Fix The World In 60 Seconds

social skills for the very-online retard

You are all autistic. Allow me to teach you a pro gamer move that will, with close to zero time and effort on your part, not only change your life but also the world.

It’s very simple: ‘Like’ things that you like.

Even better, like things that you don’t even like but which are created by people you like or at least want to encourage.

Hell, like things you don’t even like that are created by people you don’t even like but who you want to get in the good graces of for the sake of acquiring power and influence.

If you think it is literally in any way at all good, productive, or worthy of existing: Like it!

Why? Because It doesn’t matter who they are or what they’re creating: creating things is hard. And to those who creates things it is not obvious what is valuable to people. If a person or business is seeking to provide value to others (they are, because this is what 99% of everyone is trying to do always) the only way they know that it’s working is if they are getting some kind of feedback. Whether it’s more sales, more subscribers, more time and attention, whatever. And when it comes to social media: your likes, comments, shares, subscribes, etc are the only feedback mechanisms available.

Want to get someone to do more of something? Want to get people to work for you for basically no effort on your part? Want to get people to give you exactly what you want without you even having to ask? It’s really simple. Reward them when they do the things that you like. Something as simple as strategically using phrases like “Thank you”, “I love this”, “This is awesome!”—a ‘Like’ of any kind—online or otherwise, can literally bend the world to your will.

Want to get someone to do less of something? Want someone to stop doing this and go try something new? Want to end a bad behavior in someone that has plagued your relationship for years? It’s really simple. Ignore the bad behavior.¹

The Internet Diverts Our Social Instincts

Apparently literally no one on the internet took basic high school psychology and learned about Pavlovian conditioning, so let me give you the TLDR: What you reward you get more of, what you ignore you get less of. And punishment for bad behavior is far less effective at eliciting change than reward for good behavior. You, a moron in an autistic genius’ body, not only get this backwards but actually try to punish people by rewarding them.

When you agree with something on the internet what do you do? At absolute best you’ll simply ‘like’ it. And even that’s a stretch, I can say from experience. Not even 10% of those who actually read my emails end up ‘like’ing the post (And not even 5% of my total subscribers). Are you really telling me that 90%+ of you received not a single shred of value and would prefer I stopped writing? I am certain that is not the case. And me and my numbers are not the exception but the rule for creative content online.

But disagree with someone on the internet? Their creation literally causing any twinge of negative emotion at all in you? Oh boy. Here come the long, aggressive comments; sharing the link to your friends so they will validate how bad and dumb it is; retweet so you can add some snarky comment about it; write long posts “debunking” it, etc.

When you do this you think you are punishing them; Stripping them of their social approval, eliciting social ostracism (for most of human history, a guaranteed death sentence) in an effort to elicit behavior change.

But you are wrong. You’ve been bamboozled. You are rewarding them. Because on the internet: social approval is not the reward. Attention is.

All digital media, social or otherwise, is measured by attention. When you comment, retweet, share, etc you tell the algorithm “hey this is worthy of attention”, so it shows it to more people. Outrage is the most potent fuel for the spreading of information online; Your crusade against “bad content” or “falsehood” or “dangerous ideas” only leads to a Streisand effect. A chopping off of one of the Hydra’s heads so it can spawn two more.

Does it bother you that social media is such a hellscape of conflict and mostly negativity? That news media is mostly clickbait and fearporn? Then stop being a troglodyte with no capacity for emotional regulation encouraging it. Every time you ignore that which you like and give attention to that which you don’t, you bring us all one step toward one step closer to hell.

Conscious VS Unconscious Interneting

Also worth noting: data analytics like “engagement” or “watch time” are generally only available to businesses or large influencers. And even when it’s available to all, the sample size is so small that trying to parse data from noise is not even worth the effort if you aren’t actively optimizing for business and sales.

So when all you do is observe and scroll, never liking or commenting or sharing, all you do is make big companies trying to steal your soul more effective at it meanwhile making small individuals or creators who are actually trying to provide you value less effective (Because they are getting no feedback. And no feedback is feedback saying “this is not valuable, stop doing it” so they go and do something else).

Do you want to increase social stratification and income inequality, and the hollowing out of the middle class? Unconscious interneting—letting your chimp instincts dictate your online behavior—is the single greatest way you contribute to it!

Honestly, it peeves me to no end that most content creators (Youtubers in particular) don’t explain why liking, sharing, subscribing, etc are important (hence the point of this post). They just say stupid shit like “Most of you aren’t subscribed. Please subscribe” or “I’m trying to get to 100K subscribers”. Why? Who cares? Why should I clog up my feed just to make you feel good?

They miss the point entirely. When you subscribe or comment or like or share or whatever you boost their signal. Do you think this content is important? Did you benefit from it? Do you want others to also benefit? Boost the signal!

And further, you motivate them to continue creating. Do you like them? Do you want them to feel good about themselves? Do you want them to continue working on what they are working on? Boost their signal!

Creators VS Supporters

Most people’s job is not to create the new, but to boost the signal of the existing. If you are not creating nor boosting then you are failing. Ideally you should be doing both. But If you aren’t especially creative or you haven’t quite figured out what’s worth being creative toward, you don’t have to be a useless consoomer until you do. Boost signals! It’s so easy and it takes seconds. You can boost hundreds of signals per day, taking hundreds of steps toward a better world, with hardly even a second thought. Every reddit post, every tweet, every Youtube video, every article you are consuming anyway? Like that shit! If you loved it, share that shit!

If I like someone or want to encourage them or even cared enough to consume the content in it’s entirety I always ’like’ it. Every book I read I review on Good Reads. Every YouTube video I watch all the way through I thumb up. Every Reddit post I like I thumb up. At this point I consume so much content that I use leaving my mark as a pseudo-cataloguing system to notify me that I actually consumed it.

Want to make an even greater impact than this? Make an extra effort with small or new creators. If it has no likes at all, you will literally make that person’s day and motivate them to produce for a week with simply a click of your mouse. New or small creators are particularly fragile and your tiny amount of support or ignoring can literally be the deciding factor in whether they continue producing or stop. Imagine how many thousands of people you could mobilize to create things of value if you literally just took the time and energy you were going to spend writing an angry response to some dumb bullshit that will do nothing other than release your anger and instead spent it encouraging people to create.

Do you want a better world? Hell, could you not give shit about a better world and just want to increase your power? Boost the signal of those you want to influence.

Like this fucking post! Or even better….

1. This principle—reward what you like, ignore what you dont—can also singlehandedly change your relationship with yourself. Most people obsess over their flaws and mistakes, and then ignore when they do something positive. Literally the opposite of what is motivating. Meanwhile, all these gigacorps who want to addict you to their trash reward you for every second of attention you give them. Who do you think is going to win, you who never rewards yourself and always berates yourself, or them who constantly reward you and almost never cause you pain?