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A set of thoughts rattling around my head. These facts have a common sourcethe election of Donald Trump as the 45th president of the United States. That Trump was elected, ignored the science of the vaccine, flouted the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election, and that over 74,000,000 people voted for him is evidence of a bizarrely polarized information environment in the US. On one pole are respectable (though not flawless) journalistic efforts such as The New York Times, CNN, nightly news programs, etc. On one pole are the grifters and wingnuts of OANN, Newsmax, Infowars, anti-vaxxers, etc. The role of social media, and Facebook in particular Prior to social media, wingnut press existed, but its reach was blunted due to the barriers of publishing and transmission. With social media, wingnuts found their platform grow, as their inciting, fiery rhetoric triggers engagement from readers, cause it to spread. It is reasonable to state that Trump would not be president if it werent for social media. And that the Covid-is-a-hoax, anti-mask, anti-vax, rigged election sentiment would not be nearly as prevalent if it werent for the petri dish that is Facebook. So, while Facebook isnt the cause of the shitshow weve seen in America and much of the world the past 4 years, its most certain a contributor, a contributor that has seen its own fortunes grow as greater chaos was sowed. I appreciated the analysis shared in this tweet thread: Stephen, why are you so critical of Facebook and not the other big tech companies? A for well-intentioned engineers about how to navigate the complexities of big tech. Stephen Diehl (@smdiehl) January 3, 2021 Where he gets at the heart of the business model: And that leads to Facebook, the singularly worst company in the tech sector ever. Its business model is to strip mine data from your relationships to your friends and family. It does this by showing you addictive, misleading and divisive content to optimise your screen time. (7/) Stephen Diehl (@smdiehl) January 3, 2021 And the ...