The Social Dilemma

I finally got a chance to watch this film last evening after a LOT of people had recommended I do so. It was indeed a very well made film but I still had a few reservations about it. The core takeaways were valid; social media has been repeatedly used as a tool to control the minds of the masses and move them in the direction required by the highest bidder. Teenage years as I remember them are no more and they have been completely destroyed for this generation. Depression and suicide are very real issues that are being amplified by social graphs. We are the products being sold to the highest bidder and our minds are being trained to engage for as long as possible on meaningless garbage for the most part. All of this is true. As someone who works deep in the data privacy and security space of the tech industry, I can absolutely attest to these harsh realities of social media. 

However, the film was unidimensional and lacked balance. I found it quite ironic that a film that talks about the imbalance and bubbled views projected to an individual by social platforms did in fact do the same thing. I would have loved to see more than a couple of formality snippets of the positive side of social media too. It would have been nice for the filmmakers and the experts on the panels to recommend and talk about the right way to leverage social media for the strengths it was designed. Since they decided to skip out on that part, I'm going to pen down a few ways I have been able to leverage the power of online connections to improve my life. 

1. Facebook has helped me learn and grow specifically by using groups. I specifically am a part of birding groups, hiking groups and mushroom groups that help me share, learn and grow in fields that I’m very passionate about. I have had the opportunity to interact with and meet (both in person and virtually) some fantastic people who have dedicated their lives to these fields and have learned so much from them. I feel they have helped be become a better birder, a more avid hiker and a safer forager. 
2. WhatsApp has helped me stay in touch with friends and family across the globe. I have categorically made it a point to not be a part of the notoriously infamous “Family WhatsApp Groups” that are full of spam and fake news. Due to this platform, I have strengthened the bonds with people I care about, had deep meaningful conversations that taught me so much over the years and most importantly had the opportunity to be there for friends when they needed me and vice versa. Sometimes, all one needs is someone to listen and WhatsApp absolutely enables that.
3. Quora, before its decline in 2019 was probably the platform I spent most of my time on. For years I was a silent reader learning and soaking in knowledge about a diverse range of very interesting topics. Eventually I tried my hand at writing and that was an altogether different learning experience. Quora offered me the opportunity to interact with people at the top of their field, folks who I really admire and look up to. It allowed me to get advice and mentorship from those who I would otherwise never had the chance to interact with and similarly also gave me a platform to talk to hundreds of thousands of young students and professionals. I had the the opportunity to grow as both a mentor and a mentee and the lessons I took away from my time here are priceless. 
4. YouTube probably played the biggest role in fueling my passion for food. It gave me the the opportunity to travel the world and learn about cultures and cuisines from around the globe without ever having left my living room. The quality of content on YouTube is spectacular if you curate it to what you wish to learn about. I sometimes go down the rabbit hole and spend an hour of mindless clicking too; it is definitely a growth area for me; but the benefits I’ve gained in terms of knowledge and experience in the food space outweigh the cons for me. It has made me a more passionate cook and foodie, willing to try out more diverse cuisines and along the way made, taught me empathy towards other cultures. Today, when I meet someone from a different country, I’m able to have a very in depth conversation with them about the cuisine from various parts of their country. This has been such a fantastic ice-breaker for me in countless situations. People immediately warm up to you when they realize you know a little about their heritage and are keen to learn more. 
5. Instagram, Snapchat, Pintrest, TikTok, etc. have never interested me tbh so there’s not much I can comment on those. I have at some point tried them all out but they were not for me.

Like all advancements in technology, it is for us to choose whether we use that super computer on the other side of our smartphone screen to empower our lives and take us to utopia or to allow it to completely control our minds and let society degenerate into dystopia. Like most things, good balance is always the key.