This trend of becoming an “influencer” seems to be affecting social interactions and the mental health of people who are aiming for it. This is like a popularity contest run amok, where the posts are desperate for more likes, and have actual mental breakdowns when they don’t get enough likes. This striving to be more popular, to get more likes, to get more clicks, seems to be removing people from real life and actual social situations. Although these likes and thumbs up or down give us a chance to “interact” or curate what we want to see, the use of gamification and preying upon addictions seems a little malevolent. I see so many situations that I think afterwards “I wish I had that on video” but it usually comes afterward, rather than before. There is something far more enjoyable about a walk when it occurs without holding a camera to video the whole thing. My dogs are hilarious, as one of my dogs loves to nuzzle into the snow, and shove her face in as deeply as possible, she even does the fox hunting dive, and flipped right over with her head in the snow. Wish I had that on video so that I could show it to my friends and family, not post it online to get a bunch of likes…..
The Social Trend of Micro-Expressions
3 responses to “The Social Trend of Micro-Expressions”
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Your observation around wanting the video after not before is an astute critique of this culture. So many people are so eager to get a good video that they spend their whole lives looking through the camera lens. Last year, I videotaped my class in the school musical, but I forgot to actual experience it. Now when I look at the video all I really remember is taking the video, not truly enjoying the performance. Society has convinced us that online likes matter more than actual experience to the point where people spend copious amounts of time fabricating experiences or memorable moments just to try and get a viral video. And yet, unlike true memories, these moments do not last.
Thank you very much for this post, Catriona! You know, I am thinking about my A3 in terms of who can be trusted on the web, and I believe that your piece of info will be a brilliant contribution to that. Regarding social media, personally, I am a bit tired of them. I know that TikTok and IG feel like a burden for my younger acquaintances too. Maybe we are a step away from discovering something else to successfully occupy our minds.
I totally understand and share your feelings about not having a camera at the right moments with your furry friends. Probably the future will bring us a camera in our glasses to record everything automatically, without us thinking about it much.
I am a bit grumpy because PageRank of Google is not the same as it was, say, ten years ago. Then there was one click and voila! very decent results were in front of me. Now I have to additionally search Google results to get what I want (or not). Do you think it’s our biases and a lack of logic that spoiled the algorithm, so excellent in the past? Thank you! Anna
I find that the more I read about algorithms, the more I think that the so-called biases are more just a lack of data issue rather than an actual bias. I think that the paid ads are more of an issue than bias. Whenever someone pays to jump to the head of the line (or top of the search page), I think we are losing something fundamental in the algorithm.