Loftwings and Demons

I might survive if I was still logged into Tumblr, but I wouldn't be living.

Been noticing more new Tumblr people on Pillowfort lately. Sounds like some kind of, ah, additional Livejournal--style changes being implemented on Tumblr are the cause, but I haven't investigated the details myself.  Don't know about Dreamwidth but I should probably subscribe to more comms here if I want to see more of what's going on. Or not--maybe I'll just hang like a spider in my quiet corner here, lol. To be decided! Nevertheless, maybe I should check some of the comm activity on this site to see if we've been getting new users here, too.

Tumblr is continuing its vast slide downhill and I'm not sure how long I'll be able to hold out on that platform, even with a defunct blog. The Tumblr Live debacle (what is this 'snooze' nonsense?) has convinced me that no, Tumblr is not going to get better, it's just going to give its users the option to pay Tumblr for them to be exploited by it. And no, this cannot be fixed, because it is the point of venture funding and how companies like Tumblr work. It's not and never will be about the customer, even if the customer is paying for the service. This is because the company runs on debt. There are plenty of other paid services like this--for example Amazon, which is anti-customer in a lot of ways. I boycott them both because they're anti-worker and anti-customer. Amazon, like Tumblr, was also not profitable for a large portion of its history, and regularly operates by selling items for a loss. But profitability didn't make it start treating employees or customers better. Its entire business model is about pleasing the investors at the expense of everyone else. And that's how Tumblr works too.

This leaves me with a dilemma because I know a lot of the people I met on Tumblr are never leaving that site...

So I recall back in 2018 when a whole bunch of people left Tumblr due to the NSFW ban.  Now some of those people came here or to other small sites like Pillowfort (which is another site I'm on).  But some of them went to Twitter.  And now that Twitter is being massively defaced by Musk people on Twitter are coming back to Tumblr. 

Personally, I'm beginning to think that these large venture-capital funded sites are not any more stable or reliable than smaller ones.  And since their business model is ultimately one of inherent exploitation of their users, I'm not coming back to Tumblr.  As long as any users have to be fed ads to pay for the site, it is reliant on advertiser revenue and thus the content is dictated by the advertisers.  I'll consider returning to Tumblr if they're someday no longer beholden to any advertisers or external companies like Apple to determine the content policies of their site, and they change their content policies to serve their users. 

As for Twitter, I've never liked that site and in fact think it is intrinsically bad.  But though it doesn't affect me personally, I feel bad for all the employees who were laid off, and all the destruction Musk has and will cause to the knowledge and networks people built up on that site.  I know far too many people relied on a site that is now wholly under the control of a man who is essentially a glorified scam artist.

I often read the notes and reblogs of Tumblr posts, which may sound tortuous, and sometimes is, but is also highly informative when one applies critical thinking to what is being said.  It's also, I would think, not nearly as tortuous as being subjected to getting a lot of notes on one's own post on Tumblr. I think people often complain when they're told competing information and just kind of give up evaluating it.  I find this unfortunate because it is rarely the case that all arguments made are equally well-constructed.  And in fact having a number of arguments made by a variety of different people all in one place can be a very valuable resource.  So while I do often get frustrated by trying to discern the truth for myself given the amount of incorrect information and outright lies out there, I know there are processes that can be applied to discern more correct arguments from less correct ones, and also to know which statements are irrelevant to determining correctness.

Some statements are simply about declaring a position, not proving it.  These have no relevance when determining the the value of that position.  People who agree with it will make positive statements of this kind about the position, and people who disagree will make negative statements of this kind about the same position.  Whether one enjoys them or loathes them, this has no bearing on the truth of the statement itself, because this kind of statement is simply not designed to help uncover truth.

Instead, we must look for actual arguments being made.  And we must ask questions about these arguments.  For example, is the logical foundation of the arguments correct?  Are sources given?  Do the sources actually say what the material says they say?  What are the limitations and biases of the sources? 

If you ever evaluate a source to have absolutely no bias, this is incorrect, because all sources are biased.  Some biases are stronger or more relevant than others, but everyone has their own biases.  This is in fact the point of people, that even when we are not predictable, we are directed and not simply randomly or aimlessly adopting positions.  Unlike dice, which we want to be random, humans do not benefit from random behavior.  We also are unable to make decisions based on a perfect and complete understanding of the world around us. Thus we develop biases to help us to navigate that world.  This helps us survive, but it also means we are biased towards making certain types of errors.  By understanding the biases involved in a situation, you can understand what conclusions the biases may predispose one to.  Of course, just because someone has reached a conclusion that their own biases support doesn't mean they're wrong, just that this should be one factor used to evaluate the quality of the argument.

When references are given, it is important to check whether the references actually support what the argument is using them to support.  Sometimes people misunderstand a reference or purposely misrepresent it.  Either way, the end result is a reference that does not actually support the argument being made.  Depending on the references given, this may require advanced reading comprehension and deductive skills, as well as a great deal of time to accomplish.  That's just the nature of things!  No one can do this all the time.  But it should be done regularly if one cares about truth.

Examining the logic of an argument is also a vital part of determining its value.  Evidence by itself is meaningless without the mental tools to reason about its wider ramifications.  Again, a very time consuming process, but a necessary one.

Going back to my mention of Tumblr notes and reblogs of posts, I find them useful to read because they're often an organic compilation of opposing viewpoints (along with a great deal of completely irrelevant chatter).  And by taking the time to assess the arguments given in the ways I've mentioned here, I often feel that they provide valuable additional understanding of the assertions in the original post.  And that's why I like to read notes and reblogs on posts.

I'm sorry to see Tumblr getting progressively worse with censorship, but this is why I left the site years ago and won't be posting there again.  It's never going to get better, but I've also come to realize that that will also never spur a mass exudos to less restrictive social media, because less restrictive social media is also less commercialized, with the accompanying lesser financial resources and differring focus.

I think platforms like Dreamwidth and Pillowfort are better for my purposes, because I can't abide such random and arbitrary censorship, but I also admit the Dreamwidth interface can be awkward to use, even if I appreciate its power, and Dreamwidth is not great for artists, even if it could be usable for that purpose by someone sufficiently determined to do so.  Pillowfort is much more intuitive for someone used to Tumblr, but I understand that many artists find the max file upload size rather restrictive.  Both platforms also lack the giant city feel of a large social media platform, and I can understand how that could be offputting to people as well.  Even I find that aspect frustrating at times. 

But I find the direction Tumblr and other large social media sites have decided to go in much more concerning.  I think the thing is, this keeps happening because these companies realize people will complain, but, well, it will never matter to their bottom line.  Apps are more important than civil rights to their popularity.  Because apps aid commercialization.  And commercialization will ensure large resources are available for development and storage, thus ensuring large quantities of people on the platform, and this social capital, ie. the commercialization of social bonds themselves, will ensure the chokehold of these platforms and corporations like Apple.  It doesn't even matter that I've never bought an Apple phone or computer, my life has been indelibly altered by the choices that reprehensible company has made.  And the same is true of anyone who uses social media affected by their draconian rules, which for many places on the internet, are in actuality laws.

I think I've identified what it is about Tumblr that gives it its distinctive atmosphere (for better AND worse).  It's like if someone took one of those hippie communes where no one has locks on their doors, but got millions of people to join it, then attempted (extremely badly) to commercialize it to a ridiculous degree.

Like, you get exposure to people and discussions you would never otherwise encounter, but the nature of the discussions taking place in a constant performance atmosphere and in a society with little to no understanding of the concept of boundaries does twist that discussion in some truly horrific ways.

I continue to find it both hilarious and sad that Tumblr's ad system doesn't seem to operate on any conceivably logical basis. Like, I don't ever feel Tumblr's ads know too much about me, or for that matter, even care what I think about them. At the same time, why must people on Tumblr endure ads at all given how terribly unprofitable it all seems to be. Tumblr doesn't make money. So why does it have ads?

There are so many times I read Tumblr threads where people are arguing and I end up feeling angry at every single person in that reblog chain plus OP.  I hate arguments where everyone involved seems to just be trying to preach to the choir and so doesn't even attempt to think through what they're saying.  Also when people do the 'well look here's an argument against my argument that's badly constructed, all arguments against my argument ergo must be exactly like this one'.  I hate that so much. So much.

ramble-tags: so glad I at least don't post on Tumblr anymore, even if I couldn't quite bring myself to delete, I mean, even if I did, realistically I'd still be checking a number of posts there, of course there are plenty of bad arguments on other social media but in general it doesn't allow for quite the same perfect storm of people who hate each other yelling at each other with the equivalent of loudspeakers, in a crowded street