Weigh In: Has the social media revolution devolved conversation?

[misteraven]

@El Mamerro Will certainly require a little bit of adjustment for a lot of people. Also, you're super behind so once you get caught up on a few key threads, you naturally fall into a rhythm with it so not too bad.

 

Welcome back! Lots to catch up on.

[misteraven]

So a lot of news this week talking about some of what we touched on. Besides Zuckerberg (founder of Facebook who now also owns Instagram) illegally shared all their user data with Cambridge Analytica to compile profiles and strategies used to sway election results with better targeting, it seems they’ve also been cutting deals with handset makers to scrape and share data. One of the handset makers is a major Chinese company that’s apparently already being monitored as a national security threat.

 

https://www.businessinsider.com.au/australian-parliament-mark-zuckerberg-huawei-2018-6

 

Facebook’s response for Zuckerberg not mentioning it when he just spent 10 hours testifying before congress to specifically address the sharing of user information... That it really wasn’t successful so they had already decided they were going to phase out those partnerships.

 

Meanwhile Apple announced their next big OS update would include completely new privacy technologies that combined with the new Safari browser that drops with it, essentially kills the exploit Facebook has been using to gather data about online users that browse the web beyond Facebook and Instagram.

 

https://www.apple.com/macos/mojave-preview/

 

“Enhanced Tracking Prevention

When you browse the web, the characteristics of your device can be used by advertisers to create a “fingerprint” to track you. Safari now thwarts this by only sharing a simplified system profile. And now improved Intelligent Tracking Prevention keeps social media Like buttons, Share buttons, or comment widgets from tracking you without your permission. We know you’ll like that.”

 

It’s a step in the right direction, but personally feel it’s too little, too late. Seeing as Apple has also announced its stepping into the advertising space and has to compete against key players Facebook and Google, I also have to question how noble this security update actually is.

 

Anyhow, scary stuff that honestly should lead to people protesting in the streets and probably dropping Facebook and Instagram, as well as their *smart* phones.

Edited June 7, 2018 by Guest

[glorydays]

So a lot of news this week talking about some of what we touched on. Besides Zuckerberg (founder of Facebook who now also owns Instagram) illegally shared all their user data with Cambridge Analytica to compile profiles and strategies used to sway election results with better targeting, it seems they’ve also been cutting deals with handset makers to scrape and share data. One of the handset makers is a major Chinese company that’s apparently already being monitored as a national security threat.

 

https://www.businessinsider.com.au/australian-parliament-mark-zuckerberg-huawei-2018-6

 

Facebook’s response for Zuckerberg not mentioning it when he just spent 10 hours testifying before congress to specifically address the sharing of user information... That it really wasn’t successful so they had already decided they were going to phase out those partnerships.

 

Meanwhile Apple announced their next big OS update would include completely new privacy technologies that combined with the new Safari browser that drops with it, essentially kills the exploit Facebook has been using to gather data about online users that browse the web beyond Facebook and Instagram.

 

https://www.apple.com/macos/mojave-preview/

 

“Enhanced Tracking Prevention

When you browse the web, the characteristics of your device can be used by advertisers to create a “fingerprint” to track you. Safari now thwarts this by only sharing a simplified system profile. And now improved Intelligent Tracking Prevention keeps social media Like buttons, Share buttons, or comment widgets from tracking you without your permission. We know you’ll like that.”

 

It’s a step in the right direction, but personally feel it’s too little, too late. Seeing as Apple has also announced its stepping into the advertising space and has to compete against key players Facebook and Google, I also have to question how noble this security update actually is.

 

Anyhow, scary stuff that honestly should lead to people protesting in the streets and probably dropping Facebook and Instagram, as well as their *smart* phones.

 

I keep seeing these iPhone ads where you can unlock your phone with your face, add emojis using your face, and add your face as a "profile" for your phone when youre near another iPhone

That's a little scary considering that phones can be lost, broken into, hacked, etc...and the government, with Sprint as proof, and they haven't exactly stopped the Patriot Act, they will look into your info.

the new features on the iPhone should be taken in with a grain of salt...at my work, when we hand out government iPhones to VIP, we lock down everything...all the features that create a user "profile" is blocked at a registry level.

And its not just settings that I lock down, we have a specific piece of software that we run on the phone that does the rest of the hardening for us. So i'd be weary of what these companies put out as "gimmicks" on their smart phones.

[luhem]

Longtime lurker , first time poster .

 

Just wanted to chime in and agree with OP - social media has killed the (e)conversation .

 

Growing up I was active on many BBs/forums - the owner who created my first multiplayer rpg (before "massive"morpg's) , my video game clan , basketball etc . .

 

Every walk of life I was into had a forum dedicated to it with a community of newbies and bona fide pro's , creating a plethora of information to learn from .

 

Staying up all night just talking to people from other countries on Ventrilo / Xfire / MySpace / Xanga / AIM / IRC , my pops used to take my keyboard away so I spent my saved up lunch money to buy a backup one instead of bearings for my board . .

 

When memes were just unnamed funny pictures people made on MS Paint or a bootleg copy of PS .

 

Used to get my ass beat for being into Star Wars in elementary school , had the trading cards and still have 30+ Expanded Universe novels , Disney shit on all of that . . watched the last jedi but not spending $ on Solo or anymore here on out .

 

Being a nerd is cool , being a skateboarder is cool (won't wear a thrasher shirt for another year or two til all these cunts simmer down) , graffiti is cool . . . what the fuck is going on yo . . I was fucking crucified for all of these in my youth . . . .

 

I have an insta but rarely use it . the app's not even on my phone . . . shut off my FB (since I doubt anything attached to Zuckerberg is indefinitely deleted) almost 5 years ago , and life feels so surreal without them . . I'm completely out of the loop .

 

Kind of sucks to think about where society and technology is headed , on some bitter I-liked-how-life-was-before tip . . .

 

EDIT: took my lifestory out of this post . .

Edited June 7, 2018 by luhem

[misteraven]

@luhem Appreciate you popping through and chiming in man. Welcome back and thanks for finally dropping a comment. Likewise, I feel you a 110% on all this. Crazy time's we live in and for you, the rest of the people who have posted in here, as well as the remaining people lurking or passing through checking things out... I don't think we need to even consider competing with social media platforms (as if we could). Think I already said as much, but I started this thread thinking they were competing. Now I realize they're two separate things that do have some overlap, but are vastly different once you actually get into it.

 

Likewise, we have something like 55,000 followers on Instagram. Real followers, not some fake group we manipulated through the savvy use of social media strategies, not some paid follower shit and without a bunch of gimmicks or really much in the way of a concerted effort to have a massive following. I can say it openly and honestly and with the benefit of hindsight that though we have a ton of registered users, we've never had anywhere near 55,000 active members on here. In our hey day, we'd see maybe 1200 people logged in, but even that wasn't entirely accurate since "logged in" was defined as someone that was on the forum in the last 3 or so hours. In reality, it was more like 300 users active within the last 10 minutes. That said, our user base was more significant back then despite being exponentially smaller than the user base that follows us on Instagram.

 

In other words, we accomplished so much more with much less back in those days. It would be great to have 55,000 active members on here and maybe one day we can accomplish that. But again, I don't aspire to compete with social media, let alone believe I can. And we don't really have to. My goal is to extract ourselves from the controls of Facebook and Instagram. To no longer allow them to middle man the relationship between 12ozProphet and you guys. It's already fucked up they won't allow any of us to see the content we take the time to follow, in the order its posted. But we've also seen how they've manipulated the entire internet to track us, to profile us, and then to sell our data at great profit, so other companies can more effectively target us and optimize their potential to sell us shit we don't need or really want. Then there's the whole cooperating with the government side of shit and who the hell knows what's happening there. Its common knowledge the NSA helped develop facebooks facial recognition algorithm and now we see Zuckerberg testify that he's illegally sharing data with analytics groups that are being hired by political campaigns. One can only imagine what else is really going on. All the while it's also fact that Instagram at its best, was never as fun as the forums were.

 

This is completely in our control. We can decide what we chose to support. Where we chose to connect. The discussions we have and what we share. After reaching out to a ton of people, I can't tell you how many responded with a comment along the lines of "glad you guys are doing this", "Glad you guys are bringing it back", or yeah I've been hating Instagram, been off Facebook for a while and just maintaining myself waiting for something else to come up so I can keep following friends and topics I'm into".

 

I'm not saying these forums can solve all the issues we're griping about in this thread. I also know that this isn't right for everyone. What I can say confidently is that it used to be a shit load of fun. That a lot of us made some great friends on here, learned a lot and had a lot of laughs. I can also say, it really doesn't take a lot of people for it to start being fun again. In fact, we've grown a little over 300% in the last two weeks since I started this new mission to revive the boards. I'm already finding myself breaking concentration on work shit, to check the responses on here. I've helped recover a couple dozen accounts in these last days, seen a ton of original crew come back on (some sticking around and posting regularly again) and see a lot of new accounts being registered.

 

I really think that collectively we can regain control of our connections and conversations and really believe we're already well on our way.

[Mercer]

I think people overlook social medias tendencies for consolidation. Much like public utilities will operate at a loss to establish market dominance, it's only after they've established a "monopoly" are they able to operate at a profit. Nobody in their right mind would choose today's Instagram, over the Instagram of 2013 when they were gaining market share and operating at a loss. The same can be said for Facebook, when they weren't so annoying and geared towards advertising/profits.

 

The fact these services are good at first when they're focused on gaining market share, then turn to shit as soon as soon as it's possible to in order to make profits is off putting to their users. Unfortunately, if a competitor were to spring up, and break the market dominance, they too would either remain unprofitable, or end up being garbage like Facebook/instagram are today. That old saying "you get what you pay for" holds true in the digital age, as long as these services are free, they will suck.

Edited June 7, 2018 by Guest

[misteraven]

@Mercer Not sure I entirely agree with that. Look at GitHub or Reddit. Both are profitable, both have very loyal followings, both remain solid and maintain loyal user bases and flourishing communities.

 

I think what we see Zuckerberg is greed and probably a God complex of some sort. I really don't think you have to suck to be a financial success. I also don't think profit and good intentions / good product (service) are mutually exclusive of each other. My issues with Facebook is that they want to be the gatekeeper to the digital world, which is becoming increasingly integrated into the living world. They started as a gated community and propagated like a virus turning the entire internet into a series of gated communities with them having a near monopoly on being gatekeepers. Then they turn around and misuse all the detail they pick up regarding traffic and activity, while also forcing their own agenda on you. Its one thing to claim its a private virtual environment and you don't have to participate, but seeing as how they literally have tentacles spread across the entire web, we all know you're ability to fully appreciate and consume the web compromised if you decide to opt out of their game. That's my problem with Facebook. Also considering how they've already proven how they're quick to abuse that position makes me think its time to rethink it all and if there's something that cane be done, we should try. That and the fact that most people yearn to be connected to people and subjects that interest them and Instagram is doing a poor job servicing that. It wasn't much better back in the day to be honest, but the novelty and convenience of it sucked everyone in. After a while, there were few options for interaction and content online that don't require a subscription of some sort.

 

And again, most would acknowledge that the time spent here on 12ozProphet was far more enjoyable / satisfying / entertaining than Instagram or Facebook even at their peak. That's because it wasn't about 12ozProphet, it was about all of us. We can still do this and I'm doing all I can to deliver and sustain a platform capable of that.

[Mercer]

Facebook is by far much more profitable than Reddit, or Github combined. I think Microsoft just purchased Github for 7.8 B, and Reddit is valued at 1.8 B according to CNBC as of July 2017. By contrast, Facebook is valued in the hundreds of billions, and more profitable by an order of magnitude. I'm just describing the situation from a purely economic perspective. When you've got a board of directors, and shareholders to answer to, it boils down to return on investment, which will always be the final deciding factor on who's still in business, and who gets squeezed out, or liquidated in the end.

 

IMHO nothing is free, every move you make in business, or life has a price. More people are waking up to this fact now, and realizing Facebook isn't a free service after all, every bit of user data collected and sold by them is the price you pay for a convenient way to share photos, or just interact with a larger circle of associates. Me personally, I don't really see the value in it, I haven't deleted my instagram yet, or the second FB I signed up for after deleting the first, after realizing it was the only option I had to stay in the loop with my extended family.

 

Another opinion I have is that the "free" model is on it's way out. I don't know if you were aware of, or participated f the recent push for "Verge" which ended disastrously when they got millions of new users in a matter of days and their servers couldn't handle it. They had a non-free business model and a pretty good UI for mobile. Poesia posted a link on IG, and I checked it out and followed suit. I still get people I tried to put on telling me, "too bad that flopped". It's only a matter of time before the next competitor pops up and makes that model work. People hate facebook, and having a non chronological timeline in instagram, so most of the content creators would rather pay to not be sold out, and users would prefer to have the content they're subscribed to arrive in their feed chronologically, and not so manipulated.

 

This "non-free" business model concept is carrying over to browsers now. Brenden Eich (inventor of Javascript and other cool shit) became a cryptocurrency convert, and has assembled a great team that just built an open source browser that has a very good chance of disrupting the entire advertising business model for the web. Highly recommend using it since it's not spyware like all other browsers, or in it's buggy beta phase anymore and very solid.

 

They created an ERC20 or ERC23 standard Ethereum token for it called BAT (basic attention token). This token works much like Steemit does. The browser itself has a built in wallet, you can buy/earn BAT and deposit into your browser, then set a monthly limit on how much BAT will be given to the sites you visit, based on the amount of time you spend on them. You can also curate this list manually if you want by pinning your favorites, or turning the feature off for sites you visit but don't want to support. I've got mine set to spend 10 BAT a month (roughly $2.50) on my most visited list with a few pinned. Only 3 websites I visit regularly currently accept BAT payments, but there were zero accepting it a couple months ago so it's starting to build momentum.

 

 

BTW You should get one of those green check marks next to 12oz and earning free money.

 

 

 

The Brave browser's business model isn't fully developed yet, and the flip side of this business model comes in when advertisers want to reach prospective clients. As a Brave user, you can choose to see advertising, (it's all blocked natively by default without a need for plugins) and instead of an advertiser paying a website to target users, the advertiser can pay BAT directly into the brave system, and reach users directly. These users will be more engaged, and verifiable, and also willing to look at ads wile earning a small amount of BAT.

 

The software is on Github, and open source. This allows large advertisers with their own dev team to audit the source code, and make sure they're getting the biggest bang for their decentralized bucks. I've been taking a look at it myself, along with the Brave browser's Metamask plugin. Way above my head but there's some pretty neat stuff involved.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Imagine cutting out the middleman as an advertiser trying to reach an audience. Your payment is broken down into tiny digestible chunks, and spoon fed to willing participants that wanted to earn a little BAT on the side. Users will be able to track their own use, and remain private wile submitting their own interests to be targeted appropriately. I don't think most people are like me, and willing to pay, but there will be plenty of people who'd like to earn a few extra cryto tokens a month, either to cash out or use for paid access content. The best part is it's your choice, whether or not you see an add, pay a website out of your own pocket on a donation basis, or just browse the internet ad free assured you're every move is not being tracked. This is the future.

 

I don't think Facebook, or Twitter will be around much longer in their current form. Disruptive open source technology like this is being developed now at a pace they won't be able to buy out, absorb, or squash before it's too late like they did with their other competitors. I don't fault Zuckerberg for what he's doing as far as his fiercely competitive scorched earth policy in social media. That's capitalism at it's finest. At the same time, I fully acknowledge he's a piece of shit. From the jump he's been nothing but a snake ever since he stole the original idea for FB from the Winkelwov twins. But with that said, I also think on some level, we're all complicit with his schemes, albeit on a much smaller scale. This is the problem with expecting everything to be provided to us for free, disregarding the fact that nothing is ever free, and you get what you pay for.

[Dirty_habiT]

I'm gonna expand on that thought. Social media creates tribes. People with the same way of thinking, same school of thought, and from how they type, their own vernacular also.

And this kind of environment creates an echo chamber. A group of people yelling out the same talking points, no real criticism, and no real valid points. This is dangerous because it breeds an extreme form of tribalism based on "us vs them" mentality, that would eventually turn to hate. 4chan is that way, facebook groups, and even some subreddits operate on that paradigm.

12oz can claim to be a tribe, but we don't reserve judgement and we call out the bullshit. We forgive and forget also. We're not a perfect platform but we don't go to extremes to defend a moot or useless point just to advance our own shit.

 

The "dumb" people we hate on social media, some of them have a massive following. That's the scary part. The people who influence others.

 

I think it goes even deeper than that. Look at what high regard society holds celebrities in. Many of them are not very smart and have no business discussing politics at all.... yet they do and people listen because the people don't possess the ability to logically separate what is a credible source from one that is not.

 

Mercer - that browser concept sounds pretty neat but I'm not sure I understand what incentive there is for end users to use it? Is it because you earn BAT while surfing.

Edited June 8, 2018 by Dirty_habiT

[Decyferon]

It's interesting seeing how my son uses social media (he is 14 this year)

He has no interest in Facebook and when I asked him neither do his friends. He has an Instagram account but never uses it.

 

It seems the younger generation use YouTube more than anything. When I asked how he communicates with people online and he said using discord when playing games or whatsapp group with some friends. He barely knows what forums are!

[Trueoginkhead55]

I’m going to try to add my own ramblings in here that will most likely be overly obvious. I’m approaching this solely from a technology standpoint. I’ve been here for a while. If I had to put a year on it, I’d say that I was first creeping around somewhere between 98-99ish. It was fantastic back then.

 

The Beginning.

You could see some true graffiti vets discussing style and exchanging mission/chase stories. It was a small niche community. At that time, I think there were a lot of lurkers like me. Cards got pulled when people talked bullshit, techniques and spots were still pretty well guarded. Pictures were not as common if posted at all. Maybe it was a constraint of the board at that time, but it was definitely also due to the fact most of us didn’t have a digital camera and or a scanner. I remember going out, taking flicks of freights, developing them, scanning them in. You had to use a thirdparty image host in order to share them. Still a lot of dial up connections back then. Privacy was a big deal during this time. Outside of Raven, most people didn’t put their names out there openly.

 

Broadband + the dawn of digital camera/camera phones

These become more common, Brickslayers really starts to grow, this in turn changes what content is posted/consumed. MySpace is around but at this point writers are still trying to lurk in the dark a bit. Channel Zero blows up. Seeking drops the dime letting kids know how to make Krink.

 

Next tech change we would see is introduction of smart phone.

Good quality flicks/ Facebook and Instagram emerge. People become content creators who publish but do not dialogue with others. No more hiding behind screen names or locations, if anything they are more upfront about it. Paint companies start sponsoring more writers and doing tours showcasing paint. Everything is accessible. The demographics for graffiti blows wide open- no longer just other writers interested. At this point we are literally flooded with flicks. Due to algorithms, you can’t keep up no matter how much your try.

 

Now that that’s out. I would say that my engagement has decreased at each time there was a shift/progress. I went from reading every thread and comment posted to not being able to keep up, to no contact at all. There was a shift in management at one point where things got heated between some of us and I thought that I might be too close to it and needed to step back.

 

We have entered an age that is counter to what most of us grew up in. Immediate gratification. When I grew up skateboarding, there wasn’t a YouTube channel that told you how to kickflip. Best you got was a photo sequence in thrasher magazine. You had to figure it out. Now, the culture is such that My nephew found a skateboard and at the end of 2 weeks, he could Ollie, shuvit, and landed a kickflip. A week later, he moved on to something else.

 

Now what does this mean for graffiti culture. Will history survive? Books? Probably not. Outside of subway around a a couple of others most of this history will get wiped because it wont make it into a digital format. How many graff books would you like to order but they arnt out there.

 

There was a time where I thought that a graffiti wiki would be a great idea. Something that you could use to track down the origins of style and crews. I quickly gave up on this because I don’t think it would be possible to get an accurate account or keep it from getting incorrupted by people within the community.

 

Reddit.

reddit gets so much right. Let’s the community grow as organically as possible. If your a member of /r/skateboarding and want to talk Only talk to dudes over 30 or dads or skate, there are subreddits for that. That way older dudes can avoid the kids who are obsessed with whatever a dragonlazer flip is. It allows groups to form and function on their own. If I want to read something on Reddit, I’m on a computer. I know it will be a deep info dive. But I also use it a ton to just look at images/memes/politics. I’m also able to post to it with a fairly anonymous username that doesn’t connect with what high school I went to. Design wise I remember when I first saw and and thought to myself, who would use this piece of shit. But turns out almost ever one and it could be one of the last places on the internet that has genuine discussion with potentially intelligent people.

 

Is it possible to do something that appeals to people that isn’t instagram, and functions as a real forum, yes. But I also think that they have bridged the gap by not limiting it to just one subject.

 

 

I deleted Facebook 2 years ago. I still have Instagram but think of deleting it all the time. My reasons for this are as follows. While I have access to friends, it feels false most of these people do not talk to me or interact other than liking Picts. I feel as though it cheapens our relationship and rarely is genuine. The ability to influence decisions based on what info they show you is scary to the point I would rather abstain until it is better regulated. All these services are free and no one is asking what it is costing them. I’m too old to think that it is only ad dollars. Most of all, social media is something that consumes more of my time than what it gives back. If I spent as much time drawing or painting graffiti as I do looking at it on my phone, I would be a much much happier person. Having a phone makes us feel like we always have to be checking something. Social media, a game, etc. we wind up spending every little break we would have sat waiting, getting consumed by time vampire activities. You feel like your busy, but what you are really spending time doing is fucking pointless. It takes and gives nothing back.

 

Unlike seeking, ive been writing this all on a phone. It was a difficult to read and even harder to proofread so I haven’t.

I’m certain I’ve rambled and even more so haven’t made sense or completed thoughts but I’m scared to try to clean it up out of fear I would lose what I’ve written.

 

I’ll come back and clean it up once I’m at a real computer.

 

 

One last thing, I think we will hit a counterculture of people who will disconnect from smart phones. I can’t be the only one that feels like this. Think about any music show you’ve gone to, someone spent the whole time videoing it on their phone, proving they were there and completely missed the show. I’ve been working on being more present in life and conversations. Next time your talking with someone, see how often they are distracted by tech and not really engaged with you.

I I truly agreed people just hit the emoji icon on photos but seem to careless about the individual themselves. It’s definitely one of the lame aspects of Instagram @misteraven raven

Edited June 8, 2018 by Guest

[misteraven]

@Mercer I'm consistently impressed by your grasp of leading edge tech. Just wanted to say that.

 

In any case, I'm not saying that GitHub or Reddit are as big or profitable as Facebook. Only that they're fine examples of business' that are hugely profitable and accomplished it while not fucking their user base and over playing the leverage they have over their respective communities. I'm going to stray a moment now, while put on my tin foil hat and say that I do not believe that Facebooks success is necessarily savvy business. At least not in the traditional sense. There's conspiracy theories regarding a DoD project called life stream that was looking to document all aspects of a persons life for the purposes of building massively detailed histories and profiles that in turn would allow for algorithms to be developed to model predicted behaviors. It happens to be that project was cancelled suddenly the exact day that Facebook went from being an upstart to an official business. Could be coincidence, but certainly raises a flag and worthy of considerate review.

 

What I do not believe is conspiracy theory as the knowledge is publicly available is how deep in bed Facebook is with spy agencies like NSA, CIA, FBI, etc. Again, NSA is credited with co developing the algorithm used for their facial detection software. Its clearly in teh governments best interest for Facebook to not only exist, but for it to become as prolific and universal as it possibly can, especially when its clear that Facebook has zero qualms about sharing that data with third parties. Clearly they have a close working relationship, so its not a huge leap of faith to start assuming that there's a lot of nefarious shit going on and that if the government and its various agencies and vast resources have to pull a few strings to ensure their success, that it's in their best interest to do so. We also know the government absolutely has the power to do so and based off legislation like the Patriot Act and NDAA (which has very clear bipartisan support considering the various administrations its maintained and has grown through), as well as the Snowden data dumps, that they also have zero qualms about leveraging every tool possible to push their own agendas. Would seem to me that its a match made in heaven.

 

Anyhow, slightly off topic, but related and point I wanted to make is that its nearly impossible to look at Facebook and their practices as the example of whats needed to be successful as there's is a very likely possibility that the entire success has been engineered not through hard work and effective business decision and practice, but rather through some really shady practices by entities that have way more power and control over our lives, and the world at large, than they should.

 

That flash in the pan Vero is another great example that I believe follows what you saw with Verge (perhaps even more obviously). Assuming for a moment that what I said above is uncontested fact, and that Facebook is a powerful tool wielded by a the true power brokers, then we can also assume they'll do what they can to preserve it as an affective tool. We both know tech well enough to know that it takes nearly zero effort to degrade performance online. In fact, even this forum has a feature that allows me to stall the connection of a certain user so that instead of banning, they get time outs, errors and mis-loaded pages that eventually make them not bother coming anymore. Having full control of name servers, the national backbone and just about every aspect of the internet, not to mention highly talented tech people and software and hardware that we can barely wrap our heads around... How hard would it be to sabotage a promising new social platform that has the potential to supplant Facebook and isn't showing much interest in playing ball with those very same power brokers?

 

Take Vero, which was founded by the son of some Syrian king or some shit... Then think how many meetings it took for that same group to reach the conclusion that having a successful social platform owned by an private international company and worse, possibly tightly connected to not only a foreign government, but one that has historically been on our shit list and more recently, on the receiving end of some deep political drama and military action... Its clear that Vero was dead before it began. Suddenly there's accusations in the media that the dude was a rapist, that his uncle was responsible for censoring Facebook in Syria (ironic since its a muslim country largely run under Sharia law), and all kids of other negative shit that popped up everywhere. Ready to post memes flooded Instagram with nearly the ferocity as the backlash of users that we're excited to finally dump instagram for something else. Then service on Vero degrades to essentially being unusable and it never manages to recover and eventually dies.

 

Don't know man, I have a very tough time believing they simply dropped the ball and couldn't scale their growth. We live in a world of elastic computing and we're talking about a dude that had the resources to throw as money as needed at a problem that is relatively easy to solve.

 

Anyhow, starting to stray, but also overlaps and a part of this discussion and further supports my position on why its so important to not allow ourselves to place all our eggs in that one Facebook basket; allowing them to continue as gate keepers to nearly ever facet of the internet, including our relationships, all the while cheapening them at the same time.

 

P.S. Browser looks interesting, will look at it closer. Started playing with Aloha browser for iOS that sounds similar, but isn't available on desktop.

[misteraven]

It's interesting seeing how my son uses social media (he is 14 this year)

He has no interest in Facebook and when I asked him neither do his friends. He has an Instagram account but never uses it.

 

It seems the younger generation use YouTube more than anything. When I asked how he communicates with people online and he said using discord when playing games or whatsapp group with some friends. He barely knows what forums are!

 

100%. My son is a year younger. Has zero interest in Facebook and has never bothered with it. Daughter as well who is nearly 15. Both have Instagram and rarely use it. My son loves YouTube, but uses reddit for discussion and Discourse for real time chatting, if not doing it via console. Both kids are fairly regular Snapchat users, but don't really seem loyal to it. They actually use it as a replacement for text messaging, for reasons I still don't fully understand but have also both said it's getting lame.

[misteraven]

@Mercer was just thinking that with all you know regarding tech, privacy, block chain etc... Would be really cool to start up a thread with tips and info on how the average user can take steps towards helping preserve online privacy. Feel up for that?

 

No doubt @glorydays and @Dirty_habiT could lend a lot of insight and knowledge on that subject as well.

[Mercer]

Mercer - that browser concept sounds pretty neat but I'm not sure I understand what incentive there is for end users to use it? Is it because you earn BAT while surfing.

 

For now, the only incentive is it's an open source browser superior in both performance, and user privacy due to it's unique "business model" if you can call it that.

 

There's no need for add blockers, they're built in and don't sell white listing like other ad blockers. There's also no need to worry about this "free" product tracking your every move which is a plus, for now google stores that data for advertising purposes, but who knows how it could be used in the future.

 

Once the advertising thing is worked out, users will be able to choose store their demographics, anonymized browsing data ect. and lease that info out to earn BAT. They'll also be able to watch advertising but instead of the browser, or website getting a tiny piece of revenue per impression, the user gets that tiny bit of BAT which can add up.

[Mercer]

@Mercer was just thinking that with all you know regarding tech, privacy, block chain etc... Would be really cool to start up a thread with tips and info on how the average user can take steps towards helping preserve online privacy. Feel up for that?

 

No doubt @glorydays and @Dirty_habiT could lend a lot of insight and knowledge on that subject as well.

 

Sure, I'm down. It's funny but I always thought that this was 12oz's biggest advantage. Why publish graffiti photos on a platform designed and proven to rat you out warrant or no warrant.

[misteraven]

On that note, we actually use cron jobs to purge logs older than 60 days so that by the time we're subpoenaed, the information no longer exists and we cant be accused of destroying evidence. Helps maintain privacy and save precious disk space.

[seeking]

My ability to read longform internet is absolutely fucking destroyed. I am super interested in reading all this thread in depth and yet I immediately felt assaulted by text.

 

THIS!!!

had to edit some photos, so i got out the laptop again....

The names i know.... tesseract, mams, dirty habit, colter!!! trent! etc, all y'all know of my prior ability to read lengthy posts and respond in kind. all. fucking. day. long. now a days tho.... i just don't fucking have it in me. and i can't imagine anyone on here, no matter my nostalgia, no matter how much i care about the past, i can't imagine wanting to sit through page after page of their thoughts. Was rad to hear tesser has a kid. I've genuinely thought of you and wondered how you were doing...but if we're being honest, i also didn't make even the smallest attempt to search for you. because thats life at 42. so caught up in my own every day struggles that while i think of others (mams, we live in the same fucking city and have never kicked it?!) it basically ends there. i think of the [literally] hundreds of folks I've met in person off this site.... i think of our talks. our friendship. i think of what they might contribute to whatever sparks their memory, and then i get distracted by whatever trapping of adult life finds me next. hell, @Joker is the only post read in full, and that was just because... well, its fucking joker, and i wouldn't have written graffiti if not for him (sorry to tarnish your legacy with mine ;) . but even on that... after 12oz, we maintained a volley of occasional emails. sharing art. sharing ideas. every single time id see something from him.... i can't begin to explain the honor i felt, that someone i'd always respected so much would discuss my work with me, and even that proved too much to maintain. Jer, i'm not sure who's turn it is to respond, but don't worry, my paintings haven't progressed much. ha.

 

i often like to imagine myself as simply dysfunctional, as if I'm different and more broken than others, but i don't think its that easy. i don't think I'm the only one. i started on prodigy message boards in 1991, amassed 30million posts on here, and finally graduated to a point i can barely reread the captions I write under my own instagram posts, and truth-be-told, i think I'm fucking hilarious! i want to think this place could reemerge in some context, and perhaps it can/will but i truly don't see it fitting into my life. i see ten year anniversaries. i see bbq's. i don't see spending lengthy amounts of time on this laptop, and sure as fuck not on my phone. part of it is growing up but a larger portion of it is the fact that at this point, what haven't i read? what haven't i heard? no offense to my friends here, who i am extremely fucking lucky to have had the opportunity to learn and grow with, but... i'm still trying to finish this rudolf steiner book, I'm not really worrying what 'cuban_nipple_crisis" has to say. :/

 

(i do want to connect 'keep it rail' tho, so if anyone has a lead on homie, lemme know).

Edited June 13, 2018 by Guest

[misteraven]

@seeking will respond when i get a sec and at my computer. But really glad you posted originally and honestly made my morning seeing the alert that you posted again. Not even mad you’re fighting it, LOL.

 

Spoke briefly to @Keepitrail and he said he’d get back on a after he sorted some shit out. Here’s his IG... https://www.instagram.com/keepitrail

[misteraven]

Ironically, plays into what you commented on about not bothering to look up and realize how many of these guys are around you.

[misteraven]

Alright, have a minute and will chime in with a proper reply...

 

@seeking I feel you 100%, especially about the difficulty in processing large blocks of text and all the demands on time. I have two kids and have to manage all the livestock and property in addition to my work with 12oz, which at least now is my main focus when it comes to work and even then I can't log those long hours on here. I still have other obligations for work, attend to family (freakin cat passed away yesterday - Earl RIP) and then there's the stuff you want to do for yourself, friends in the real world, etc.

 

What I can say is this: The days of any of us 35+ year olds spending 7+ hour stints on the forum are likely long gone for the most part. I certainly can't do it and I'd be pretty amazed (and a bit concerned) if any of you older guys could. But I can say that more and more often these last couple weeks, I'm genuinely excited when I check the board and see there's a bunch of alerts for new activity in threads I'm following or have posted to. I'm extra excited when I see the alerts flag users like you and other OG crew and members. Not entirely sure I can explain why, but it really feels good to reconnect, share and discuss with you guys almost 20 years after the fact of when this forum was started. Literally a half lifetime ago and longer than a lot of users on here have been alive.

 

I also have said that the future of 12oz lies in the younger generations that still have the time, lack of real life adult responsibility and the enthusiasm to explore, share, discuss and debate. Much of it (to your point) we've already done, but at the same time, as we gain experience and the world evolves, there are fresh perspectives, new ideas and insight and plenty of topics that are interesting, if not compelling and important if not flat out critical. Also previously stated is that there remain pockets of genuine community online outside of social that are not just thriving, but more successful that 12oz ever was.

 

Likewise, I agree that my attention span atrophied quite a bit as well in this last half decade. Over these last few weeks, with each comment or thread, I find it getting easier and easier. (Like riding a bike...). More significant, to me at least, is that I'm really enjoying it. After all those years on Instagram, being able to think through a position and drop it on here to whatever extent I have the time and patience for feels refreshing. After all the pent up feelings I'd been carrying around regarding 12oz, seeing so many old names pop back up on here (and a few new ones) and drop insightful / interesting / entertaining responses, has been cathartic. But perhaps more important than my own personal take-aways is the conversation I've had recently with @STYLEISKING which in turn echos the same I heard from @dekayfa, @diggity and so many more recently, which you even stated... That social media has cheapened the relationships between us all. Further to that, allowing Zuckerberg to continue middle manning the relationships between people, as well as the connections between people and a lot of the subject matter those same people are interested in following hasn't been sitting well with me. @diggity said it well when he mentioned that 12oz was an actual community. Instagram never has been and likely never will be. It's just a massive echo chamber of glimpses and excerpts.

 

Sure, I can see what you drank on the beach a few weeks back when you went on vacation. Saw this morning that your dog patiently waited for you to get home at the back door. But at the same time, back in the days, we all know that never in a million years would any of us be living in the same town and not be catching up in real life. No way would you not even know how many old friends actually live close by. No way would I know that @diggity is teaching his kid to skate yet barely even talk to him for a year or two at a time. Unlikely that you'd have connected with someone you look up to like @Joker and built the relationship that you've said inspires your own creative direction. In fact, I'm willing to bet that had it not been for the big fallout we had, the neglect I showed the forum and all the other stupid shit I did, that you guys would likely still be in communication regularly. Honestly, its crazy how all that works... We get just enough of a glimpse on social media to convince ourselves we're *connected* to the world around us, yet most of the time, its been dumbed down to dropping a stupid fuckin emoji if even that. In any case you're here and @Joker has stopped by regularly and all of us are steady reconnecting. There's no threads about rudolf steiner, but I'm willing to bet that as we build momentum back up, that there very well could be. I also think there's plenty more to explore and learn about, but most of all there's a sense of community (as @diggity put it) that Instagram was simply unable to ever replicate, even if for a the last many years it did manage to replace it.

 

@STYLEISKING articulated it strongest in our conversation in that even the culture of graffiti (no doubt serving as a small cross section of society on general) has become diluted due to social media. Was a time where you really had to work at getting down and learning a craft. That you'd get pounded on by your peers and genuinely work hard to move up the ranks of respect and accomplishment. Now there's no cost to entry, you can speak to the global white noise that is the social media world, and carve out a successful niche if you know how to play the game and because there is no longer any sort of standard or rigor applied. You can buy your followers, stream your falsehood and leverage that into an opportunity since everyones too busy doing the same thing to really call anyone else out or reached a point where they just don't even care enough to say anything.

 

Its sort of ironic that you were one of the first OGs I reached out to a few weeks ago and it really came from the fact that you were posting these long captions. That and picking up on your Instagram frustrations and feeling the same way about it. If you hadn't posted those long rants (and they are indeed funny most of the time), I'd probably have tuned it out like I have so most others on there. Not because I don't give a shit, but because I've sort of become numb on there since there's little in the way of actual dialogue and discussion.

 

Likewise, I know you're unlikely to keep your laptop at the ready and drop in regularly again, but at the same time, you do put in the effort to still put out your thoughts or opinions with more than an emoji or shallow caption like most people on Instagram. If you're going to go through the trouble, why not do it in a place where it can actually engage and inspire? I'm about to launch the next generation of the forum and it'll be as easy to post photos and drop emoji's on there as Instagram is, but for it also allows for a deeper level of engagement if you want it. Won't fix the fact that typing on an iPhone will always suck, but if you find a little extra time or feel compelled to do so, at least the option is there. Likewise, it wont be buried in moments or disappear after 24 hours.

[misteraven]

*sorry for the long post. Maybe make a sandwich and grab a beer before you dig in.

[psm026]

Not sure what to post , so ill pop off some moderator having his first baby news to break the ice, though this coming straight from a Instgram post by him . “Congrats BK” burger king .... Jake! :clapping:

 

Hello to all the old and new heads. :handfist:

 

[seeking]

haha. i post repeatedly about my lack of attention span and you counter with a 10,000 word essay. it's like you're just challenging me to prove i can be a good friend and actually read the things you've taken the time to write. :)

 

100% social media has cheapened our interactions and connections. you know how often I've written about that (ironically on social media). its easy to not reach out to someone after you see a picture of their kid, because it satiates that feeling of longing that otherwise would exist. it supplies us with just enough familiarity to continue existing in obscurity. given enough years of that and a tendency towards general isolation becomes blanket policy. combine that with the days becoming shorter and obligations always increasing, at any given moment i'm working on one project while simultaneously thinking of another, texting with 3 people, liking pictures of this duck i follow on instagram, trying to avoid setting myself on fire while welding in shorts and a tank top because I'm a fucking idiot... in the midst of all that, i have a lot of conversations in my head that seem to take the place of actual interaction. it's just hard to find the time otherwise.

 

i am totally one for nostalgia and 12oz is as ingrained in the DNA of my being as anything else I've ever been apart of. i like seeing the old names. i like seeing what people are up to. the struggle is to not treat it like instagram. to not accept one update as totality and fill in the narrative around it. i hate to continue pushing the idea that we're all just automaton goldfish programmed for indifference. trying to come back here has definitely opened my eyes to just how fucking incompatible my brain has become. if nothing else, thanks for that.

Edited June 13, 2018 by Guest

[misteraven]

@seeking I'll keep this short for a change... Your last post is 100% on the money. You've always been a huge part of 12oz. Your insight and humor played a huge part back in the day. It's awesome to be able to hop back on and read what you have to say. This shit is fun and the more people like you pop up and join in, the more fun its going to be. Oh yeah, you might notice that the muscles used to post and read long ass rants will loosen up and grow stronger as you use them more.

[misteraven]

@psm026 Fuckin finally... Glad you finally stopped through dude. And yeah, reach out to @Burger King and see if you can get him back on so we can wish him a proper congratulations and catch up. Edited June 13, 2018 by Guest

[diggity]

I’m calling bullshit on this. You have time for the shit you make time for. When @misteraven told me to check back in on here, I was like sure but I prob won’t stick around. I’ll drop in and say hey dickheads and move on. Yet I find myself checking back every couple of days. It’s not back at the point of me unconsciously starting to type 12oz into the web browser when I launch it but it’s honestly the best time I’ve had in a long time online. Reading long posts on my phone and responding to them is getting easier I think the problem was just I wasn’t engaged yet. Good to see @seeking in here. I’m not really sure where your living these days, figured LA. I’d love to get your address so we can work on mailing you a package with AIDS in it, maybe that will be more of a 12oz home

Coming to need. I do like seeing your dog on Instagram but outside of tattoos I haven’t a clue as to what you’ve been up to but you look well and hope life has been good for you. I’ve also lost track of KingofHell/Hyena over the years. Again, I know he’s out there tattooing some place and had some medical shit come up a few years back but am unclear exactly what or where he’s at. Guess that’s a bit off topic for this thread. Thankfully your not a mod and more so I don’t have to worry about getting banned for that.

[misteraven]

Need another wet t-shirt contest so motherfuckers are popping in and refreshing hourly again. Anyone know where cat eyes ended up?

 

Is it fucked up most of us are married, with kids and in some cases have graduated on to divorce and I’m suggesting that boobies might be the solution?

 

@seeking any idea where our Russian bride thread is? That was some pretty epic fun for a good while.

[diggity]

Mail order bride one was pretty good. Did you guys end up calling some of them or something?

 

Seems like a remember prank calls too.

 

Married with two kids that are both girls cuts down pretty hard on the nudity threads for me. Also make it hard to check out at work, not saying to not do it, just my participation witll be limited.

[misteraven]

I penpal’ed one for a while. Pretty sure I sent her a mix tape at some point. Was supposed to fly her out to the 12oz warehouse but it never made it that far.