Social Media: The Greatest Time Waster In Human History? Or Not.

Social media started as a way to connect people. Share a photo. Keep up with friends. Stay in touch with family. Somewhere along the way it became a source of news, entertainment, political warfare, conspiracy theories, outrage, cat videos, and endless scrolling that somehow turns ten minutes into an hour.

In this episode I take a look at how social media evolved from a digital gathering place into one of the most powerful forces shaping modern life. It can expose corruption, build communities, launch careers, help independent voices find audiences, and put important stories in front of millions of people before traditional media even notices them.

But there’s another side to the story. The same platforms that connect us are also competing for our attention every second of every day. Outrage spreads faster than facts, algorithms decide what we see, and sometimes it feels like the loudest voices are the ones with the least to say.

I also explore how social media has changed politics, public debate, and the way we consume information. We live in a world where experts, influencers, journalists, and people broadcasting from their pickup trucks all occupy the same feed. Some days that creates accountability. Other days it creates chaos.

The question isn’t whether social media is good or bad. It’s clearly both. The real question is whether we’re still using these platforms as tools, or whether the platforms have become remarkably effective at using us.

If you’ve ever picked up your phone to check one thing and forgotten why you opened the app in the first place, this conversation might hit a little closer to home than you’d like.

If you’ve enjoyed the podcast and found it informative, and maybe got a laugh or two, then please contribute to keeping this podcast around. 

I’m not backed by Corporate media. There is no outside money other than my own wallet so if you could please contribute to the GoFundMe below even a small donation makes a difference.

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Transcript

A Burned Out Monday Check In

SPEAKER_00 0:00

This is a worldbone. This is a worldbone.

SPEAKER_01 0:08

From Studio 19, I'm Jeff Allen Wolf. This is a World Gone Mad, episode 244. It's time for some Monday madness. Here we go. Let me give the Wolf Pack a little insight into how these episodes come together. When I put together an episode each time for my podcast, I basically sort through all the news stories in the last 48 hours, try to decide, you know, what's worthwhile dissecting, and sharing with you the listener. Some episodes go smoothly. Putting some episodes together is how I imagine it would be if a man gave birth to a baby. Painful and time consuming. Today is one of those days. I looked at all the news, and while there were plenty of important stories, I came away feeling drained, burned out, and disgusted. Because most of the stories I reviewed had one thing in common. Donald Delusional and his supporters were at the center of these stories. After realizing that, I didn't want to do an episode. Especially today. I wanted to be sitting somewhere in Colorado, looking at the sunset over the mountains, and forgetting about the world at large. And no, we don't live in Colorado. So instead of not doing an episode, I remembered something that a listener of mine just emailed me. Let me share with you her email. She wrote the following I am now off all social media. I feel so much better. Now I received her email several days ago. Didn't think much of it at the time. I put it in the back of my mind. But because I'm having a dilemma today about what to do for this episode, her email came back to me. So I decided to talk about social media.

How Social Media Started

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Now let's see how many of you actually listen to this whole episode. Let's see how many of you actually care. Because I think the following is incredibly important. What exactly is social media? We all have our own definition, but I wanted to spend a few minutes talking about where it came from, how it evolved, and some of the benefits and disadvantages that come with it. We've all heard the term social media. We all use the term. Most of us probably checked it sometime today before breakfast, during breakfast, or while pretending to work after breakfast. Social media wasn't always what it is now. It started as a way to connect people. Friends sharing photos, family staying in touch, people posting updates about their lives. Then came MySpace, remember? Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and about 15,000 other platforms designed to answer the question nobody was asking. What if everyone on earth had a microphone and no editor? At first it seemed harmless. Vacation pictures, photos of your dog, videos of your kids, the occasional political argument with a cousin you only see at Thanksgiving. Then something changed. The platforms figured out something very important. Outrage makes money, not information, not accuracy, not truth. Outrage. The more emotional you become, the longer you stay. The longer you stay, the more advertisements you see. The more advertisements you see, the more money somebody makes. That's the business model. The goal isn't to make you informed. The goal is to make you stay. The average American now spends well over two hours a day on social media. Think about that. More than two hours every single day staring at a screen, being fed information chosen by an algorithm. Not chosen by journalists, not chosen by teachers, not chosen by experts. Chosen by software designed to keep your attention. And what keeps attention better than anger? Nothing. That's why every day social media feels like walking into a room where everyone is screaming. One person says the economy is collapsing. Another says it's booming. One person says democracy is ending. Another says democracy is already ended. One person says a politician is a genius. Another says the same politician is secretly a lizard from another galaxy. And somehow all of them have a podcast. That would be funny if it wasn't true. The problem isn't that social media gives people a voice. The problem is that it gives every voice the same size megaphone. The scientist who spent 30 years

The Outrage Driven Business Model

SPEAKER_01 5:56

studying climate change gets a post. The guy who failed ninth grade science but owns a webcam gets a post. And on social media, those two posts can appear right next to each other as if they're equally credible. That's a problem. Now let's talk about politics, because that's where things really go off the rails. If you've spent any time online during the Trump years, you've seen it. Social media didn't create political division, but it poured gasoline on it and then handed out matches. Every day, people are fed more of what they already believe. If you're conservative, the algorithm finds conservatives. If you're liberal, the algorithm finds liberals. If you're angry, it finds angry people. If you're convinced the world is ending, it introduces you to 12,000 people who think the world ended last Tuesday. Before long, people stop discussing issues. They start living in separate realities. One group believes one set of facts, another group believes another set of facts. And both sides are absolutely convinced they're the sane ones. We've reached a point where some people trust a random meme they saw at two in the morning, more than information from professionals who've spent decades studying a subject. Think about how insane that is. Imagine going to a heart surgeon and saying to the doctor, Doctor, I know you've performed 5,000 operations, but a guy named Patriot Eagle 1776 posted a video from his pickup truck, and I think I'm going to go with his opinion.

Equal Megaphones For Bad Ideas

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That's where we are. And can the conspiracy theories spread faster than facts. Because conspiracy theories are exciting. Facts are boring. Facts require evidence. Conspiracy theories require a Wi-Fi signal. If aliens landed tomorrow, social media would have a conspiracy theory before the spacecraft finished parking. Half the internet would claim the landing was fake. The other half would claim the aliens were registered Democrats. By dinner, there would be merchandise. But here's where I differ from people who say social media is pure evil. It's not. Social media isn't all bad. In fact, some of the most important stories of the last 20 years reached people because of social media. Corruption has been exposed through social media. Videos that traditional media ignored have gone viral through social media. Grassroot movements have grown through social media. Communities have formed through social media. People have found support groups, friendships, careers, and opportunities through social media. Independent creators have built audiences without asking permission from giant corporations. And that's important. Because let's be honest, without social media, a lot of independent voices wouldn't be heard. Without social media, many podcasters would never find an audience. Without social media, a local story in one town might never reach the rest of the country. Without social media, ordinary people would have fewer ways to challenge powerful institutions. Excuse me. Some of the biggest stories in recent years reached the public because somebody pulled out a phone and hit record. Not because a television network assigned a crew. Not because a newspaper sent a reporter. Because an ordinary person happened to be standing there when something important occurred. There have been moments that never would have made a national newscast 20 years ago that ended up being seen by millions of people because of social media. It also changed who gets to be heard. There was a time if you wanted a national audience, you needed a television station, a radio station, or a newspaper

Politics In Separate Realities

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behind you. Today, an independent journalist can reach millions of people from a spare bedroom, a laptop, and an internet connection. That doesn't automatically make them right. It doesn't automatically make them credible. But it does mean that giant corporations no longer control every microphone. Politicians know that too. Every rally, every speech, every town hall, every public appearance now takes place in a world where somebody is always recording. Sometimes that creates misinformation. Sometimes it creates accountability. A politician could still spin a story, but it's a lot harder to claim something never happened when 10 different videos are circulating online before the event is even over. Social media has also help people organize around causes they care about. Protests, community projects, fundraisers, disaster relief, neighborhood efforts, support groups. People helping complete strangers they've never met because they saw a post and decided to do something about it. For all the nonsense that fills our feeds every day, there are still moments when these platforms bring out the best in people instead of the worst. Communities have formed because of social media. Friendships have formed because of social media. People dealing with illnesses, disabilities, grief, addiction, unemployment, or personal struggles have found support networks they never would have found otherwise. Sometimes the internet is a toxic waste dum. Sometimes it's a lifeline. And if I'm being completely honest, this podcast is part of that story too. I'm not backed by a major media company. I don't have a corporate parent. I don't have a network promoting me. Many of the people listening right now discovered this podcast because of social media. Love it or hate it, these platforms have given independent creators a chance to compete with organizations that have budgets, staff, studios, marketing departments, and resources most of us can never afford. Those are real benefits. That's why I don't think the answer is deleting every account and moving into a cabin somewhere. Although some days that's tempting. The answer is using social media without allowing social media to use you. Pay attention to what's happening. Stay informed, stay engaged. But don't confuse scrolling with participating. Don't confuse a meme with research. Don't confuse popularity with accuracy. And don't assume that because something has 50,000 likes, that it's true. A lot of people think social media uses them only when it changes their opinion. I think it uses them when it takes their time. You log on to check one story. One story. That's all. 10 minutes later, you're watching a video about a raccoon stealing cat food. Twenty minutes later, you're reading an argument between two strangers who live a thousand miles away and have absolutely no impact on your life. Forty-five minutes later, you're watching somebody rank the best breakfast cereals

Using The Tool Without Being Used

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of all time, and you've completely forgotten why you opened the damn app in the first place. That's not an accident. That's the design, everyone. Remember what I said earlier? The goal isn't to make you feel informed. That's not the goal. The goal is to make you stay. Every extra minute you spend scrolling is a victory for the platform. That's why social media can be useful and dangerous at the exact same time. It can help you learn something important. Connect with people you care about. Discover a new idea, support a cause, or follow what's happening in the world. But it can also quietly consume hours of your day before you even realize it. There's a difference between being connected to the world and being trapped inside your phone. Stay informed, everyone. Follow the news, support the causes you believe in. Keep up with your friends and family, but don't hand over three, four, or five hours of your life every day to an algorithm whose primary goal is keeping you engaged. At some point, you're not using social media anymore. Social media is using you. The algorithm doesn't care about truth. The algorithm cares about engagement. Those are two very different things. Use social media as a tool, learn from it, connect with people through it, discover ideas through it. But keep your brain engaged while you're doing it. Because the moment you stop questioning what you're seeing, somebody else starts doing the thinking for you. And in a democracy, that's a dangerous trade, especially when the loudest voices are often the least qualified. Social media can inform us, it can connect us, it can empower us, but it can also manipulate us. The challenge isn't deciding whether social media is good or bad. The challenge is deciding whether we're still in control of it or whether it's slowly taking control of us. So to my listeners, or rather, to my listeners who sent me the email that said, I am now off all social media, I feel so much better. Your decision was for you, and I respect that decision. Everybody has to do what works for their own sanity. If stepping away from social media entirely has made your life less stressful, less angry, less anxious, and less exhausting, then that's a perfectly reasonable choice. Nobody should feel obligated to spend hours every day swimming through outrage, conspiracy theories, political arguments, and endless noise simply because everybody else is doing it. But I don't think the answer for most people is abandoning social media completely. The world's still happening. Important stories are still happening. Communities are still forming. Causes are still being organized. Independent voices are still being heard. Information still matters. Awareness still matters. Engagement still matters. The answer isn't necessarily leaving the conversation. The answer is deciding how much of the conversation deserves your time and your attention. Maybe that's the real challenge. Not whether social media survives, not whether the platforms survive. The real challenge is whether we can learn to use these tools without becoming tools ourselves. To stay informed without becoming consumed, to stay connected without becoming addicted, to pay attention without surrendering our attention. Because if we're not careful, we'll spend so much time staring into our screens that we stop paying attention to the people, places, and moments happening right in front of us. Use social media, learn from it, question it, challenge it, walk away from it when you need to, but never give it more power over your life than it deserves. You don't need to spend 10 hours a day to stay informed. That's my insight today into a world gone mad. If you've enjoyed the podcast, found it informative, maybe got a laugh or two, please contribute to keeping this podcast around. I'm Jeff Allen Wolf. This is a world gone mad. I'll be back Wednesday. Until then, I urge you the Wolf Pack. Remain skeptical, question everything. Please don't lose hope. And most of all, stay alert.

unknown 19:19

There is candy off the world.

SPEAKER_00 19:22

Can't you see? And we need to stand up the man freezer. I can love to see this is a man.