Ask Lemmy

You might be interested in this piece from a government funded Australian think tank about escaping the current social media environment

https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/social-media-as-it-should-be/

All meta apps, they're used for our government's propaganda, yes.

Absolutely.

Why would I do that?

EUian here. I tend to say no, with a big "but" (insert Sir Mix-a-Lot joke here): I would expect legislation to govern effective content moderation by the platforms. No cutting corners to save money.

UK. yes. as well as US news, import export.

Yes.

Please tell me what I'd lose if you turned off X, Facebook, Instagram, and Reddit.

At least anything that has anything to do with Trump or Muskyboi, yes.

Oh lord yes!

Depends. Not all of them are bad. Take pinterest for instance, it's harmless. And youtube is too valuable to lose. But X? Yes, X should go.

Yes. (EU)

I'm definitely on board with ban of popular social media (from any country) that tracks me and collects my data even when I'm in toilet, let alone my search history on a day to day basis and sells it to others to generate it's revenue and shoves its own agenda as the result on my feed. I want something like 4chan but a little more mature in terms of audience and no modspreading like on Reddit.

Basically, Lemmy is good. Nice middle ground. Reddit like approach to content that I wanna view with other like-minded people whilst not being pushed off from the dinner table just because I wanna eat something else. Besides Reddit and fediverse, not many platforms allow that unless you completely start over with your algorithm.

I wanna be able to see and be part of whatever I chose to ignore after I feel like eating that said food tomorrow, or the week after or the next year. If any social platform provides that, to the entire world, then they should be supported no matter what. Sadly platforms like Lemmy are not that popular even though they offer almost exactly what I just asked for.

I am a big proponent of free speech and the merits of free access to information.

Or at least I was. I've always known that bad actors with control over your information input can do an awful lot of damage. I used to think free and open access was the best choice. But seeing how a few companies captured the entire social media environment and have swollen to near-total monopolies and then how those same companies have shown themselves to be bad actors with malicious intent I have changed my opinion. Banning them would help slow down the flow of info sewage into the EU and encourage more competing companies to form. We need that since the EU can't break up American companies. So if new companies were ever to be competitive we need to remove the giants from the pool and commit to breaking up any that get too big.

I probably still wouldnt support banning any specific social media, or social media from a specific country. What needs to happen is some fucking regulation for algorithms, moderation, hate speech and misinformation. And then you can ban any social media that doesnt comply

No, it's how the various clubs I'm in plan and coordinate things.

I'd tolerate it, but not support it. Forcefully taking them away gains these platforms even more support and demand. Only when people seek for alternatives or a change on their own, we can solve the problems.

I'd rather see their methods of profit be made illegal. Not all at once. Let them try to find loopholes and other unethical ways of making obscene amounts of money, and make those illegal too.

Maybe they can switch to a paid model out of necessity, and then they wouldn't be quite as omnipresent.

No. I have friends who are American and it's much more feasible to communicate with them through social media since they live so far away from me. It'd also mean one of my favourite sites ever (Tumblr) would be inaccessible to me.

I'd support one in America lol

Yep