Destructive and polarizing is the dominant prediction for social media, and the respondent comments say we have a bad system that will stay bad or get worse. Some more tempered commentary suggest social media will split into subsets for niche segments, or simply become irrelevant. There was a tremendous response to this question – everybody has an opinion about social media.
My question was, ‘Will social media play an overall constructive role in connecting people, providing news and information, or will it have a destructive effect, increasing distrust, misinformation and polarization?’, and the answer is far from positive.
Comments are grouped into three parts: Social media is Doing Alright, It’s As Bad As We Thought, and Change is Coming.
Social Media Is Doing Alright
Yes, there are problems with social media, but they’re not that new or that serious, and we can overcome them without too much fuss.
-
There’s no real problem here, at least not a new one.
Social media problems are incredibly overblown by loud pronouncements about small percentages of bad actors. The central social media places that had aggregated are splintering again and people are aggregating where there is calmness and moderation is a benefit. For the last 20 to 25 years there have been constant swings with ebbs and flows from public to private, to small to mid-sized groups to large centralized platforms and back. There is a lot of money going into civil and civic discourse platforms, as well as research and building on good better practices and models. United States
Connecting people via social media is neither constructive nor destructive; it’s just a platform. What we are experiencing is Technology change outpacing Social change. The rules for proper usage always lag behind the introduction of the technology. Go back to the time when Gutenberg invented the printing press. Major tech change. Yet, in 2023, we see politicians banning books! They are writing new or rewriting old social change rules. Social media’s problem is that the fast feedback loops are not immediately subjected to scrutiny. On the other hand, Wikipedia is by moderators so we trust it. Canada
Interactions have been at the heart of civilizations since…the beginning. Social media is simply a different way of interacting. As Alvin Toffler suggested 50 years ago in Future Shock, changes are accelerating and humans might not have adapted yet to this pace of change. Social media is a mere blip in the history of human interacting. Its effect will be understood in a few decades. Canada
-
Most commentators had predicted the death of traditional media at early days of social media but the outcome shows that both social media and traditional media exist complementarily. Nigeria
More of the same. Social media will continue to be a form of entertainment. However, media and even governments will use it as a form of misinformation (fake news) to benefit their position. I don’t see this dynamic changing until social media is replaced with a verifiable and autonomous agent. United States
While there will no doubt be a continued detrimental impact to mental health and the spreading of misinformation, I do think the ultimate ‘accountability’ within society and visibility of world issues, will provide a more constructive outcome – as that misinformation was always through media in more traditional forms before, we just weren’t aware of it and were more compliant with what we were told. United Kingdom
It all depends on measures that social media is used more constructive, efficient and effective providing news and information by the companies themselves. Nigeria
-
This is in the hands of the user. Even trusted news sources are controlled by the elite and have a political narrative that they wish to get across to the public. People need to get opposing views and draw their own conclusions, we cannot trust media (in any sense of the word) to tell us the whole truth. United Kingdom
This will mainly depend on the acceptance of broad majorities – to take responsibility for our own habits and behavior. Germany
The most sensational stories and conversation always get the most traction. Additionally, as long as we equate traction and financial gains, then the social media companies and platforms have more incentive to allow and promote sensationalism than they do in fostering deeper and meaningful connections. As a result, the trend is towards destructive. Social media is just a tool and it simply reflects and amplifies what humans say and want to hear. United States
Both, people are people. Some are glass half full and some are glass half empty people. Positive and negative people, optimistic and pessimistic. South Africa
People will continue to be people. Australia
-
I see an increase in awareness and consciousness as a whole in society – both at individual and collective levels -, so if not fundamentally constructive it would be rejected by society. In other words, the one that would be able to create a model that truly plays a constructive role will “win”. Germany
Social media play an overall constructive role because the media regulators are becoming more proactive in censoring information. ie Facebook reported accounts are usually suspended for misconduct. Nigeria
After a period of destruction it will pick up. India
Current crisis (teenage health, polarization, disinformation) will lead to a paralysis of society on the short term, followed by more debate and finally a shift in how we use social media towards humane and constructive ways. Netherlands
The future generations will be more trusting of social media. India
Yes, it will become more meaningful and less about hearsay. United Kingdom
By 2043 social media will have failed. People will either have abandoned it due to an absence of trust or continue to use it as tribal echo chambers. Indonesia
Social Media Is As Bad As We Thought
Social media has serious problems, and they could get worse. Some of the problems are put down to control by large controlling [forces] and intentional misinformation. Technology and AI are seen as agents of harm rather than help. A possible fragmentation into decentralized information silos will be good for some individuals but harmful to our society.
-
The damage is already here. Australia
It is already destructive. Will get worse. Brazil
Social media algorithms are designed in a way they create and reinforce polarization. I don’t see any incentive for this pattern to change. Brazil
It is already very destructive: elections are being influenced, fake news, harassment. Netherlands
Social media already has negative effect on humanity. There is not future for social media as it is, however I don’t see any governing by government or business. Humanity is manipulated already and social media will maintain its advantage. Netherlands
Big SM companies lack ethics and money and profit will drive poor behaviors always. United Kingdom
I hate to see what has happened but I don’t see anything changing the destructive un-regulated forces of social media. The ability to so easily create destructive “filter bubbles” will increase. United States
Because of the role of deep fakes and the effect this can have on politics and security. It will only become destructive no matter how much I want it to be more constructive. United Kingdom
If the only source of information will be social media, people will live in their own information-bubble. Even now people tend to forget that the world has more shades of color than black and white and that there are many point of views. I think this will only get worse. Netherlands
Social media is ultimately a tool of the powerful who will use it for their own ends although there are non corporate examples such as Mastodon but presently these are small in comparison to the giants in this field. United Kingdom
I think we have started trusting lot of information blindly. The way we trust Google to direct us in the right direction even for academic research. I feel people will try and manipulate while there is still not enough supervision. United Kingdom
Social Media will cease to exist and instead we will just have media moguls, unregulated, without governance models in place, spreading misinformation all over questioning the validity of journalism. Whoever pays / owns those media moguls will dictate the public narratives. European Union
-
Social media can be a good thing. It can connect friend and family, give you insight into other cultures and seeing the world of the people you admire. The dark side though, being able to sit behind a keyboard and spread hate and lies and destruction, this is what needs to be addressed or social media will play a part in destroying the world. United States
We have such great techniques and tools in place to make things happen on a social level. Making profit and political/personal gain in the end is destructive. That includes social media companies. As fewer people will be able to distinguish real and fake, this is truly becoming an issue. Netherlands
Some people have become incredibly overly-sensitive about things said online. In my opinion this is the result of having an inaccurate perception of how the world works. Machine learning and synthetic content will definitely cause problems in what people can believe, but honestly we already have people willing to believe complete nonsense. United States
Social media influence will wane, but other technologies may replace their destructive powers. Canada
There is no silver bullet for cleaning up the messes that have been created already via social media and its ability to influence the masses oftentimes with misinformation. I honestly don’t see a drive to fix these problems as most fixes would tend to work against social media companies bottom line. Our government is full of people who game disinformation to get or stay in power – and I would also point out most in positions of power in the US government at least tends to be too old/out of touch to even understand the complex problems that need to be solved, hence we’re stuck with what we got until something breaks badly enough to try to fix it with a band-aid. United States
-
AI is going to drive massive misinformation. This one is concerning to me. United States
Social media associated with AI will require strong analysis skills to avoid manipulation and ethics issues. This will be a serious problem short term. France
I think AI will increase the destructiveness of social media, as it becomes harder to distinguish between people and bots. United States
-
The social media of the early 21st century will have withered and declined by the mid-2020s. (i.e.2043) Deep fakes, lack of societal governance drove underwriting advertising models away. Social media as an open access medium will have given way to smaller digitally connected communities, leading to a fragmented, cul de sac experience. United States
Centralized social media as we know it will not disappear but will also not achieve their social role. Specialized, smaller scale, decentralized social media are the future. Belgium
Social Media as we know it, focused on building captive audiences while destroying our wellbeing, will completely disappear after a period of heavy boycotts, hacking and regulations. Brands will no longer support the model as they experience huge backlash. Smaller, autonomous, ethical social networks will arise, while a faire portion of the population will still decide to completely abandon these medias and focus on IRL interactions and actions. United Arab Emirates
New forms of interconnected applications and media will arise with less control and centralization by media companies. Netherlands
Change Could be Coming
Social media needs to change for the better. Some changes are urgent, like to protect our youth. Some changes could come naturally or from better education. If necessary, regulation will be required.
-
New social media platforms will drop. There is already less communication through current platforms. Australia
I think social media as we know it is limited. There has been a huge move from social noise towards semi-social entertainment, and I don’t think this is going to change soon. United Kingdom
I do worry about social media. As it is now, a fake world is developing in which perfection is much the focus. This creates more depression, because people don’t conform to the picture. There will come a turning point when we no longer think this is okay, and when we realize that it is precisely imperfection that is beautiful and of value. Netherlands
Probably more destructive before it leans into its inherent constructive attributes. i have been consistent that at some point young people will find the destructive aspects unsustainable (who wants to live in a world without trust?) and they will begin reshaping social media to enable a world they want to live in. and i do believe that will happen within the next 5+ years and by 20 years social media will be more like The Cluetrain Manifesto or Jaron Lanier’s vision than some dystopian hellscape. United States
Social media are well implemented and part of the life of many people across the world (depends on the type of political system of each country) but I see already limits in their use and finally not as promising than expected. So in 20 years, I don’t believe it will play an overall constructive role as it reveals too many differences of use and habits due to human nature. France
In the short run mixed results. With the huge jump in AI capability there will be an explosion of fake news, images etc. will take time before people and social media can fight back. India
As long as trust and truth are mostly hurt by social networks, I do not see how things could improve thanks to them. But I think a balance will be found through new forms of media or relationships, focusing on building links and trust. Even though it will take some time. France
Generally social media will play a net negative effect and become the opium of the modern era, creating a culture of needing to get affirmation and promote yourself to the world. This may change if governments take strong policy over social media or even provide base platform for people. Australia
-
I expect fatigue to set in with social media and people will value genuine relationships a lot more. India
This one is a tough one to predict since we may have seen more bad than good effects on the quality of conversations. Will that change going forward? The key is deep listening. And that’s in short supply. The way social media is set up, it is the antithesis of deep listening and deeper conversations. Most of the time it is superficial and downright dangerous. India
It will be a double-edge sword and do both. “I fear the day when the technology overlaps with our humanity. The world will only have a generation of idiots.” Albert Einstein. Ireland
With work and education being increasingly virtualized and social media content so easily fabricated via generative AI, people will seek out more/higher quality IRL interactions. Social media may remain the conduit to match people at scale, but the relationships forged there will get cemented offline and in person. United States
-
Again, in the short term, social media is playing a constructive role. However, it is also behaving as a slow poison affecting the psychological aspects of the new generation. India
I start to worry that the social media is weakening the young generations’ skill of interactions with each other. They start to look more at their screen in a party instead of talking directly with each other. China
The more social media platforms are created, the more they are used. The youth is already less communicative than before. Netherlands
-
Educating our kids on safe and responsible use of social media will play a big part in its future. Australia
Both are strong trends today. I think that like democracy the role of social media is very much dependent on how well educated the population is. Denmark
I think in the last years we have seen the destructive part of SM by exposing widely the toxicity in a large % of people’s minds. I do believe this will improve through measures, codes of conducts and people beginning to rely on more authorized sources of information. Again this should be on the school curriculum. United Kingdom
It requires a lot of education and ethical standards just because AI has data confirming conclusions they may not necessarily be true. But this applies already today for news on TV, Radio and Newspapers as well as all social channels. People must be educated to learn and understand what difference between fake and real is. Switzerland
We need to have a debate on this and encourage all levels of society to have a better understanding of what is fake news. United Kingdom
It has become increasingly divisive and destructive. Media literacy is critical – as is who delivers training or guidance
-
Hopefully systems will provide more robustness and laws will be redrafted to penalize the culprits and we get to see the benefits of SM. But the dangers remain due to the business model. India
I think as people become more used to the polarisation in social media they will start to realise how limited and divisive this is and will work to make their networks safer and more inclusive (in the main – there will always be groups who want to control the world because their way is the only way…). Also I suspect that regulation – perhaps starting from the EU will start this process from a governance perspective. United Kingdom
