At first I was a bit reluctant to give into referring to people as normies because it seemed a bit elitist, but I'm realizing more and more that the wesbites I used to call home have been taken over buy a certain type of person incapable of dealing with anything remotely offensive or edgy online and it makes me sick. And corporations are enabling it by giving into cancel culture and dropping sponsorships without any acknowledgement of context or intent. I think as the internet and multiplayer gaming became ultra mainstream (2018-present because of Fortnite and explosion of twitch), corporations took notice and began targeting the lowest common denominator of people ("normies") for commercialization and slowly but surely attempted scrubbing out any trace of the genuine, edgy, "politically incorrect" communities that previously gave their websites culture. They cultivated environments where conflict was not allowed and considered harassment. I used to come home from high school and feel like I was jumping into the salty spitoon, the internet was a refuge from the rules and regulation of the real world. But now it feels like the real world is a refuge from the rules, regulation, censorship, and political correctness of the internet.
I say this because I don't think its entirely the normies faults. But their presence and the mainstream attention it brings, inevitably catches the eyes of corporations who seek to monetize the attention of the masses and they will gladly censor, moderate, and mold platforms into brand friendly Weenie Hut Jr's because it brings in more money. And over time, this has an effect on culture of which future generations will be conditioned by when they begin using the internet.
Anyone who was on twitch or youtube 2017 and before can tell you it was so much more real and exciting back then. YouTube basically sat back and let the community manage itself as long it didnt break any rules explicitely stated in TOS. Twitch was a place for nerds and lighthearted Trihard spam. Trends and culture were created by and truly reflective of the people of the platform, people were rewarded for being interesting and pioneering new genres of content. They were unfiltered, sometimes they went too far, but were ultimately called out by other members of the community, or ostricized for being douchebags when they deserved it, but they were never deplatformed or shadowbanned and could nearly always come back by regaining the trust of the community. But now YouTube and Twitch will hide comments, shadow ban people, and punish you for beefing with other "content creators" and it feels like we haven't had any major developments in the culture for the past 3 years... everything is just brands, reaction clips, and politically correct "content". TV 2.0
I'm sort of going on a tangent here but perhaps I'm just venting
I guess it boils down to the fact that mainstream attention of online gaming and social communities caught the eyes of corporations who realized they could monetize all this attention. Social media companies realized it's a lot less profitable to act as bulletinboards than it is to become a publishing service that algorithmically maximizes watch time and user engagement. Who cares about what people think is cool and popular. We'll just serve them whatever keeps them online longer.
But six years of this heavily censored "content creator" brand bullshit has slowly eroded community and conditioned people into being politically correct TV personalities for money and fame. And it's sort of rubbed off on the average user. Back then you didn't play games because everybody else was playing them on twitch or a "content creator" was promoting them, but because you enjoyed the game and people who played it. Every new game dies as soon as there isn't enough "content" to produce for it on youtube. I really miss when video game communities revolved around the people who played them not the "content creators" who promoted it. It all feels so corporate now.
Is this just the natural progression of late stage capitalism on the internet?
Sincerely apologize for how many different directions this post went. This was originally a reply to a post about the positive aspects of gatekeeping but I realized it was no longer a reply and just me venting about several issues with no coherent point. Share your thoughts.
I say this because I don't think its entirely the normies faults. But their presence and the mainstream attention it brings, inevitably catches the eyes of corporations who seek to monetize the attention of the masses and they will gladly censor, moderate, and mold platforms into brand friendly Weenie Hut Jr's because it brings in more money. And over time, this has an effect on culture of which future generations will be conditioned by when they begin using the internet.
Anyone who was on twitch or youtube 2017 and before can tell you it was so much more real and exciting back then. YouTube basically sat back and let the community manage itself as long it didnt break any rules explicitely stated in TOS. Twitch was a place for nerds and lighthearted Trihard spam. Trends and culture were created by and truly reflective of the people of the platform, people were rewarded for being interesting and pioneering new genres of content. They were unfiltered, sometimes they went too far, but were ultimately called out by other members of the community, or ostricized for being douchebags when they deserved it, but they were never deplatformed or shadowbanned and could nearly always come back by regaining the trust of the community. But now YouTube and Twitch will hide comments, shadow ban people, and punish you for beefing with other "content creators" and it feels like we haven't had any major developments in the culture for the past 3 years... everything is just brands, reaction clips, and politically correct "content". TV 2.0
I'm sort of going on a tangent here but perhaps I'm just venting
I guess it boils down to the fact that mainstream attention of online gaming and social communities caught the eyes of corporations who realized they could monetize all this attention. Social media companies realized it's a lot less profitable to act as bulletinboards than it is to become a publishing service that algorithmically maximizes watch time and user engagement. Who cares about what people think is cool and popular. We'll just serve them whatever keeps them online longer.
But six years of this heavily censored "content creator" brand bullshit has slowly eroded community and conditioned people into being politically correct TV personalities for money and fame. And it's sort of rubbed off on the average user. Back then you didn't play games because everybody else was playing them on twitch or a "content creator" was promoting them, but because you enjoyed the game and people who played it. Every new game dies as soon as there isn't enough "content" to produce for it on youtube. I really miss when video game communities revolved around the people who played them not the "content creators" who promoted it. It all feels so corporate now.
Is this just the natural progression of late stage capitalism on the internet?
Sincerely apologize for how many different directions this post went. This was originally a reply to a post about the positive aspects of gatekeeping but I realized it was no longer a reply and just me venting about several issues with no coherent point. Share your thoughts.
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