Note the cable is cut to my mike, This is what goes on once you press enter.
When I first heard about face book i joined because many of my friends had and it was a way to see what they were all up to.
Then it became a place to share notices about my upcoming performances in the Singapore Slingers — A 1920s fox trot orchestra (think of old cartoon music) and a way to share those performance for those who could not attend. I did the video as well and the videos are a legacy which you can see here. I had a direct link to the foxtrot era as my great 2nd uncles Leo Forbstein and Louis Forbes(tein) were hollywood musical directors in that era. Leo was musical director on many Bogart/Becall films that stand as classics to this day. I was named for my maternal grandfather Irwin Forbstein.
Then facebook decided to change our feeds complaining of bandwidth. The real truth was increasing profits and manipulation which continues to evolve. You are nothing but a free content provider and a profit unit. Remember that.
I accepted ads paid for the free connection, but everything you post reveals probably more about you than you know of yourself, which will be used to generate revenue. I am long past caring. And I am driven to speak.
I recognized each of the changes by who engaged with me and how. Prior to President Trump’s 1st term we were pitted against each other for argument’s sake. Keep them yelling. The Righteous Indigitation Industrial Complex had arisen to increase profits. FB will still toss a few out there.
This pattern was easy to spot for a legal research software creator knowing how relevance weighting works.
Relevance weighting in search algorithms through out the internet were changed to SEO manipulation for ad dollars but that is another discussion. That’s why you have to ask AI if you want to find something quick. It wades through the garbage of goole adwords, etc. for you. Then check the link.
Friends flooded facebook with easy content for likes reposting memes. I would fact check the memes and found that validation caught more flies than the vinegar of cognitive dissonance of truth over what they were posting. Many of the memes were sponsored garbage created by teens in the Balkans for jobs. Now its often AI generated hooey, repeated, and written to grab you but losing nuance. I post fact checks there too and note this feed is hidden for ever. Hopefully people see my comment — but those comments are probably AI hacked too.
I would ask why is a picture with words on it worth more than a signed, dated, and hyperlinked article? Because people want validation and they want likes. Populism over truth especially when it is an ‘inconvenient truth’ wins.
I hoped I could change minds. Nope.
I admit to employing shame which doesn’t work. But it is a guilty pleasure especially being a heathen hearing from the holier than thou. After this administration there is no high road for the GOP. That is gone.
I would show them how their news sources lied to them. Didn’t matter, once the media figured out how to pander any libel suit just became the cost of doing business. We all remember the Dominion ¾ of Billion payout. Or ABC and CBS sell outs for business or access. Big bux vs truth — nah. Money wins.
George Carlin said it all those years ago, its a big club and you ain’t in it. And the change has only accelerated from this video now 20 years old.
President Trump’s greatest strategy beside finding and validating our tendencies (eating cats and dogs/murders and rapists - press the fear button over and over and over again) was the cry of FAKE NEWS. Now if someone heard something they didn’t like — fake news.
Try that next time you get in an argument — liberal/conservative — doesn’t matter — everything they say is fake news. Invalidation. Being kind to the immigrant as in the bible? Fake news.
Facebook learned a lesson though. Cognitive dissonance was causing people to quit posting. The new solution was then creating all kinds of feeds.
And the goal was always microtargeting of advertising dollars for the best yield. With attention diverted this changed not only journalism with ad dollars drying up, but also our feeds. The media then staked out audiences — you can be a hemp wearing save the gay baby seals libtard or a pick up driving manly man with firearms beard and tattoo wearing conservative.
Pity for them I am social liberal and fiscally conservative. I had a 2014 Ram Sport, own firearms, and yet sided with Jesus. Hmmm….
And as an old man I have the luxury of so many fake profiles professing their love. I have strung a few along until I got bored with it.
And we get ads as content. I report them as adult content, fraud or self harm to say FU. Facebook has removed the option to tell why. Facebook also refuses to remove fake profiles of friends who have passed.
Then we got reels — most of which are clickbait garbage so I clicked on the ones of pretty girls so at least if I had to look at something, I could indulge my eye for beauty. I could not remove them from my feed.
I rail on like my old dairies on this website so much that I felt my pontificating earned me the title of lay Rabbi. I got few responses.
I asked for engagement and debate. None came. And mostly because I provide links to show what I believe and why. One friend countered with video content. I countered with more articles but that shows how others get information. Just because I read, absorb, and analyze fast doesn’t mean everyone can. His validation was ‘a bunch of people are saying it’. And that’s not science, history or truth.
For while my sermons would get typed in and then ‘something went wrong’ and the whole thing would be lost. I then started typing them into notepad and copy/paste/enter before the cookies watching me type could flag my content. The practice ended as mysteriously as it started.
FB does like pictures though — but its AI reviews them and your content. I try to fool the algorithm by adding a picture but it reads the text and sez nuh uh. Try using this one:
Instead what we get is just the seven deadly sins amplified and normalized and validated by social media. And if you have something to say it will be cancelled. Other than to those who have the same belief system looking for their own validation. But my contemporaries don’t care about that.
Freedom of speech is not free speech because you have to pay to be heard. I thought about buying ad time on conservative networks to post my content but I am sure they would not like any counterpoint — cognitive dissonance — that is not validation.
Likes are validation. Clicks from click farms would make my posts rise to the top. If I cared enough I would pay for clicks.
The battle of ‘my ignorance is as good as your science’ will play out in the public health sector as people quit taking vaccines. Then our overburdened and (rural often closed and now nonexistent) health care system will be flooded just like when dead bodies piled up at the start of COVID. Isn’t interesting to see how many have forgotten the use of refer trucks for the overflow.
So here is a summation of the facebook landscape. Rabbi Arnstein posts articles about greed, corruption and everything that the evangelical’s religious texts rail against enacted by their leader chosen by God. The real problem is knowing God’s purpose.
And for the rest of us. Post funny pictures or personal misery. Those get repeated. When I post about my chronic anxiety and depression, that gets repeated. If it bleeds it leads. Misery loves company. And I keep putting one foot in front of another.
Or maybe go to another platform. But those are dividing up too. Even this platform is little better. Few conservatives are on this platform. But at least I am not whipsawed. Maybe someone will like the picture.
Note I can’t draw, but I had ChatGPT create multiple elements that I could pull together into this collage. ChatGPT can’t create this complex of an image yet.
