Journalist Carole Cadwalladr1 said it in her TED Talk2, and she meant Facebook. It has been proven since the Cambridge Analytica scandal3 that so-called “social” media are anything but social. They are a catalyst for hate and racism4, give more reach to radical and extremist positions, do not comply with laws5, and prevent public discourse6. They are diametrically opposed to our societal values.7 Read more

Who would have thought six months ago that Twitter would die so quickly and clearly? My choice of words is not exaggerated. We are witnessing the death of a platform. Not that I ever had an account on this so-called social medium. I use its open API with my own Nitter instance1, as introduced here as a blog post two years ago2. Free of advertising, the collection of behavioral data, a user interface full of distractions, dark patterns, and 3rd-party content, I read tweets from interesting people as an RSS feed together with all other news in my personal Nextcloud news reader. Read more