To be digitised
When do we become digitised? Existing in a social media space opens a gate to many useful, but also harmful tools. Passive scrolling or reading can make us feel detached from reality and at the same time we subconsciously engage with the content on our screens. The algorithms are getting more advanced and they want to keep you watching. Nowadays, numerous things happen in the digital space: payments, services, shopping and entertainment. Digitalisation has so far been revolutionary for our society, but recently there are more and more voices speaking against it. Currently, you don’t have to use your full name or actively take part in online discussions to already be noticed by some algorithmic program. Therefore, it is nearly impossible to avoid leaving a mark of your actions in the digital world.
Social media hates us (but we love it)
At this point in time I suppose many people are aware of the negative sides of social media. Despite having that information, a lot of individuals remain its active users. Even though most of these platforms started as exclusive social communication networks, they are now being used as a powerful marketing tools reaching millions of people all over the world. The phenomenon of ‘influencer’ being a ‘job’ is a consequence of the fact that companies want to advertise their product with someone who is already trusted and through that reach new customers. As well as people want to have a more relatable and down-to-earth idol than a famous actor or singer in the rising trend of loneliness. Very often, mainstream social media creators now have a whole team working for their reputation and image, but when we see an edited sponsored post on Instagram, it is not the first thing that comes to our minds. All cheesy marketing strategies and psychological tricks are continuing to work well, but now through the digital medium. This money-driven content is supposed to make the viewer feel worse about a certain aspect of their life, so that they will buy the product that claims to improve their experience in that area. Still, for some reason it is so difficult to just stop scrolling, because maybe another video will show a better solution for the problem that we have been introduced to 20 seconds ago.
An attempt to BeReal
The idea to make social media more realistic and not necessarily focused on consumerism and influencing has led to developing an app called BeReal. The core function of the app was sending a randomly timed notification once a day to all users and make them take a picture with both back and front cameras at the same time within two minutes. Users couldn’t edit any of those pictures. To adhere to the realistic approach, the app provided the number of retakes for the viewers, and the post would disappear when the next notification came. It was supposed to ‘realistically’ show what people are doing at the moment and prove that the everyday life is not perfect. However, if someone didn’t make it in time, they could still participate in today’s ‘be real’ with it being shown as a late publication. This is already missing the core idea, and enabled users to wait for the most exciting moment of their day to then take the picture and share it. Even if the app was lacking editing tools, the users could still stage their posts in some way just to make it look better than their actual reality. This kind of pressure of having to take a picture ‘just now’ and having your reality good enough creates a sense of having to market oneself every day. On the other hand, people who followed the main theme would get bored with posting ‘the same’ picture every day. In turn, the app that was supposed to contradict the social media’s falsity and toxicity has grown to be equal, or even worse than other already popular platforms. Eventually, using the app got very mundane and it has noted a massive sudden decrease in the number of users despite the efforts to introduce new features. Now I can barely see people using or even mentioning it.
Facing the reality
The pressure for following trends, overconsumption and interacting in the digital space has now grown to a point where it overwhelms many individuals. The addiction to social media is growing among young people but at the same time there is more knowledge spread about the dangers connected with it. Undoubtedly the digital space is influencing our daily life and the perception of others. I am not trying to argue that it is just a bad phenomenon, since it also brings a lot of new information and entertainment when responsibly used. However, I believe that there is a certain limit for everything, and the apps that require you to use them and actively engage in their contents every day are crossing that boundary. The digital tools are supposed to facilitate and simplify our daily activities, and not digitise us. People are so multidimensional that they cannot be reliably defined by the digital, even if they try to ‘be real’1 about it.
Sources
https://culted.com/instagrams-intentionally-ugly-step-sister-bereal
https://time.com/6201636/bereal-popularity-challenges
https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/20/23313295/bereal-instagram-app-curation-change
https://www.vice.com/en/article/bereal-isnt-real-and-makes-everyone-look-extremely-boring
1 I’m sorry, it would be a missed opportunity not to use that play on words.
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