use Youtube more than any other service. If you like video essays, documentaries, and other medium- and long-form content, it's the only place on earth to get it. Cable television ditched intelligent content long ago. Nebula and Curiousity are okay, but most of the content that I couldn't already get on Youtube has that shitty cable tv vibe.
The only downside with Youtube is it's huge and the algorithm is iffy. It can take a long time to build up a library of subscriptions that provide high level content every day. But now that I have that, it's basically my exclusive streaming platform. I watch 1hr of Netflix/HBO/whatever with my wife every night, and all the rest is history, cooking, science, etc. on Youtube.
I am very similar and did not realize before you said it, that I'm essentially just replacing the early days of educational TV when TLC, History Channel, Discovery, etc. were all showing educational/interesting content.
I’m starting to think it’s deliberate because I can’t believe his sheer stupidity.
I used to not think it was sheer stupidity, but when he's literally challenging his chief rival to measure up penises on a public forum, I think it is, indeed, sheer stupidity.
That’s just Musk being Musk.
That doesn't really change my point.
I know.
Look people are gonna say Elon was always like this but I disagree. There's a difference between being a major asshole and this kind of insanity.
We all acknowledge how being terminally online has a huge negative effect on your mental health. We all acknowledge that covid drove a lot of people crazy.
I'm pretty this happened to Elon. This isn't a sympathy thing just an observation.
I think YouTube is in an extremely good position to elevate long form content. The problem is that I have 0 faith in googles management to the point where I'm sure they'll ruin it eventually.
I disagree on telegram. It's never been more relevant. Both Russian and Ukrainians post on them real time involving the war. You could follow the failed coup on Wagner via telegram.
Conceptually, I think there's a huge need for a telegram like service that's more or less free for all parties to broadcast via channels. Obviously there are downsides, but I'd argue the ability to broadcast revolutions real time is worth it.
The problem is telegram itself isn't really trustworthy given the Russia connection
That's because of the user base, no other reason. And you could follow not that much.
We are on one of such services now, FFS.
You don't have to think that far to say it's not trustworthy. Just read about its protocol and how its creators are as people.
I could be wrong, but I firmly believe that the dismantling of Social Media is an indicator of the state of the economy, instead of being intentional. I believe that investors are hurting for money and are pushing platforms to turn a profit at all costs which is hurting the industry. Additionally, This appears to be happening elsewhere in other industries too but is manifesting into other symptoms. However, I think that the Tech and Entertainment industries will be the first to "Fall" (for lack of a better word) as these industries are more of a luxury rather than a necessity.
Durov also went full NFTbro with his fucking username sales. I was a massive Telegram advocate until that moment. Destroyed my trust in him. Now we move to targeted ads inserted everywhere... the end of Telegram is near :(
Signal is great
Living in Russia, I had some idea who Durov is from his interviews and reputation and actions, before Telegram when he was in control of VKontakte too, so I never was a Telegram advocate.
Also that mtproto is a load of hacky crap is something people were writing whole articles about from the very beginning, and their arguments that their IM is "secure" were also quite typical for frauds.
But, still, at some point it was usable. EDIT: And there was hope for alternative clients pleasant to use.
I haven’t used Telegram in ages. Now I think they may have reset my username. And I can’t reset it because it insists it’s taken.
Oh well. It’s just another service full of crazy.
What's Telegram good for? I thoguht it was more like WhatsApp with extra security? So not social media at all - just a messenger client. Does it do something else?
About the opposite, WhatsApp is Telegram with extra security. Telegram is not secure at all. It's not even E2E for anything but "secure chats" which its desktop client doesn't have.
In channels and group chats it has reactions similar to social media and used as such. Channels are like blogs - they consist of posts by the channel's authors with a link to comments. Channels and group chats can be private or public. Private ones you can't search for and can join if somebody adds you.
You don't have any kind of news feed, yes. But in general it's pretty close to social media in experience.
Creating a channel and posting something there is similar to your page in Facebook, just optional. You can add the link to it in your profile description so that people could go there after clicking at your avatar pic in a group chat, for example.
In fact it is being used like social media. Just no news feed and no friends (contacts are rather similar to that anyway).
EDIT: Describing it made me realize that I'm probably unfair to Durov. If from VK the most important things he'd remove were friends and news feeds, then he might actually be not such a bad person. It's just that I want a p2p messenger\social network with user directory, like old Skype, but completely p2p. It wouldn't become worse if it had Telegram-like channels functionality, just first things first.
Thanks for the info!! Much apreciated. I'll check it out and see if I like it.