Social media, it's changed almost everything

Dozer said:
I'm mid thirties and have been bashing around on bikes for thirty years. ""blah blah BLAH BLAH
I'm keen to see your opinions on this. I want to hear from young dudes who have never known otherwise and people like me who've been on the scene before the almighty internet arrived. What positives and negatives do you see social media having on mountain biking?
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We're hitting mid 50's....

get off our lawn....

we worked at a uni computer lab, when 16 colours were for rich people and monitors with fish bowl aspects were the norm....... AARPnet started and we both thought... f*ck this is awesome.....

we were wrong.... so f*cking wrong..

farkin.net was the only good thing that ever existed and the post we did about BMX helping someones crotch fruit with an assignment... it was the best thing until "agent picolax" came along.....

We were so wrong... then social media started... and all our bad thoughts were confirmed... the internet is the downfall of humanity (god, imagine being one of them)

Are you off our lawn yet?

S

p.s. funny thing, just got a gig at job doing command line linux work to process while genome DNA data and none of the "cool internet kids" who have "influenza" know how the f*ck the command line works..... HAA HAAA HAA being old still hurts.
 
Spanky_Ham said:
We're hitting mid 50's....

get off our lawn....

we worked at a uni computer lab, when 16 colours were for rich people and monitors with fish bowl aspects were the norm....... AARPnet started and we both thought... f*ck this is awesome.....

we were wrong.... so f*cking wrong..

farkin.net was the only good thing that ever existed and the post we did about BMX helping someones crotch fruit with an assignment... it was the best thing until "agent picolax" came along.....

We were so wrong... then social media started... and all our bad thoughts were confirmed... the internet is the downfall of humanity (god, imagine being one of them)

Are you off our lawn yet?

S

p.s. funny thing, just got a gig at job doing command line linux work to process while genome DNA data and none of the "cool internet kids" who have "influenza" know how the f*ck the command line works..... HAA HAAA HAA being old still hurts.
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Can someone translate this for me please? Looks interesting.
 
Spanky_Ham said:
We're hitting mid 50's....

get off our lawn....

we worked at a uni computer lab, when 16 colours were for rich people and monitors with fish bowl aspects were the norm....... AARPnet started and we both thought... f*ck this is awesome.....

we were wrong.... so f*cking wrong..

farkin.net was the only good thing that ever existed and the post we did about BMX helping someones crotch fruit with an assignment... it was the best thing until "agent picolax" came along.....

We were so wrong... then social media started... and all our bad thoughts were confirmed... the internet is the downfall of humanity (god, imagine being one of them)

Are you off our lawn yet?

S

p.s. funny thing, just got a gig at job doing command line linux work to process while genome DNA data and none of the "cool internet kids" who have "influenza" know how the f*ck the command line works..... HAA HAAA HAA being old still hurts.
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James Ellroy. Is that you?
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Jabubu said:
I just deactivated my Twitter account - the algorithm is pushing me more and more towards confrontation with dickhead football fans and bike hating motorists, just the thickest or most blinkered people and they were pulling me down to their level. Congrats to Elon Muck for engineering Twitter towards a platform of hate and division but I no longer want to be a part of it.

I'm going to enjoy being free of yet another time sink. YouTube shorts on the other hand - total k-hole!
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Twitter used to be an amazing resource. It was where the academics, researchers, journos and pollies used to congregate. I was able to keep up with who was publishing what and when, then engage in all the ensuing discussion. Of course there was all the negativity and arguing, but it was always up to the individual if they wanted to engage or not. For me, most often, I avoided it. I got a LOT out of that platform over the years. But when Musk took over I took off. I wasn't going to support the direction he was taking it in. He's a fucking idiot - he might, and I stress might understand business, or how to be a dodgy prick and make money out of other people's ideas, but he is a complete fool when it comes to sociology and politics. He's like a first year undergrad that has the arrogance and naivete to think that they're the first person to have a big idea. He's totally ignorant of the generations of people that have thought through the issues he's championing and have already found out what is and is not a good idea. He's also just an infantile troll that clearly missed out on a bunch of maturity that comes from good upbringing. I don't particularly blame him for that, but hate that the world now has to deal with his childishness, which he ignorantly thinks is some kind of next level thinking.

This place is now the only kind of social media I use. No FB, insta, Twitter, TicTock, etc. I look info up on YouTube, but detest having to wade through the oceans of shit posted by 15 year olds and attention starved adults.

A former boss of mine once said that all the internet has done is give the idiots a louder voice. Apart from being able to buy MTB parts from around the world, I think that he may have been largely correct.
 
johnny said:
This place is now the only kind of social media I use. No FB, insta, Twitter, TicTock, etc. I look info up on YouTube, but detest having to wade through the oceans of shit posted by 15 year olds and attention starved adults.

A former boss of mine once said that all the internet has done is give the idiots a louder voice. Apart from being able to buy MTB parts from around the world, I think that he may have been largely correct.
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It's full of sad and pathetic people that are only looking for a rise instead of contributing to a solid conversation. When the latter happens it's a great place to be but generally it's swamped with fuckwits.

I use FB for local events, MTB club updates and marketplace. Instagram, I chat to a few people but I don't hold much interest at engaging with it. I don't use TikTok at all. I'm already feeling better about my decision, and that includes not posting here as much.
 
Spot on @johnny - I still use twitter as a news feed for a bunch of different interests from bikes and cars to politics and art. So much good stuff there.

But the debate and conversation between people plummeted due to bots and trolls and spoiled an underrated resource.

My other half has decided to get an EV, and it ain't gonna be a Tesla, cos fuck that guy.
 
johnny said:
Twitter used to be an amazing resource. It was where the academics, researchers, journos and pollies used to congregate. I was able to keep up with who was publishing what and when, then engage in all the ensuing discussion. Of course there was all the negativity and arguing, but it was always up to the individual if they wanted to engage or not. For me, most often, I avoided it. I got a LOT out of that platform over the years. But when Musk took over I took off. I wasn't going to support the direction he was taking it in. He's a fucking idiot - he might, and I stress might understand business, or how to be a dodgy prick and make money out of other people's ideas, but he is a complete fool when it comes to sociology and politics. He's like a first year undergrad that has the arrogance and naivete to think that they're the first person to have a big idea. He's totally ignorant of the generations of people that have thought through the issues he's championing and have already found out what is and is not a good idea. He's also just an infantile troll that clearly missed out on a bunch of maturity that comes from good upbringing. I don't particularly blame him for that, but hate that the world now has to deal with his childishness, which he ignorantly thinks is some kind of next level thinking.

This place is now the only kind of social media I use. No FB, insta, Twitter, TicTock, etc. I look info up on YouTube, but detest having to wade through the oceans of shit posted by 15 year olds and attention starved adults.

A former boss of mine once said that all the internet has done is give the idiots a louder voice. Apart from being able to buy MTB parts from around the world, I think that he may have been largely correct.
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I opened a facebook account for the first time ever a couple of years just for marketplace access... I (quite naively for a while...) started using the rest of it, and i see how addictive it can be!! But it quickly became just what a horrible place it is, and how many horrible people are out there :(

I keep it to the Pathetic Mountain bikers and some obscure stuff like the International NSU Ro80 page which is amusing.

Totally agree on Musk. If he'd kept to cars and rocket ships he'd be rightfully lauded as a very positive contribution to the planet - the twitter stuff is just very weird and annoying...
 
Tubbsy said:
My other half has decided to get an EV, and it ain't gonna be a Tesla, cos fuck that guy.
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Im still not on board with that idea tbh - the cars are not designed or built by musk, and they really reflect the efforts of a whole bunch of super talented engineers. Musk is really just the guy they got them all in the same room.

And the money Tesla makes goes into more teslas (and cross funding SpaceX), not mansions and yachts for Musk.
 
Haakon said:
Im still not on board with that idea tbh - the cars are not designed or built by musk, and they really reflect the efforts of a whole bunch of super talented engineers. Musk is really just the guy they got them all in the same room.
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Sure; he's not the only objectionable billionaire making products I buy. I'm sure the cars are good, there are thousands of them in Canberra. My neighbour has a dual-motor Y and loves it. Best value for performance and range by some margin.

Still chalked off the list, partly because of Musk, partly his obsequious arse-licking fanbois, but also we don't really like the look of them.

And Musk spoiled twitter.
 
Because I’m a tradie, sorry Hakkers, I get fed lots of random pages of what are supposed to be ‘help me with my renovation work or something or woodworking or decking or whatever’ you’ll click on it and there might be 1% offering actually constructive criticism or advice. The rest are just a pack of hungry sad hyenas descending on the poor soul that was silly enough to ask for help on the internet and tearing the work to pieces and finding sny real or imagined fault.
It’s horrible.
Social media. It’s a scourge. My 9 year old is asking for a phone in grade 5 because all the other kids have them. No fucking way! I’m a prick in her eyes. It’s a constant battle.
But what really scares me is AI. it may not be able to do fingers well yet but once it sorts that little issue out we’re all fucked. Half joking. But seriously. Try and search something on FB or Google and you are forced to have a discussion with a Computer! It is becoming more and more ingrained in every thing we do. Hard to trust anything you see, hear or read these days.
 
I'm on Twitter / X a fair bit for work (yes really) and as others have said it's taken an absolute nosedive in the last 12 months or so since Elon took over. I never really saw it as close to the peak of social discourse (could be f***ing funny though), but new algorithms are clearly skewed towards antagonism, zero fact checking (because Musk fired them all) and a heavy populist bias.

The good news bit: it's not working. Twitter / X profits have fallen by a quarter in the past year, and users by about the same amount since Elon took over. Twitter's Australian division has plummeted, they've lost about 80% in revenue in the same period.
 
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