Your reason for some online interactions being unchristian is thought provoking. I’ve been working on leaving most social media as well because of the harm we know it can do. I’d also like to set a good example for my daughters. But this is a new angle I’m excited to see more of.
I’m also glad to hear you’ll be more active here! I much prefer the longer form content Substack enables. It leads to more thought-out content. Thank you for what you contribute!
Agree that the platforms have “reprogrammed” how we think about people. Put another way it has disordered our emotions toward people (and our emotions in general). My answer has been to try to be more intentional about spending more time in person contacts . But it is more difficult than I thought. Another key is a daily prayer life and a focus on devotion. That means reading as much devotional material as analytical material aspirational goal ). I do think you have made many of the right choices as I have followed you. Given the strong presence of new Calvinists on social media, a balancing voice was truly needed (and I say that as a Catholic ). I do see your dilemma as to some degree you become a prisoner of your patrons (you have not let that distort your mission as far as I can see). Good luck and God Bless.
I think I left Twitter for good. I might reactivate my account just to point people to the other places I’m at now. But, Twitter has become toxic in many ways. While I have friends in there, it has turned into a net negative experience. I’ve been pondering “what does it profit a man to gain the whole world but lose his soul?”
Of course I'm going to say this, but the reason that algorithmic media is the most popular and least human of all media is that it is the most profitable. Tiktok will never serve content that you find boring, even if the content is edifying. They need your eyeballs on that screen as long as possible, to serve you more ads. And thus, content-creators have to compete for your eyeballs too to monetize that. Once again, the market gets its hands on an essential part of human life, monetizes and commodifies it, and sterilizes it.
While I loved the freewheeling (and smaller)Twitter of ~10-12 years ago, where I connected with you, some mutuals, the Side B folks, and kibitzed with "weird Christian Twitter" as it would be called in hindsight, that world is long gone.
Your dilemma is interesting – and sort of a side effect of the "attention economy", he said, shuddering. As you said, disseminating information is what the Internet does – but the lack of quality gates and filters within that is still unsolved. So platform nomadism has turned out to be my approach.
Your reason for some online interactions being unchristian is thought provoking. I’ve been working on leaving most social media as well because of the harm we know it can do. I’d also like to set a good example for my daughters. But this is a new angle I’m excited to see more of.
I’m also glad to hear you’ll be more active here! I much prefer the longer form content Substack enables. It leads to more thought-out content. Thank you for what you contribute!
Agree that the platforms have “reprogrammed” how we think about people. Put another way it has disordered our emotions toward people (and our emotions in general). My answer has been to try to be more intentional about spending more time in person contacts . But it is more difficult than I thought. Another key is a daily prayer life and a focus on devotion. That means reading as much devotional material as analytical material aspirational goal ). I do think you have made many of the right choices as I have followed you. Given the strong presence of new Calvinists on social media, a balancing voice was truly needed (and I say that as a Catholic ). I do see your dilemma as to some degree you become a prisoner of your patrons (you have not let that distort your mission as far as I can see). Good luck and God Bless.
There’s freedom over yonder, beyond the cold glow.
I think I left Twitter for good. I might reactivate my account just to point people to the other places I’m at now. But, Twitter has become toxic in many ways. While I have friends in there, it has turned into a net negative experience. I’ve been pondering “what does it profit a man to gain the whole world but lose his soul?”
Of course I'm going to say this, but the reason that algorithmic media is the most popular and least human of all media is that it is the most profitable. Tiktok will never serve content that you find boring, even if the content is edifying. They need your eyeballs on that screen as long as possible, to serve you more ads. And thus, content-creators have to compete for your eyeballs too to monetize that. Once again, the market gets its hands on an essential part of human life, monetizes and commodifies it, and sterilizes it.
While I loved the freewheeling (and smaller)Twitter of ~10-12 years ago, where I connected with you, some mutuals, the Side B folks, and kibitzed with "weird Christian Twitter" as it would be called in hindsight, that world is long gone.
Your dilemma is interesting – and sort of a side effect of the "attention economy", he said, shuddering. As you said, disseminating information is what the Internet does – but the lack of quality gates and filters within that is still unsolved. So platform nomadism has turned out to be my approach.
Yes, that’s exactly what I need. Find me a multi-millionaire who wants to entirely fund J&S.