Feb 23, 2021, 2:14 PM ETPanel

From Social Pariah to Social Fabric: What Is the Future of Digital Media?

The primary driver of digital harm is identified as a business model that monetizes engagement, addiction, and polarization rather than user well-being.
Social media platforms profit most when users are addicted, anxious, outraged, and polarized, effectively "domesticating" humans into predictable behavioral products.
The internet's original design prioritized rapid adoption and universal connectivity over security, intentionally omitting safeguards and assuming self-regulation would suffice.
Technological evolution (AI, genetics, energy) is occurring faster than civic institutions, legal frameworks, and political processes can adapt to manage the risks.
Asymmetric advantages favor bad actors; they only need to be right occasionally to cause harm, whereas defenders must be right 100% of the time to prevent damage.
Global internet connectivity has democratized communication but also created a landscape where every device acts as a supercomputer aimed at the human brain, creating infinite attack vectors.
Current statistics indicate that 0.5% to 1.5% of all daily tweets qualify as violent or hate speech, amounting to hundreds of millions of users encountering such content annually.
Conspiracy theories demonstrate significantly higher engagement rates than non-conspiracy content, driven by algorithms designed to maximize virality.

70% of U.S. households have experienced declining income over the past 15 years, contributing to a societal "tinderbox" prone to anger and disconnection.
An Oxford University study projects that 47% of U.S. jobs are at risk of replacement or reduction by robotics and AI within the next two decades.
The fragmentation of shared reality prevents society from solving coordination problems regarding inequality, racial justice, and climate change.
Platform self-regulation is characterized by "whack-a-mole" tactics where specific "bad apples" are removed (e.g., QAnon, Holocaust denial) without addressing the systemic "bad apple farm."
Content moderation by platforms has historically been reactive, often occurring only after significant real-world harm has already been done, such as during the Northwest wildfires.
A virtual monopoly by Google, Facebook, and Twitter suppresses competition and innovation in safety, privacy, and ethical business models.

Regulation: Panelists agree that self-regulation is ineffective; the internet is not a policy-free zone and requires updated legal frameworks similar to those used for aviation, pharmaceuticals, and finance.
Consumer Protection: Proposals include updating laws to treat "dark patterns" (deceptive data collection) as consumer protection violations and aligning online civil rights protections with offline standards.
Transparency and Audibility: There is a consensus on the need for a "digital black box" equivalent, requiring platforms to provide independent researchers access to data to audit algorithms and detect influence operations.
"Board of the People": Hani Farid and Tristan Harris suggest replacing or supplementing traditional corporate boards with a "board of the people" responsible for quarterly reporting on addiction and misinformation metrics.
Financial Crisis Analogy: The attention economy is compared to the pre-2008 financial system, characterized by "junk assets" (fake attention) and excessive leverage, necessitating comprehensive reform rather than piecemeal fixes.
Taxation Models: Karen Kornbluth proposes taxing online advertising revenue to fund public interest journalism, addressing the vacuum left by the collapse of traditional news media.
Global Cooperation: Solutions must be global rather than U.S.-centric, involving ethicists, human rights workers, and technologists to establish norms that cross cultural and legal borders.

2020 Election Context: Intelligence communities have increased focus on foreign interference (Russia, China, Iran) compared to 2016, utilizing task forces like the "Russia Small Group" to harden infrastructure and counter foreign trolls.
Domestic vs. Foreign Threats: While foreign influence operations are being contained, the domestic problem of disinformation and polarization remains a significant, unregulated threat.
Election "Circuit Breakers": Hani Farid and others advocate for voluntarily disabling specific high-risk features (e.g., trending topics, recommendation algorithms) for two weeks before and 72 hours after elections to prevent disruption.
Precedent for Disabling: The panel notes precedents for election silence in Western Europe, where airwaves are restricted prior to voting, arguing this does not violate the First Amendment as it applies to the platforms, not the individuals.
Ukraine Model: The "Learn to Discern" program, utilized by the Ukrainian Ministry of Education to combat Russian disinformation, is cited as a successful model for digital literacy education that is now being imported to the U.S.

Inevitable Regulation: There is a consensus that regulation of social media is inevitable, with Europe and the UK already moving forward, and the U.S. following suit.
Cultural Awakening: Beyond policy, a "cultural awakening" is required to recognize the "Pearl Harbor" nature of the business model's assault on society.
Individual Accountability: Niloufar Razihau emphasizes that education and individual responsibility are the only variables entirely within human control and are critical for immediate impact.
Institutional Lag: The panel invokes E.O. Wilson's concept of "paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, and God-like technology," arguing that current institutions are lagging behind the accelerator of technology.
Proactive Steering: The future requires proactive "steering wheels" (regulation and design changes) rather than reactive post-mortems, as the cost of inaction is societal collapse.