How the internet realy works

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Part one: Is Mark Zuckerburg a Bigger Pimp Than Snoop Dogg?

In the picture below who is the bigger Pimp? Is it Snoop Dogg? West coast rapper, football coach, diplomat, comedian, slick talker and for a brief period in 2003 an actual pimp. Or Mark Zuckerberg? Entrepreneur, visionary, billionaire and founder of the largest social media website on the planet, Facebook. Let’s compare them in the three fundamentals of pimpin, style, game, and business.

Style

Ones fashion scene, charisma and swagger.

Snoop:1 Mark: -0

Game

The ability to talk slick to the ladies, control their mind and unleash their inner freak.
Ones fashion scene, charisma and swagger.

Mark

Snoop:2 Mark: 0

So far it looks like Snoop is afew Cadillac lengths ahead but what about business? You ain't no pimp if your business game ain't tight, green is for the money and gold is for the honey! If we could be a fly on the wall when the photo below was taken it might have went down something like this.

So who is he pimping?

Who is his stable of 2 billion getting him that money?

Do you use Facebook?

Then the answer is you!

Me? You Say?! How could this be! I ain’t no hoe!

Calm down, calm down…It’s just a metaphor. To help understand why lets look at the definition of the word pimp.

Now what if we replace the replace the word prostitute for user.

Starting to click?

So if we are the prostitutes in this metaphor then what are we selling and who are the clients?

To be put simply our product i.e our “loving” is our Data and Content and the clients (“tricks” in pimp talk) are the advertisers.

Come on! Seriously?! We are not selling anything!

Many people think that the Internet is not free but it is not. We indirectly pay for it with our data and content. Our content is what attracts other users onto these platforms and without any user created content Facebook and Youtube would be nothing more than digital deserts . Once we are drawn to these platforms by user created content we are introduced to the clients who are the advertisers. The advertisers feed us ads and the pimp (ie Facebook or YouTube) takes all the profit for providing this matchmaking service. Along with social proof what makes these ads particularly valuable to advertisers is the analytic tools that they are able to use to fine tune them and pinpoint the precise demographic they wish to serve them to. This precision is made possible by the vast pools of data that we give them anytime we “like” type or do something on the platform. Everything is fair game. A fun experiment to try is to think of some ridiculous topic or commodity and open up a chat box with one of you close friends and start talking about it, then watch adverts start populating your news feed!

So how much is our “loving” i.e. content and data worth?

In 2016 the yearly revenue made from each Facebook user was $16

But In exchange we get a free service so it’s a fair deal Right?…

Yes Facebook and YouTube are amazing world changing services there is no denying that and business need to make a profit to survive. But they also need to innovate and offer the best value for the customer to stay ahead of the game. If they are not careful they may lose dominance to upstarts who can offer better value for users, creators and advertisers. Before getting to these promising alternatives let’s look at some of the areas that Facebook and YouTube have fallen behind in.

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Organic reach

Organic reach refers to how many people see your posts that you don’t pay for. This is extremely important to business, new business especially as they are often are running on a shoestring budgets so the more organic reach the better. Over the years Facebooks organic reach has been steadily declining as seen in the chart below.

And the same applies for personal accounts too. So next time you only get two likes on that awesome post you did, one from your long lost relative and another from a creeper who you used to go to school with. Don’t feel bad, It’s probably because they are amongst the few who seen it and it was likely they did because they where actually visited your page.

Here is a good video further outlining these topics.

Click Farms

Clickframs are centers that are set up most commonly in developing countries to offer customers the ability to pay for likes and followers. For a small fee people can cheat the system and buy likes and follows by having people working at the click farm like or follow their pages. But the problem goes much deeper than that. To avoid drawing unwanted attention to themselves these clickfarms has devised a method of creating fake accounts and liking a lot of various things so it is not obvious that they were set up with the sole purpose to follow the customers who paid for it. The consequence of this is that now even if you pay facebook to legitimately get more exposure you are still likely to get a large amount of fake likes and follows from countries like india who have workers in click farms setting up fake accounts and liking everything to divert attention form themselves.

Here is a another video from Vertasium if you want to look further into click farms.

Freebooting

Freebooting is the act of profiting from other peoples videos without giving them credit. Ever scince Facebook started to push videos and favor them in their algorythem this has become a major problem for creators of original content. One such creator; Kurzqesagt, producers of fascinating easy to follow animated science and philospoy videos has done a video on the topic that can be watched below.

De-monetization

Facebook is not the only platform having issues compensating original video content creators. Youtube is currently experiencing what is know as the “Ad-pocolypse!” What is the ad-pocolypse exacly? The ad-pocolypse is a term used to describe the current demonetization of of YouTube videos. The Ad-pocolipse was summoned when Youtube star Pewdie Pie was accused of making a racist video causing a backlash from major advertisers. However if you have a further look into the incident you will see that it is more the case of traditional media outlets overreacting to sell a story that isn't there while simultaneously discrediting their competition. This incident has had a snowball effect with a large amount of youtubers that had light adult content being demonetized. This is a big problem for youtube as content creators have started to look else-ware to monetize there content. Twitch has been a ever popular option for gamers and personalities as it allows them to monetize through tips from their fans during live streams. This may also be a missed opportunity on youtubes behalf as if they had a better algorithm maybe it would be possible to categorize content so that videos with lightly adult content can be correctly matched with the appropriate adult friendly advertisers. For example a lot of vloggers have been demonitised for using marijuana in their videos. Now that it is becoming increasingly legalized it would make sense to to match these marijuana dispensaries, and accessory makers with the appropriate content creators instead of demonetizing them completely.

Fake News and Bad Vibes

Just imagine for a second that you where an alien and social media was your first point of contact with earthwhat would you think? Is this a place you would like you visit?

DISASTER!, CAR CRASHES!, STREET FIGHTS!, OUTRAGE!, Trolling, Propaganda and Advertising masquerading as news, people acquiring devastating life affecting injuries in “hilarious” fashion, click bait, scams and self-help gurus who haven’t mastered anything but marketing . All this fed in-between an endless stream of meaningless distraction and infotainment that their old brains have not been upgraded yet to process in any useful way. But luckily most of us humans understand the subtle differences between the Internet and the real world. Yes the world has its fair share of problems resulting from the technological and population explosion of the last 100 years. Those probeblems being predominantly , governmental, social and environmental.

But despite what the internet would lead you to believe the world is more peaceful, educated and in better health (human wise, physicaly) than any time in history

Don’t believe me?....

. . . So why would the internet make you believe total opposite?

To be put simply because that’s what we react to and we really only have ourselves to blame. And by ourselves I mean more specifically our brain which evolves at a speed many magnitudes to slow to adapt to the last century of rapid technological progress and changes we have made. A lot of the shenanigans and bad behavior we see on the Internet is a result of smart (though morally questionable) people and companies exploiting our basic instincts and behaviors know as cognitive bias for profit and personal gain. And it is easy to do too without much moral remorse because of the second major issue which I refer to as detachment.

Take the title of this article for instance. I am in no way implying that Mark Zuckerburg is a actual Pimp! Or even Snoop Dogg for that matter.Yeah he was an actual pimp for a year or two and his persona is straight out of Superfly but unlike a coldblooded pimp who just takes Snoop has done alot for his community. I named the title how I did with cognitive biasis in mind more specifically (celebrity, sex, intrigue, sensationalism) to get more clicks on the article so people would read it and hopefully find some value, entertainment and insight in it. To keep with our pimping theme “don’t hate the player, hate the game! Do I agree with the game? Hell no! I would much rather write an accurate and detailed heading but, as the meme says "ain't no one got time for that!" So I had to write a heading and article with cognitive biasis in mind . Below are some of the cognitive biasis that shape the Internet.

Sensationalism

The predominant driving force of headlines and content on the internet is our attraction to bad/shocking/ news and content.
The evolutionary psychology based hypothesis for this is that in our past more often than not things where either neutral or good. But when something came along that was negative or out of the ordinary it should be paid close attention to as it could mean injury or worse.
People exploit this by concentrating on negative or fake news and creating articles with misleading or over sensationalized headings known as clickbat. This is a real problem as the world’s zeitgeist is increasingly being determined by online media and peoples world view and knowledge base can be negatively swayed by a barrage of bad and false news. This is especially prevalent for the older generation who have grown up trusting the media as a reputable source of information. The problem is that Facebook hasn’t mastered an algorithm that can discern and value truth and constructive content over clicks and engagement. The more clicks and engagement the content gets the more money Facebook makes from it's advertisers. It doesn't matter whether that content is good for society or not. An algorithm doesn't have a conscious. But it can be programed with moral values in mind but at the moment facebooks algorithm seems to be more concerned with maximizing profits than any moral responsibility for the wellbeing of society.

Sex

Sex sells there is no denying it. And it's use in marketing is a no-brainer given the majority of our cognitive function and behavior is based on our instincts to survive and procreate. It's influence is far reaching and has been used to sell everything from cars to cigarettes, watches, realestate and medication. In an increasingly visual based Internet sex has been used to boost click through rates through the use of provocative thumbnails and Instagram “models” have been cashing in on their assets through product placement.

Social Proof

One of the things that have made social platforms such an effective medium for advertisers is that they have built-in social proof. Social proof is the theory that people are more likely to accept/like or buy the same things as other people in their network do. Groupthink has its evolutionary origins linked to safety in numbers. We love to feel parts of tribes as they offer a scene of identity and feeling of safety and community. We are part of many different tribes, from the countries we live in to the sports teams we follow to the subcultures of our hobbies and interests. Celebrity tribes are some of the biggest and most influential. The cult of celebrity has its evolutionary origins to as they are similar to leadears of a tribes hiarachey and it is best to be on there side incase a feud or disagreement broke out. Today you won’t be exiled form your group and left in the cold without food if you are not a Justen Bieber Fan, but you may find it hard to bond with your 13 year old cousin or keep up with the latest fashion trends. fashion itself being a prominent signifier of tribes.

Information

Humans are naturally curious and information seeking creatures. If you can answer a question or provide some useful information you are more likely to draw people to your content. We also love intrigue and mystery. Combine the two with some other cognitive biasis mentioned and you have a Buzzfed worthy heading like. “ Kim Kardashtian reveals her top 3 shocking marketing secrets that will make you a millionaire! ”

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Under the Bridge: The rise of the troll

If you are under forty or a regular user of the Internet you will probably be familiar with term troll. Trolls are the bane of the Internet. A troll is a person finds gratification in baiting or taunting someone online with negative unconstructive comments and insults. A troll is often of low value In all its forms; social, economic and Intellectual in the real world.

Another group of people who seek gratification through attention are Social Justice Warriors. They are the people get their kicks by being offended by everything, taking things out of context, crucifying people and complain for the sake of complaining without actually doing anything constructive for their cause. I'd like to think of them as trolls with morals.

Peasents don’t talk to kings

Think about it. In real life pesants don’t talk to kings and legends don’t talk to losers. A person of low value isn't going to get a meeting a Benjamin Franklin or Elon Musk. Infact in most cases unless you have a knack for infiltrating security and evading them with the swiftness of a quarterback you aren't even going to get close.

In the real world there is a reason that presents don’t talk to kings and it is to for the overall benefit of humanity. In the real world people have to earn the right to talk to people of high value by doing things of high value themselves. In western society a person’s value is most commonly measured by there economical wealth and In an utopian economy the wealthiest are the people are the ones who have created the most value for society. I am saying people of low economical value should not be able to talk to people of high value. Infact this is one of the great things about the Internet in that it enambles people to spread their ideas and make contacts regardless of there socio-economical standing. But the thing is that the majority of the pesents who are most vocal online arn't just poor but are also dumb, drunk and belligerent!

Never throughout any time in history have people of low value (moraly,financialy and intellectually) been so easily able to communicate with people of high value.

The problem is that in the online world real life social norms no longer apply because being loud, mean and controversial is actually an amazingly good value proposition. With very little or no effort they can not only get the cheap dopamine rush that comes with zero physical risk digital combat with a famous person they secretly idolize they can also freely leverage all of their fans/clients or anyone paying attention to build a following of their own and effectively steal value from them. Most people of high value are smart enough to ignore the trolls as they know they have no value too bring them and can only steal value from them. But the thing is that not everyone is used to these new attention biased economics that have resulted in a fundamental change in the way we communicate information.

In my opinion the times we live in, benefits and pitfalls, advancements and growing pains can all predominantly be explained by the following : The transition from small close physical real life uncompressed networks to large wide compressed digital ones.

This change has facilitated massive technological breakthroughs and spawned thriving societies, but has also been the cause of many environmental and social problems as people, governments and businesses try to adapt to the repercussions of the change in networks. I will talk in more detail in the next chapter as this is a very important subject and to understand this is to understand why alot of things are the way they are right now.

Thanks for reading, as this is my first real post I would be stoked If I could get some sort of response or feedback :)

If I am show support by the community I plan to release more in this series mixing science, humor, hiphop culture and my own thoughts and ideas detailing the times we live in, its benefits and pitfalls and possible solutions to make it better. Yes I will answer the question is Mark a bigger pimp than Snoop? probably in part three or four. It's a pitty that you can not edit posts so subscribe me on https://steemit.com/@rj23 for new blogs and part 2 possibly coming soon.

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rj23

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